Minutes of Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers Volume 48 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1877 Excerpt: ...of a year or two, during which these beds had been used as downward intermittent filtration beds, receiving the whole of the sewage; but they had ceased to bo so used before any of the analyses had been made. There was no experience to show what the permanence of their action might be. And when it was considered that, in the case of Merthyr, 21 grains in every gallon of the solid matter in the sewage was retained by the land, and that it amounted to 32 cwt. per day upon the 20 acres, how was it possible to conceive that that substance could be left in the soil witbout the pores of the soil being gradually filled with it? With regard to profit, Mr. Bailey Denton had stated that during the first year, in which ho maintained that the system of downward intermittent filtration was still in vogue, a profit of 20 per acre had been made, --to quote his own words, "a return more than sufficient to cover the cost of the 75 acres of land and the whole of the works connected with the 75 acres" (ante, p. 185). He thought that upon this point Mr. Harpur's evidence at the Barnes sewage inquiry, before referred to, was better than that of Mr. Bailey Denton; he had been asked: --"' Q. Now, I would ask you, in regard to the profit--have you made any profit from the cultivation of land there?--A. I am sorry to say that we have not derived any profit. Q. You have not?--A. "We have not; on the contrary, we have sustained a considerable loss. Q. Which is more likely to realise a profit, the irrigation farm combined with intermittent filtration, or the irrigation farm alone?--A. The irrigation farm combined with intermittent filtration. Q. Will you give us the particulars of your experience at Merthyr?--A. In 1872 there was a loss of 624 16. lid.; i...