Meijering
Applications # 2006 Washington DC
Teppfa and Plastics Europe initiated a comprehensive study to provide quantitative figures of the quality of sewers after long life service of up to 30 years. The overall aim and purpose of the project was to determine which sewer pipe materials better fulfil the requirements of sustainability in its broadest sense, operational and environmental. The study was based on examinations of CCTV video inspections of 1800km buried concrete, clay and plastics sewer pipelines in service in Germany, Netherlands and Sweden. Failure types and frequencies were detected and counted according to the new EN13508-2, on basis of these practical data the environmental impacts has been analysed. The outcome of the study is that the performance of flexible plastics (PVC, PE and PP) pipes is significantly better than those of rigid pipe systems, Concrete and Clay. The environmental impact of defects in sewer pipes of plastics pipes are significantly less than that of rigid pipe systems. The clear conclusion of this project is that buried pipes need flexibility. This flexible pipe behaviour reduces the risk to the environment from infiltration and exfiltration. And furthermore, the results of this study are of high interest for the local municipalities where they now can rank the sewer defects in their systems with regard to the environment and use this as a tool for their maintenance policy.
