A New Septic System Could Reduce Pollution
NextGen Septic is a new system that treats wastewater for recycling or reentry into groundwater.
According to The Energy & Environmental Building Alliance, the “NextGen system consists of a stainless-steel treatment unit placed on top of a two-chamber septic tank. The unit is small enough to fit between the tank's two risers.” The treatment system has the potential to remove the need for a leach field, allowing homes to be built on otherwise unworkable lots.
Rather than flowing to a leach field, effluent from the septic tank is pumped through the NextGen unit, where biomedia remove nitrogen, phosphorus, viruses, bacteria and other organic contaminants. Hopper says the unit's output is clean enough to be discharged into the environment or for use in landscape watering. "It's cleaner than any system we have ever seen," he says.
In fact, NextGen claims that the unit's output exceeds the standards used for wastewater treatment plants. It removes up to 99% of nitrogen and phosphorous from the effluent, the main causes of algae blooms and other water pollution issues.