Town:  Bridgewater, South Australia

Location: 24 kilometres south east of Adelaide, situated in the Adelaide Hills region

Population: 3,498

Client: SA Water

Council: Adelaide Hills Council

Year: 2006

Scope: Design and construction of a Pressure Sewer System to serve properties which currently have onsite disposal systems and connect to the existing gravity network.

Environmental Factors: Bridgewater, which sits in the Adelaide Hills, is a part of the Onkaparinga River catchment. Due to the steep slopes of the Adelaide Hills, combined with heavy clay and mud stone soil conditions, onsite septic systems were failing to control run off to the catchment.

PSSA Solution: The project included the design of the pressure sewer system to eliminate environmental and community issues that typically surround a sewerage project of this size. Through the use of squat tanks and trenchless pipelaying technologies, the impact on the environment and disruption to the community was minimised.

Environmental Outcomes: There was an immediate improvement to the local catchment creeks that feed the Onkaparinga catchment along with odours associated with septic systems no longer being present within the valleys. This project removed 13.4 million litres of septic and greywater discharge from the environment per annum.