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Comment by barbazoo | Hacker News Reader

> Raw sewage under normal conditions goes to wastewater treatment plants but currently, even a small amount of drizzle in London can overwhelm the network, triggering overflows into the Thames.

Can someone define what's meant here by "raw sewage" please? Are we talking about wastewater from toilets?

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Wastewater from toilets, showers, sinks etc watered down by rainwater. But the waste from toilets is what's causing the problems.

I hope they'll do the Olympic swimming events upstream of that then.

It seems Paris is well on its way to cancel the swimming events in the Seine this summer, so it's not exactly an isolated issue

London has one of the earliest sewer systems, and it predates the practice of separating storm drains from effluent drains. Normally the sewers drain through pipes to the water treatment works, but if there's too much rain then the system becomes full and it drains into the Thames to avoid flooding streets and buildings. The new pipe will fix that.

Seattle also has this problem and our sewer network is more modern. We are also building a storage tunnel!

I believe this might be the Ship Canal Water Project? https://www.seattle.gov/utilities/neighborhood-projects/ship...

I'll give you one guess if I'm a local or not!

Your username gives you away!

Realistically, if your sewerage system is from before the mid-20th century, you'll usually have this problem.

Apparently, the first official inquiry into London's sewerage recommended a separated system, but Bazalgette prevailed and his design was a combined system. Other British cities, and other cities round the world, copied this design.

https://news.sky.com/story/down-the-drain-what-went-wrong-wi...

Toilets, showers, sinks, storm drains, and last but certainly the most severe, the supporters section of Millwall's Den.

Unrefined brown sauce.

Yes.

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