Water School

With a few exceptions, a permit is required to install a septic system in Texas. The Legislature, in the Health and Safety Code, designates the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) as the official agent to investigate and decide whether to approve a permit request.The commission is also tasked with overseeing whether the septic tanks continue to function properly and the Commission can require the property owner make repairs when needed.However, the law allows the Commission to desig...

MGD or million gallons per day is a measurement of water flow frequently used in measurement of water consumption. One mgd equals 133,680.56 cubic feet per day, 1.5472 cubic feet per second or 3.0689 acre-feet per day.

Reclaimed water is treated wastewater or effluent that can be used for certain beneficial purposes, such as irrigation, without first being returned to the water cycle.

Separate from sanitary water lines or wastewater sewers, storm sewers carry away surface rain runoff, street wash and snow melt via curb-side drains.  Also unlike sanitary sewers, these systems usually drain directly into a creek, river, or other body of water without treatment.  This is also how a lot of the trash ends up in our rivers and lakes.  Everything thrown out in the street or dumped in a street drain (storm drain) ends up in a nearby river or lake.Dumping hazardous substances into the...

Wastewater treatment plants are typically located near creeks and rivers.  The treated effluent is returned to the water cycle by being released into these waterways.  As water sources become less abundant, many municipalities have chosen not to release effluent into the water cycle; rather to reuse the effluent for irrigation and industrial purposes directly from the water discharged from the treatment plant.

Effluent is the water that leaves a sewage treatment plant after it has been treated.