Blocked Stormwater Drains Management
Residential and commercial plumbing systems are required to carry an enormous amount of water and material away from our homes and businesses. Water that comes out of our taps, toilets, showers, and other fixtures leaves through the sewer system. It is then treated before being disposed of or recycled. But there is another crucial plumbing system present in all our homes and businesses that is often overlooked, to the detriment of home and business owners. This is the stormwater, or surface water system.
Stormwater, Clearwater, or surface water is water run-off that comes from rain and the immediate environment. Your home has a stormwater system which carries rainwater, and all the material that is carried it, through gutters and surface drains away from your home. Organic materials such as leaves, soil, and other residual debris can damage or block your stormwater system, causing it to overflow.
An overflowing stormwater system can cause flooding, leaks, and structural damage to your home or premises. With this in mind, it is crucial to maintain an awareness of what stormwater systems are, how they work, how they can be used for productive purposes, and what you can do to keep your stormwater in working order.
Stormwater can become a valuable resource for the conscientious home or business owner. Reusing stormwater and other runoff can significantly reduce your environmental impact, save potable water supplies, and provide you with greater landscaping opportunities around your premises.
Stormwater systems
In Australia, our municipal stormwater systems are separated from the sewerage system to ensure that public health is maintained through first-class sanitation. These two systems form the bulk of public waterworks and drainage systems, with sewerage systems connecting to water treatment plants and stormwater systems usually being discharged straight into the sea or waterways.
The majority of stormwater is collected in the form of rainwater, or water from rising creeks or rivers during extreme weather events.
Some areas in particular are prone to excessive wear and tear to stormwater systems due to an increased prevalence of extreme weather events. Even hear in Melbourne, failing to clear your gutters of fallen leaves and debris at least once a year can result in damage to your home in the event of heavy rain.
Managing your stormwater system
Blocked Stormwater Drains Management and the lack of awareness surrounding the function and maintenance of stormwater systems has negative implications for both the environment and domestic or public infrastructure. Failing to maintain your home’s stormwater system, or being unable to recognise when there is a problem, can result in leaks, burst pipes, or back-ups/overflow from your stormwater drains.
Luckily, there are a few simple things you can do to keep your stormwater system in good repair. Doing so will reward the diligent homeowner by reducing water damage to their premises, as well as providing them with an awareness of stormwater systems that should allow them to spot a minor problem before it becomes a plumbing emergency.
Here are a few simple steps you can take to better manage your stormwater, and reduce your home’s environmental impact:
• If you are building a home or additional structures on your premises, avoid using cut and fill methods when preparing foundations. Cut and fill methods alter existing drainage patterns through significant changes in an area’s topography. Altering your premises’ topography by using cut and fill methods could result in stormwater building up in unwanted areas, making it difficult to remove and causing numerous problems.
• Reduce the potential for soil erosion on your property during building or landscaping by minimising the time that soil is left in an unstable, exposed position. Use tools such as sediment traps to minimise erosion during this sensitive period, and cut trenches to divert stormwater around the excavation site.
• Retain or plan vegetation around your premises, as these bind soil, decrease runoff velocity, filter nutrients, capture sediment, and reduce salinity. Trees are particularly valuable in this regard, as they lower the water table and reduce the potential for localised flooding.
• Minimise areas which are paved, roofed, or concreted. Where these areas are located, ensure that adequate drainage systems are installed and maintained.
Creating a stormwater site plan
Coming up with a stormwater plan when conducting building works or renovations can help reduce stormwater runoff and environmental damage. It will also ensure that any adverse weather events such as heavy rain don’t have a major impact on the worksite.
Things you might what to consider when drafting a plan include:
Reusing stormwater
Harvesting and storing water from roofs is a good way to deliver extra water and nutrients to your garden or veggie patch.
Minimising chemical use
Try to minimise the use of solvents and chemicals, such as fertilisers, pesticides, and herbicides, as these often end up in stormwater and get carried to water sources.
Avoid solvent-based paints
Use water or plant-based paints instead of solvent-based, as these are significantly more environmentally friendly.
Floodplains
Avoid building on floodplains, as this land can be subject to periodical inundation in the event of heavy rain. They may also have a higher water table than usual. Your local council can advice you on the flood level for a certain area.
Traditional approaches to stormwater management
Stormwater management responses were traditionally based on conveyancing. Pipes or channels conveyed water from collections areas (such as streets or houses) to a discharge point. These discharge points are usual the nearest creek, river, lake, or ocean. This system was simple in its aim; to remove the largest quantity of stormwater from a site in the least amount of time possible.
The conveyancing method was simplistic in its approach to stormwater management, and simply carried stormwater away from residential or industrial areas without attempting to manage it at all. As such, the local water balance is often upset in areas where this method is applied.
When stormwater is conveyed in this way, it carries a large amount of sediment, litter, oil, and nutrients with it, which is then deposited in a local water source. In the event of heavy rain, this often results in severe flooding or pollution of local creeks or rivers.
If your town has a creek running through it, you may notice that it is filthy and filled with litter in the parts that run through residential or built-up areas. This is a result of the conveyancing approach to stormwater management.
Water sensitive urban design
This is a new approach to stormwater damage that seeks to imitate natural water flow as it would occur in a non manmade environment. Incorporating a variety of techniques, it serves to slow the runoff of stormwater, filter the water naturally, maximise on-site retention and infiltration.
This means that it takes longer for stormwater to reach local water sources, and that the water has been filtered by plants and soil before it gets there.
By minimising impervious surfaces such as paved and roofed areas, and by incorporating more vegetation, less sediment and litter is likely to be gathered up by fast-flowing stormwater.
Flood mitigation
A common feature incorporated into most newer building projects is on-site water detention facilities. These features are incorporated into a home’s stormwater plumbing system, and they are designed to capture and hold stormwater for a short period before releasing it in order to minimise the impact of flooding further down the system during heavy rain.
Water captured in such a system slowly drains from an opening in the base of the stormwater ‘pit’ which connects to the municipal system. Local councils sometimes regulate the incorporation of stormwater pits, so check with your council whether or not you are required to have one in your new home.
If you need professional help on your blocked septic system, contact us on 0412 738 874 or leave a message.
We will take care of your blocked drain problems. If your problem is an emergency plumbing matter or a burst pipe and you need urgent assistance contact us right away!
Helpful details for a Blocked Drain and Emergency Plumber situation:
Triple zero – 000
City of Melbourne – Floods and Storms
VicWater
Yarra Valley Water
Victoria State Emergency Service
