SEWERS & SEWER LINE MAINTENANCE WHITE PAPERS & CASE STUDIES

A Handy Tool For Wet Well Maintenance: Cutting Through The FOG

Blame our fast food diets or restaurants’ negligence for what’s going down the drain. Whatever the cause, fats, oil, and grease (FOG) accumulation has become a pervasive problem for wastewater treat­ment plant collection systems.

• Water Utility OT vs. IT — It’s Not A Battle, It’s A Balance
• Why It’s Time To View Plastic Pipe In A Whole New Light

• Building A Better Plan To Cope With Major Water Leaks

  It is perhaps a water utility manager’s greatest fear — a rupture in a major water distribution line. Although such occurrences are sometimes unavoidable, proper planning and preparation can go a long way toward easing the sting of such a major event. But where do you start? Here are some guidelines that can prevent the next such occurrence from becoming a 6 o’clock news nightmare.

• What To Do When Your Water System Is Under Water

  Much has been made about how climate change can limit the source water available to pump inside distribution pipelines. On the other hand, however, what can be done when climate change delivers too much water — in the form of flooding rains — on the outside of those pipelines? As is true for so many other water infrastructure scenarios, being prepared is half the battle. Here are some suggestions for weathering the storm.

• Managing Data To Maximize Asset Maintenance Efficiency

  Although an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, all the money spent on regularly scheduled maintenance can add up to a ton of waste — and still result in unplanned downtime — if asset managers can’t reasonably differentiate between which equipment truly needs attention and which doesn’t. Fortunately, data-centric analytics derived from physical performance in real time can make that distinction. Here’s how.

• Using Special Repair Fittings To Tame Tough Pipeline Problems

  For most water utilities, maintaining existing infrastructure — whether planned or in response to emergencies — is a large part of physical plant costs. Being prepared to respond is half the battle. Here are several guidelines and options to consider for maintaining the most cost-efficient solutions to everyday pipeline problems. As with most good plans, they start with proper organization.

• Finding A Perfect Fit For Mix-And-Match Piping

  Today’s water/wastewater piping options offer numerous advantages in terms of cost, performance, and anticipated service life. Unfortunately, utilities must still deal with what’s already in the ground — steel, cast iron, ductile iron, asbestos cement, plastic, concrete, and even wood. Here are guidelines on making transitions between old and new pipes of varying sizes and materials as smooth as possible.

• Clamping Down On Bell-Joint Leaks

  When one considers all the bell joints in a water distribution or wastewater collection system — caulk-joint or rubber-joint — and all the stresses to which they are subjected, it is a wonder there are not more leaks. Fortunately, bell-joint-leak clamps provide a reliable and relatively easy-to-install solution — if they are properly specified and installed. Here are some key points to consider when trying to remedy bell-joint leaks.

• Put A 'Stop' To Water-Main-Repair Shutdowns And Boil-Water Notices

  For most water or wastewater system operators, engineers, and repair crews, the only thing worse than facing a 24”-main emergency repair is facing an even larger one. To those who have never performed an emergency line stop and bypass, the idea of completing repairs with no service outage, no long-term shutdown, and no ‘boil water’ notice is almost beyond belief. To those who have, it’s a sigh of relief.

• Mapping Assets For Resilience And Response In Emergencies

  Among utilities concerned about resilience and response in natural disasters or other emergencies, precise asset inventory and mapping are high priorities. In truth, there is value in having the same information for everyday purposes as well. For anyone who has ever had a problem locating or tracking key water or wastewater system assets, here are several good reasons and ways to avoid a last-minute scramble.

• Asset Monitoring: Are You Getting Your Money’s Worth?

  Mapping the assets of a water treatment, water distribution, or wastewater collection and treatment system is just the means to an end. Maximizing value from that effort requires systematic planning and a healthy curiosity for looking into patterns of activity. Here are some considerations for turning raw asset data into more valuable benchmarks for better decision-making across multiple aspects of water operations.

• 12 Installation Tips For Challenging Pipeline Repairs

  Having to repair old, worn, broken, or leaking pipes is bad enough. Having to revisit the repair location a second time to refurbish the original fix is doubly frustrating. Here are some guidelines for getting the best results from pipeline repair efforts and enhancing the durability of the repair effort to match the anticipated service life of the pipeline itself.

How To Predict And Prevent CSOs And SSOs

Combined and sanitary sewer overflows are natural hazards for wastewater collection systems. Without a comprehensive solution to monitor troublesome conditions, overflows can be triggered with little warning and lead to expensive and embarrassing situations. Fortunately, versatile analytical systems that capitalize on existing wastewater collection infrastructure hold promise for avoiding such negative impacts.

• Using Data To Improve Asset Management
• Maximizing The ROI On Your SCADA Investment