Identifying Sewage Leaks in Urban Environments: Examples from Athens, GA

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Identifying Sewage Leaks in Urban Environments
Examples from Athens, GA

• Denise Carroll and Todd Rasmussen
• Warnell School of Forest Resources, UGA

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Two Case Studies

• Stinky Creek
• Located near UGA campus
• Nonfunctional sewer lift system
• Trail Creek
• Drains a Manufacturing-Commercial District
• Obstructed main line (1 mgd)

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Piped Section
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Stinky Creek Timeline

• August 2002
• Received local resident complaints concerning
  creek odor
• September 2002
• Began study examining water quality parameters,
  biotic indices, geomorphology
• Sampling continued every year between September
  and December
• December 2003
• UGA Stream Watch and CleanUp Found leaking sewer
  lines
• Contacted Athens-Clarke County This is when the
  real story begins

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TOTAL SUSPENDED SOLIDS
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BIOTIC INDICES
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Fecal Coliform
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AMMONIUM N
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December 2003 Clean-Up

• What we found
• Two sewer leaks (20 gal/min)
• One unpermitted discharge
• Construction debris
• Improperly placed dumpsters
• Milky discharge from construction site
• What we removed
• 11-14 bags of trash
• Two bikes
• One hibachi grill
• Three chairs
• Remnants of a toilet
• One large metal mailbox
• Old rusted pipes
• Large chunks of glass

• What we left behind
• Furniture
• Five bags of household trash
• Feral animals feeding on dumpster debris
• Lead acid battery
• CDs
• Party debris (e.g. paper plates, beer bottles,
  soda cans)
• PVC pipes
• Numerous bricks
• Paint cans
• Foam Insulation
• Fast Food Packaging (Zaxbys)
• Lumber
• Concrete Blocks
• Tennis balls

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December 2003 August 2004

• We contacted the following entities to resolve
  the problems we found
• Construction site manager
• ACC Public Health Dept Only responsible for
  problems with septic systems
• ACC Sewer Authority Not responsible because ACC
  sewer lines were not leaking
• ACC Environmental Coordinator (Dick Field)
• EPD (Athens Office)

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Fruits of Our LaborSept 2004 Restoration Efforts
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Fruits of Our LaborSept 2004 Restoration Efforts
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Fruits of Our LaborSept 2004 Restoration Efforts
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Trail Creek Timeline

• Saturday, April 3, 2004
• 2004 River Rendezvous - sponsored by the Upper
  Oconee River Network (UOWN) - showed extremely
  high levels of pathogenic E. Coli bacteria as it
  flows past the Greenway at Dudley Park.
• Wed Thurs, April 7 8, 2004
• Additional testing confirmed very high E. Coli
  contamination, as well as elevated specific
  conductance - a measure of dissolved solids that
  are high near leaking sewer lines
• Dead fish, foul odors, and a black sewage scum
  covering the streambed were also indicators that
  something wasn't right with this normally
  beautiful stream.

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• Friday, April 9, 2004
• Because retesting confirmed the high levels of
  contamination, the Athens Clarke-County Public
  Utilities Department was contacted on the morning
  of Friday, April 9.
• County personnel were quickly dispatched to
  locate the leak.
• Unfortunately, county personnel were not
  initially able to find the source of the
  contamination.
• Saturday, April 10, 2004
• At the request of the county, UOWN immediately
  established nine sites within the Trail Creek
  Watershed.
• Water quality measurements obtained from these
  sites indicated the approximate location of the
  major leak, which was forwarded to the county on
  Saturday, April 10.
• Monday, April 12, 2004
• The ACC Public Utilities Department were able to
  locate the cause of the failure, and the sewage
  leak was fixed by noon.

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Discussion

• Measurements collected by Professors Rhett
  Jackson (UGA - Forest Resources) and Bill Miller
  (UGA - Crop and Soil Sciences) in late November
  showed Trail Creek to be healthy
• A subsequent UOWN quarterly sampling on January
  4, 2004, indicated high fecal contamination.
• These dates narrow the failure window to sometime
  in December 2003.
• UOWN estimated that over one million gallons per
  day (1 mgd) of raw, untreated sewage were being
  discharged directly into Trail Creek.
• It is probable that this flow had been occurring
  for some time - at least since January 4 - which
  means that over one hundred million (100,000,000)
  gallons of untreated sewage was discharged into
  Trail Creek.
• This foul mix flowed through East Athens, and
  then into the North Oconee River at Dudley Park.

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Urban Sewer Problems

• Lack of routine monitoring to identify failures
• Lack of technical means to identify source of
  failures
• Lack of institutional coordination to resolve
  problem once source has been identified

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Recommendations

• Develop routine monitoring program for urban
  streams to identify those streams where failures
  are occurring
• Many failures are most easily identified during
  low flow periods due to absence of stormwater
• Routine monitoring for specific conductance, E.
  Coli, stream health could identify those where
  failures are occurring

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• Develop technical skills for locating source of
  failure
• Establish a catchment network of temporary
  stations to bracket the leak location. Use easily
  accessible sites for this, and then narrow the
  focus until the failure location is located.
• For situations where the ground-water is
  affected, use indirect measures of septic wastes,
  such as optical brighteners. Identify zones where
  sewer lines/systems are likely to have failed,
  and then narrow the search using ground-water
  monitoring probes.

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• Develop intergovernmental organizations to
  facilitate dialogue and accountability
• The jurisdictions of individual counties,
  agencies, and non-governmental entities need to
  be established a priori.
• Finding the agency responsible for assuming
  command should be clear before the problem is
  found.
• A clear chain-of-command should be in place so
  that problems associated with overlapping
  authorities can be avoided.