Bilge water

“ When the stratum in which the water is found is very porous, as in the case of gravel and some sorts of chalk, the water flows freely; and a yield has been obtained in such situations as great and rapid as the pump has been able to lift, that is 600 gallons an hour. ”

“ In our own day we consider 40 gallons sufficient, and many think this excessive, including the use of water in manufactures, &c. No wonder, with the facilities for drainage which the rapid Tiber afforded, and with this plentiful supply of really good water, the great city was rendered, in spite of overcrowding and an unhealthy situation as regards its neighbourhood, comparatively free from those epidemics which are so fatal in all densely-populated towns. ”

“ That in time of flood a large proportion, both of the suspended and dissolved filth, is conveyed down to the intakes, and in ordinary weather considerable portion of soluble organic matter makes its way to the pumping works, and is still present in the water distributed to the consumers. ”

“ It is not claimed, nor is it a fact, that water can be pumped from a driven well, in any given stratum, with greater ease than from an open well sunk into the same stratum; but the great advantages are that a much larger and more extended supply of water is controlled, and, in consequence of the passage of the water through the earth under the pressure of the atmosphere, a constant filtration is secured, thus securing both a greater supply and better water. ”

“ In the case of deep-seated wells, the probable yield of water must depend, primarily, upon the area of permeable strata likely to affect the supply, and upon the facilities those strata may offer for the passage of water ”

“ FOR IMPURITIES IN FEED WATER.
Much expense can be saved in fuel and boiler repairs by a little preliminary expenditure of money in securing a supply of good water for the steam boilers of a new establishment. Well water is nearly always inferior to the running water of streams; water from mines is especially hurtful, containing, as they do, large quantities of free sulphuric acid. Wells along the sea shore or on the banks of rivers affected by the tides, are likely to be saturated with chloride of magnesium. ”

“ By long experience, however, country plumbers have found that if such a well contains five feet of water in extremely dry weather, it can be relied upon for the needed fifty gallons a day each for a family of seven with enough over for safety.
In fact, with all water sources except an artesian or driven well, the question always is, will it last during an abnormally rainless season? Never-failing springs and wells that never go dry are institutions in any countryside. ”

“ Water, for ordinary purposes, on the banks of rivers or lakes, may be regarded as of unlimited abundance; but if required for irrigation, it may even there be insufficient to supply all wants, while in places which depend for their consumption on cisterns or tanks, or on wells which are not copious, or are liable to fail, water takes its place among things the quantity of which is most strictly limited. ”

“ The same evaporation which thus affects the hands, renders the land cold, when filled with water, every gallon of which thus carried off requires, and actually carries off, as much heat as would raise five and a half gallons of water from the freezing to the boiling point. ”

“ A gallon of boiling water was then added. The thermometer, a very delicate one, was not in the least affected by the boiling water in the top of the box.
"In this experiment, the wooden box may be supposed to be a field; the peat and cold water represent the water-logged portion; rain falls on the surface, and becomes warmed by contact with the soil, and, thus heated, descends. ”

“ Absorption and Filtration.—The process of under-draining is a process of absorption and filtration, as distinguished from surface-flow and evaporation. The completeness with which the latter are prevented, and the former promoted, is the measure of the completeness of the improvement. If water lie on the surface of the ground until evaporated, or if it flow off over the surface, it will do harm; if it soak away through the soil, it will do good. ”

“ In considering the principles of well supplies it is important to bear the following facts in mind. The crust of the earth, so far as it is permeable and above the sea-level, receives from rainfall its supply of fresh water. That supply, so far as it is not evaporated or absorbed by vegetation, passes away by the streams or rivers, or sinks into the ground. If the strata were uniformly porous the water would lie in the rock at different depths below the surface according to the previous quantity and distribution of the rainfall. ”

“ Shallow and deep wells are those which are sunk through a permeable stratum, and form, as it were, reservoirs, into which the land springs may filter and accumulate; whilst artesian wells are those which [37] are sunk through an impervious upper stratum, to reach a subterranean water-bearing stratum lying, in its turn, upon an impervious upholding bed. In the former cases, the quantity of water obtainable is simply that which can filter through the sides of the well to replace the water removed, or which may accumulate in any reservoir formed below ”

“ Effluents from maximum standard treatment processes, for instance, can be injected into underground strata as recharge water for aquifers—a process mentioned earlier as one alternative in the emerging package of water supply techniques—or may be spread over the surface of large areas of rural land [Pg 54a] where they serve as irrigation water and fertilizer combined, as well as soaking down into underlying aquifers. ”

“ The water is taken from the Pleisse River, through an arched aqueduct, 656 feet long, to subsiding reservoirs or wells, two miles in diameter, and thirteen feet below the lowest stage in the river. The water is pumped into a reservoir, 140 feet lift, by two Wolf engines, with a power of 120 horse-power. The maximum daily consumption of water, in 1876, was 2.6 millions, and the minimum was 1.8 million gallons. ”

“ From the foregoing it is seen that the question of water supply has engaged the energies of man from pre-historic times. These great irrigating works are found, however, in regions of sterility, or light rainfall, from the rude irrigating canals of ancient Peru and Arizona to the marvellous accomplishments of the hydraulic engineer in India and Egypt. ”

