IDDE Archives - Center for Watershed Protection

Working with Dogs to Sniff out Sewage Leaks

Working for the Center, every once in a while I get a chance to go off to a far flung place to poke my head into catch basins and outlet pipes. Last month I traveled to southwestern Vermont to meet up with a team of folks to track down illicit sewage discharges. Over the course of several years, Vermont’s Department of Environmental Conservation (VTDEC) has been systematically supporting illicit discharge investigations in different parts of the state with the overall aim of reducing bacteria levels in its waterways. This year, VTDEC’s focus has been on the town of Bennington and [...]

admin2017-09-18T09:42:38-04:00October 26th, 2015|

New Tools for Sniffing Out Poop

As a mom of two, I have an uncanny ability to smell a poopy diaper from across the room. Little did I know that sense of smell can also be important to watershed work. I recently learned of two unique methods for sniffing out illicit sewage discharges. The Center has been helping communities track down illicit discharges for almost 10 years now and, although we’ve refined our outfall survey protocols to focus on the most cost-effective and reliable techniques for identification of suspect discharges, actually tracking them to their source can be a challenge. Source tracking can be costly when [...]

admin2017-09-30T10:46:42-04:00December 19th, 2014|

Sewage Happens- All Hands on Deck!

I am sitting in a coffee shop when a friend walks in and sits down to work in the chair next to me. I tell him that I’m writing an article about sewage pipes. He immediately chimes in and says, “Huh. My uncle is a wastewater engineer who inspects construction sites and he was telling me how often he finds sewage pipes that contractors have connected to a stormwater pipe instead of to the sanitary sewer system.” No, this is not the start of a bad joke…it’s just pure coincidence and a perfect way to introduce the lovely topic of [...]

admin2017-09-18T06:20:02-04:00November 24th, 2014|