Effluent sewer
type of sewerage system in which each premise has its own septic tank, and the effluent from the on-premise septic tank flows into the sewerage system
Effluent sewer systems, also called septic tank effluent gravity (STEG), solids-free sewer (SFS), or septic tank effluent drainage (STED) systems, have septic tanks that collect sewage from residences and businesses, and the liquid fraction of sewage that comes out of the tank is conveyed to a downstream receiving body such as either a centralized sewage treatment plant or a distributed treatment system for further treatment or disposal away from the community generating the sewage. Most of the solids are removed by the interceptor tanks, so the treatment plant can be much smaller than a typical plant and any pumping for the supernatant can be simpler without grinders (sometimes water pumps are sufficient).
An alternative effluent sewer which is similar to the STEG system is the STEP system. Because of the vast reduction of solid wastes and the capture of fats, oils and grease (FOG) within the interceptor tank, a pumping system can be used to move the wastewater under pressure rather than a gravity driven conveyance system.
Design considerations
Effluent pumping sewers have small diameter pipes that follow the contour of the land and are only buried a metre or two underground. While an effluent sewer can use gravity to move waste, the ability to move waste with a pressure system can be a big advantage in places where a gravity system is impractical. Compared to conventional sewer systems, effluent sewer systems can be installed at a shallow depth and do not require a minimum wastewater flow or slope to function.
Effluent sewer systems, as well as all sewer systems, can use two methods to transport wastewater to a treatment facility. These methods are gravity and pumping, also called pressure systems. Gravity systems use pipes that are laid on a slight downhill slope to transport wastewater.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Effluent sewer” is type of sewerage system in which each premise has its own septic tank, and the effluent from the on-premise septic tank flows into the sewerage system. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Effluent, sewer and type, not as a finished interpretation.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 26, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q5347504. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Effluent sewer” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.