Tabernilla, Jhomar P.

CE-3/2010150253

CE143/A1

Sewerage/Septic/Drainage Systems in the Philippines Most Philippine cities have drainage systems of some kind. There are no separate storm water and waste water (sewerage) systems. Wastewater from septic systems freely mixes with the stormwater. In practice this is not as bad as it sounds as the volume of storm water is large and may well flush out the drainage system and its contents into the streams and rivers. The installation and maintenance of drainage systems (along with roads and water systems), is a one of the major responsibility of local government. The systems are not necessarily centralized. The idea is to get wastewater to a nearby ditch, stream or river. Most residences will have a septic tank or cesspool to treat toilet waste. This can provide some very basic level of treatment of human waste. The output of septic system (septage) is piped to the subdivision or barangay drainage system. For a description of how we built our Philippine septic system. Greywater (wastewater from sinks, showers and washing) is generally discharged untreated into the drainage system. Sometimes the drainage system is more or less underground and sometimes it is open concrete ditches. This can be smelly but cheaper and easier to keep clear than covered drainage systems. In many places the drainage system is under the sidewalks, the sidewalks consisting of concrete slabs covering the drainage channel. Sometimes these are broken, so walk carefully or plunge a few feet into the malodorous mess. There is no further treatment of the waste before it plunges into the nearest stream. Missing slabs show a typical sidewalk over sewer Philippine municipal sewer system in Tigbauan, Iloilo. In squatter areas the the above scenario breaks down and there can be more obvious, surface pollution. Iloilo has some big rivers with strong tidal flows so all that goes into the rivers seems to get promptly flushed away. My impression is that the situation is better here than in Cebu City where the streams used for drainage were really disgusting. When you look at property, ask about and confirm the easy availability of a good drainage system. We have looked at property in Iloilo City which seemed so nice but actually had no access to a drainage system. Further, access to the nearest drainage would involve going through other properties. This may or may

not be easy. Do NOT expect anyone to inform you of such problems when you look at property.

Sewerage/Septic/Drainage Systems in Phnom Penh Since 1998, Phnom Penhs population has doubled to more than 2 million. Highrise buildings have popped up in the citys center and housing developments have been hastily erected. Yet the citys antiquated, decades-old drainage system has undergone little improvement in that time and experts say the rapid urban growth currently underway could outpace the drainage systems ability to channel rain and the increasing amount of water out of Phnom Penh. Although the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has been working with City Hall since 1999 to improve the drainage system, there is still no plan to install a wastewater treatment plant in order to prevent the vast amounts of raw sewage being pumped into the citys lakes and waterways. Adding further complications, City Hall has no complete underground plans of the drainage network and possesses limited means to ensure that piping is properly maintained. Authorities have no data on how much sewage the city currently produces. JICA is currently constructing 20 km of additional piping in central Phnom Penh. Once a toilet is flushed, the wastewater travels down the pipes, through open canals or the underground drainage system and eventually arrives in Boeng Trabek, where morning glory and lotus plants partially purify the sewage through natural process. Plants in the reservoir absorb the discarded waters bacterial nutrients and break down the waste before it is funneled, black and fetid, through the Boeng Trabek pumping station. The Contents are then emptied into Boeng Tampoun and finally ejected into the Tonle Bassac and Tonle Sap rivers. Phnom Penh City has been developing very fast and many commercial and industrial activities have been located in the downtown and peri-urban areas and the wastewater from these activates is generally high contamination, said Seng Solsdy, a program officer from JICA, in an email. With this situation, the construction of a waste-water treatment plant is very important for treating the wastewater from the city before discharging it to the river and to avoid impacts on the environment and peoples health.

