# Aerobic Septic System Modification



## Country Living (Dec 15, 2009)

Many of you have aerobic septic systems. Some of you wonder how you’ll handle sewage if you have an extended power outage. Some of you have never thought about it. Some of you simply don’t care.

This is for the first two groups. In case of a power outage your aerobic system will not work. If you have an extended power outage, you may wake one day and find sewage all over your yard. Besides being ugly and smelly, it’s disease-harboring. 

We modified our aerobic system to overflow into a leach field if the electricity is out for an extended period of time. When we have electricity and the float gets to a certain level in the pump tank, the sprinklers come on and discharge the water in the tank down to a specific level. The output for the leach field is about 12” above the normal float level for the sprinklers so if the water gets that high it simply flows into the leach field. No mess. No fuss. No sanitary problems. It was pretty easy to do (if you have the right people) and didn’t cost as much as I initially budgeted. 

Our pump tank (as with most concrete tanks) has punch-outs. Usually only one is used on a pump tank and that’s for the link between the aerobic treatment unit and the pump tank. Directly opposite that hole is another hole that can also be punched-out and that’s the one we used for the leach field line. This punch-out already had a gasket so that made things even easier. 

We had 60’ of Schedule 40 sloped according to regular leach field regs and then another 60’ of gravel-less pipe* that was level. One clean-out was put in the Schedule 40 line. An “escape pipe” was installed at the end of the gravel-less pipe just in case, for whatever reason, too much came down the leach field to easily dissipate. That overflow would go out into our pasture. It’s one of those things we’ll probably never use; however, we’ll be darn happy to have it if we need it. 

An extended electrical outage is not the only problem with aerobic systems. The pump can fail. The float can break. Damaged diaphragms can cause your compressor to go out (we always keep repair kits on hand). 

I hope a few of you may find this information beneficial. This is usually one of those things you don’t think about until it’s too late. 

*Annular corrugated single wall wrapped in geotextile fabric with 5/8th holes. Not every soil type can use gravel-less pipe.


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