ABSTRACT
Society today has widely accepted the importance of adequate wastewater treatment prior to discharge as opposed to discharge of untreated wastewater. Wastewater treatment prior to discharge is necessary to ensure protection of water quality and to reduce requirements for treatment of potable water. As mentioned in Chapter 1, during the 19th and the 20th centuries, the use of centralized collection systems was viewed as a cost-effective permanent concept for wastewater treatment, while the use of conventional onsite systems, typically septic systems, was viewed as a temporary solution for areas outside the reach of centralized collection systems. By the end of the 20th century, wastewater professionals realized that centralized collection and treatment is not the only way for managing wastewater and it is impossible to extend centralized collection systems to many areas where new growth is occurring. Rural “electrification” (extending the central electric service grid to all of the populace) is no longer the model for serving the entire population of the U.S. with adequate wastewater collection, treatment, and effluent dispersal. Decentralized wastewater solutions can and will play an important role for managing wastewater in the future. Thus, advanced onsite wastewater systems technologies offer alternatives not only to conventional septic systems but also to centralized wastewater solutions.