Last year, alone the total value of approved construction projects nationwide increased by 72 percent to 2.11 billion, compared to 1.23 billion in 2011. Noun Rithy, CEO of Bonna Realty Group, agreed that many private developments often leave the issue of drainage as an afterthought. This is coupled with the fact that municipal authorities do very few of their own checks on the drainage provisions of new projects. Sewerage/Septic/Drainage Systems in Fiji Sewerage is a significant contributor to the release of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere; gasses that contribute directly to global climate change that threatens the very future of Pacific Island nations. It also makes the immediate area around the sewerage treatment plants an unpleasant place to live or work in and creates a vast amount of sludge that finds its way into landfills (if we are lucky) or is dumped without any real concern for the environmental and health issues. The cost of the treatment is significant. Sewerage treatment uses a great deal of electricity and again, in Pacific Island States, this leads to increased imports of diesel fuels and an added strain on the countrys economy. Now a new technology for sewerage treatment is being introduced to Fiji by a Fijiowned company, for Earth South Pacific. Based in Nadi, the company has taken Australian developed technology and experience, which is already proven in Australia, China, Thailand, and is about to be introduced into the India, Dubai and USA markets, and made it available throughout the South Pacific. This technology has not been developed anywhere else in the world and is a totally unique concept. The basis of the treatment is the use of a selection of specific beneficial bacteria that are naturally found in wastewater, but are generally not sufficiently strong to provide optimum reactions and therefore need to be supplemented to increase efficiency. Existing treatments do not break down all the contaminants and they leave behind a large residue of sludge, which ultimately has to be removed and disposed of at a significant cost. All sewerage plants are biological plants but the beneficial bacteria are seldom available in the required volume. This new technology introduces additional beneficial bacteria to the process. They are selected because of their ability to maintain durability in harsh and toxic conditions and for their appetite for waste nutrients commonly found in human, animal and green waste. The beneficial bacteria are first generation cultured from laboratory conditions. They are held dormant in liquid form and can be stored for up to three years. By adding the liquid to the waste treatment process the Biological Nutrient

removal is dramatically accelerated, converting the greenhouse gases in the waste to non-toxic and harmless gasses and breaking down the components of the sludge, leaving absolutely zero biological sludge as residue. There is also no odour, with Hydrogen-sulphide, the most common unpleasant smelling gas (commonly known as rotten egg gas) being converted to other types of gas. After treatment the water can be recycled for watering gardens and golf courses. The beneficial bacteria also assist in the control of algae when it is released into storage ponds. The new treatment method is based on a combination of three new technologies, which goes under the name PLEA System, standing for Probiotic Low Energy Aeration System. It is extensively proven and is AQIS approved by the Australian Quarantine InspectionService. Aqis is recognised as one of the strictest codes in the world. The treatment system can be introduced to existing plants with no structural changes required. Parts of the old system are decommissioned and some minor new installations are put in place. As well as the benefits of odour and sludge reduction there is a dramatic reduction in power consumption, in the order of a sixty percent saving. The process can also be used to treat landfill sites, removing all global warming gasses and odours and treating the leachate (the water that drains out of garbage at all landfill sites) so that it can be recycled. It is also effective in soil reconditioning where there has been pollution from hydrocarbons (such as oil on service station sites) and in the breakdown of manufacturing waste before release into the sewerage system. Austrade have been instrumental in the introduction of the technology into Fiji, arranging workshops and introductions for the new company to a wide range of industries such as manufacturing, hotel and resort operators, water treatment facilities and waste disposal site operators. Sewerage/Septic/Drainage Systems in Gujarat, India Almost half of the urban Indian population still depends upon groundwater sources for drinking, cooking and bathing which puts them at direct risk from the polluted water, Sunita Narain, director general of CSE, said. Other experts at the meeting shared details of how serious the water-sewage situation was getting as India urbanizes. They warned that the country faced a more complicated challenge as the process of urbanization would still leave millions in the villages who would depend upon the river and groundwater systems. Tushar Shah of International Water Management Institute said India was by far the highest user of groundwater with more than 20 million irrigation wells across the country and almost 80% people still depending on self-supply of water for personal consumption.

The lack of focus on water-sewage systems has led to a position where not a single city in the country has a sewage system that covers the entire population. Only four cities - Pune, Chennai, Surat and Gurgaon - claim to connect at least 70% of the population through a network of closed drains. In most cities, the sewage simply mixes into the open drains and storm water drains, polluting water sources. Almost 40% of the total sewage treatment capacity of the country exists in just two cities - Delhi and Mumbai. Class I and II towns - which are expected to grow and absorb most of the migration in the coming years are faring the worst. Untreated sewage flowing into water bodies has almost doubled from around 12,000 million litres per day to 24,000 million litres per day in Class I and II towns. There are 302 Class I cities and 467 Class II towns with no sewage treatment facilities. Of the 21% of sewage passing though treatment plants in B towns, only 60% really meets the required standards. Overall, this means that just about 12% of sewage generated in Class I cities and Class II towns meet the standards, said Deepak Kantawala, an independent consultant told the conference.