A report to the Chicago Real Estate Board on the disposal of the sewage and protection of the water supply of Chicago, Illinois / by Messrs. George A. Soper, John D. Watson, Arthur J. Martin.

  • George A. Soper
Date:
1915
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A report to the Chicago Real Estate Board on the disposal of the sewage and protection of the water supply of Chicago, Illinois / by Messrs. George A. Soper, John D. Watson, Arthur J. Martin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    would have been cheaper, far cheaper, to go on turning the sewage into the lake, and to rely on filtration for the protection of the water supply. Particular attention to the conditions favorable, and unfavorable, to the disposal of sewage through dilution has been paid by the Massachusetts State Board of ] tealth. No set of men have had so broad an opportunity to study this question as intelligently or over so long a period of time. In a special report issued by the Board in 1890, a table was given showing the chemical ingredients added to streams by domestic sewage for various ratios of population to quantities of water flowing.* It was stated that objectionable conditions might exist when the ratio included ratios of diluting water from 2.5 to 7.0 cubic feet per second per 1,000 persons contributing the sewage. The Board said (p. 791): With smaller volumes of water the pollution is so great as to be inadmissible. With lower volumes, the pollution is so small as to be clearly admissible from the standpoint of the offensiveness of the water. The information furnished by subsequent investiga- tions considerably narrowed the debatable ground and it was stated by Mr. X. H. Goodnough, Chief Engineer of the .Massachusetts State Board of Health, in a report pub- lished in 1903,} that when the rate of dilution is less than 3.5 cubic feet per sec- ond, objectionable conditions are likely to result from the dis- charge of sewage into a stream; while, in cases where the dilution exceeds 6.0 cubic feet per second per 1,000 persons, objectionable conditions have not been produced. This concln- sion, as already indicated, relates only to the effect produced upon a stream or body of water after the sewage has become mingled with it, and it is assumed that the water of the stream or pond receiving sewage is unaffected by other pollution. ^Examinations by the State Board of Health of the Water Supplies and Inland Waters of Massachusetts 1887-90; Part I of Report on Water Supply and Sewerage, pp. 785-802, dated December 18, 1002. fReport of the Committee on the Charles River Dam (Boston, Mass.), Appendix No. 5, p. 307-8.