What Happens To Sewage After You Flush?

Industrial & Manufacturing Blog

Have you ever wondered what happens to the sewage after it leaves your house? All that waste water and organic material has to go somewhere and be dealt with. So, what does happen to it?

Immediately After Leaving Your House

As soon as the toilet flushes or the water runs down the drain it goes down into your house's waste water line. From there, it goes out through the pipes and off your property. There your waste water pipes hook up to the municipal sewer lines. From there, the sewage starts on its long journey to the sewage treatment plant. 

At the Sewage Treatment Plant

The sewage treatment plant's entire goal is to separate any solid contaminants out from the water flowing into the plant. That solid contamination includes things like organic material from your house. This separation allows that solid sewage to get treated so that it eventually becomes safe. The fluid waste goes a different way to get treated so that it also becomes safe. 

There are several ways that all that stuff gets separated out:

Screens

One way is to use screens. The waste goes through a series of screens. The first screen catches the largest material. Each following screen gets smaller and finer, until eventually all that goes through is waste water.

Generally, the first screen catches trash that doesn't belong in the sewage treatment. That can include things like flushable wipes, rags, and other trash that may have gotten into the sewer lines. That stuff is all gathered off and taken to a solid waste disposal plant.

Tanks

The other organic material gets sent to its own tanks. Those tanks are generally quiet and still. That will let the heavy stuff in them to separate out and fall to the bottom. In the tanks there is some anaerobic bacteria. That bacteria will start to eat and break down the solid waste until it becomes a sludge.

That sludge eventually becomes clean and uncontaminated biosolids. That happens after more filtering and some final polishing that gets everything that could be dangerous out of the biosolids. 

The biosolids can be disposed of in several ways. Since it is clean, with no dangerous contamination left over, it can actually be used as fertilizer in fields. It can also be dried and compressed and burned for power. Some sewage plants will do that to help power their machinery. 

Once the sewage leaves your house, it gets cleaned and can have its own productive life.  For more information on how this is done, consider learning more about grinders like muffin monster grinder and others.

19 January 2015