Click on “Download PDF” for the PDF version or on the title for the HTML version.


If you are not an ASABE member or if your employer has not arranged for access to the full-text, Click here for options.

Development of a Standard for Gravelless Trench Products - Results of a Pilot Protocol Series

Published by the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, St. Joseph, Michigan www.asabe.org

Citation:  Eleventh Individual and Small Community Sewage Systems Conference Proceedings, 20-24 October 2007, Warwick, Rhode Island  701P1107cd.(doi:10.13031/2013.24013)
Authors:   George Heufelder, Keith Mroczka, Sushama Pradham, Mike Hoover, Tom Stevens
Keywords:   Gravelless technology, Standards development

The Idaho Department of Environmental Quality provided funding to the National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) International to develop a standard for onsite gravelless trench products with the intention that the standard becomes an American National Standard. A task group of regulators, industry and consulting engineers developed a draft standard including testing procedures and pass/fail criteria. A pilot test of a gravelless (test) technology against gravel trench system (control) was completed following the draft standard. Five replicates each of the test and gravel control systems were installed in constructed soil trenches, which were constructed to provide for distribution of dosed wastewater within the trenches, and for collection, quantification and analysis of the water applied to the trenches. Soil analyses were completed on the constructed trenches to determine the consistency of construction. Results obtained from the soil testing and pilot test, including ponding data within the test and control trenches, chemical analysis of wastewater, and fecal coliform data for water samples collected from the trenches, will be used to make revisions to the draft standard. The methods and results of observations and laboratory analyses obtained during the pilot test are described in this paper.

(Download PDF)    (Export to EndNotes)