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Septic System Alternative

Septic tanks are the traditional way to store and treat waste water from the home in rural areas. Although septic tanks are reliable and trusted, not all areas allow septic tanks. Moreover, in certain conditions, building a septic tank is not possible. One possible alternative is the mound method, which uses some of the same techniques as traditional tanks, but employs new methods as well.

  1. Mound System

    • Build a mound system if your area has one, or a combination of these three things:

      1. Slow or fast permeable soil. Permeability is how fast your soil will absorb liquids.
      2. Soil cover that is shallow, or if an area is made of rock.
      3. If your area has a high water table. The water table is level where the groundwater pressure meets the atmospheric pressure in your area.

    Design

    • The mound uses gravel trenches, which are placed in a mound of sand. Pipes carry waste water from the home to your mound run along these gravel trenches. The waste water that moves through the pipe has pressure introduced to move it along the pipes evenly. These distribution pipes are covered by soil and vegetation to prevent erosion of the pipes. The mound system has three main components:
      1. A pretreatment chamber
      2. A pump chamber
      3. The mound

    How it Works

    • The waste water travels to the pretreatment chamber, which is a buried container made of fiberglass, concrete or plastic. The heaviest materials in the waste water, also called sludge, sinks to the bottom of the chamber where bacteria decomposes some of the material. Light materials rise to the top. The waste water will drain to the dosing chamber, another container made of the same material as the pretreatment chamber. The dosing chamber contains a pump, pump control floats, and a high water alarm. As the waste water rises in the pump chamber, the pump chamber will shoot some of the water out to the mound once the water level rises to a certain point. If the water gets to high in the chamber due to flooding, the alarm will go off. The waste water that has been pumped to the mound, the gravel trench with the mounded sand. Small holes in the pipe buried in the sand mound shoot water out in small doses to spread the waste water evenly. Natural bacteria will attack the waste water as it sinks into the soil.

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