Centralized Stormwater Treatment (or lack thereof)

One question I hear a lot is “doesn’t stormwater get treated centrally before it gets discharged anyway?”  The short answer is ‘no.’  Although most stormwater systems used to go through through the same treatment as sanitary sewer, most urbanized areas have replaced the combined sewer system with two separate systems, one for stormwater and the other for sanitary sewer. What …

Where does My Stormwater Go?

Stormwater suffers from the “Outta sight, outta mind” issue.  Once it’s gone from my view, it’s gone, right?  Of course we know that is incorrect.  Its disappearance from the pavement into a conveyance system is really just the start of the earthbound portion of its cyclical life.  Let’s take a look at the various ways that stormwater may be headed …