“ The lift from a canal watercourse is a few feet, that from a well may be 50 feet or more.
Most persons consider that a system of charging for water by volume would be a very great advance on present methods. It has been said that if the water were wasted it would be difficult for the cultivators to bring home the responsibility to any individual. This objection does not seem to have great force. Every individual would have a direct interest in economising the water, and any cultivator who was habitually careless would soon be detected by the others. ”

“ A hydraulic ram is the cheapest method of pumping water, provided that the necessary flow with a sufficient head to do the work is available. It requires about seven times as much water to flow through the ram and be wasted as is pumped, so that if it is desired to pump five hundred gallons a day, the stream must flow at the rate of about thirty-five hundred gallons per day to lift the necessary water. ”

“ Our supply of eight hundred gallons of water generally lasted about six weeks, for, as has been said already, we used chiefly salt water for the bath. To refill the tanks we could either move out of our [Pg 142] berth on a spring tide and take the water on board through a hose from a neighbouring shed where water was laid on, or we could have it carried on board by hand. On the whole, we decided to have the water carried on board, and our barge-owner friend kindly allowed us to take the water from his house. ”

“ If there is any inclination in the water-bearing strata, or if there is a current of water only in one direction, then one of the wells would prove a failure owing to the proximity of the fault, while the other would furnish an abundant supply of water. ”

“ It has two kinds of supply—one for drinking, that of spring water, and the other for manufacturing and general use. For the latter demands, the supply is taken partly from the Neckar River, and pumped through three artificial filter beds; and partly from lakes, whose water is conducted, through cast-iron pipes 15,000 feet in length, to five filter-beds, and thence into two reservoirs, 145 feet below the lake. The reservoir, for the filtered water from the river, is three miles from the pumping station, and 180 feet elevation. Seven million gallons are used daily. ”

“ Although at the present day a large proportion of the very ancient wells are completely sanded up, or have suffered great deterioration in respect of their flows, there are still many examples to be met with where bores, certainly between 2,000 and 3,000 years old, are still producing strong discharges of water at the rate of hundreds of gallons a minute by day and by night. ”

“ Water for sluicing operations is frequently brought from great distances through canals, ditches, or flumes, the proprietors of which sell the water to miners at so much the miners' inch, a miners' inch being in most localities the quantity flowing in a given time through an aperture one inch square under a head of six inches.—The celebrated hydraulic process, invented in Placer co., Cal., in 1852, consists in washing down the whole surface and underlying mass of auriferous deposits, preparatory to sluicing. ”

“ As we find the liquid water in nature it is more or less impregnated with vegetable, gaseous, and saline matter, which often impairs its fitness for mechanical purposes. These admixtures are derived from the rocks and ground over or through which the water flows. The incrustations which form in boilers are caused by the precipitation of the impurities in consequence of the concentration of water in the boiler. ”

“ Every well has its own particular level of water while steady pumping at a given rate is going on, and if that level is lowered by harder pumping, it may take months, or even years, for the water in the interstices of the rock to accommodate itself to the new conditions; but the permanent yield after such lowering will always be less than the quantity capable of being pumped shortly after the change. We have hitherto supposed the pumps for drawing the water to have been placed in the well at such a level as to be accessible, while the Pumps in boreholes. ”

“ Under modern legislation no such abstraction of water is usually allowed, even if limited to times of flood, except on condition of an augmentation of the natural dry-weather flow, and this condition at once involves the construction of a reservoir. ”

“ The filtration of water may now be considered. The water of our wells is presented by nature ready filtered to the hand of man, and often exhibits an admirable degree of transparency and purity. It acquires this state by percolating through the mineral strata of the earth, which deprives it of the organic matter it derives from the soil and subsoil, but, at the same time, it dissolves a portion of the saline and earthy media through which it passes, and hence acquires that peculiar ‘hardness’ which is constantly found in spring water. ”

“ But drinking water was brought to their large cities in a form that did not greatly differ from those I was already familiar with, excepting in cleanliness. Their reservoirs were dug in the ground and lined with glass, and a perfectly fitting cover placed on the top. They were constructed so that the water that passed through the glass feed pipes to the city should have a uniform temperature, that of ordinary spring water. The water in the covered reservoirs was always filtered and tested before passing into the distributing pipes. ”

“ Chapters three and four deal with the artificial and natural purification of water. These are the most important portions of the book to the engineer and taxpayer, taking up the question of water supply in its economic and commercial aspects, both as regards the general town supply and also in reference to individual household filtration. The physical forces and forms with which we have to reckon are next considered under Rain, Ice, Snow, and River and Stream Water. ”

“ The kind of water system, like the supply, is governed by geography and geology. If there happens to be a spring on a nearby hillside somewhat higher than the house, nature has provided the cheapest and simplest system. A pipe line and storage tank are all that are needed. Gravity does the rest. On the other hand, if the spring is on the same level or lower than the house, a pump must be added to the equipment to force the water into the pressure tank and out of the faucets. If the spring has a large flow and adequate drainage, a water ram is advisable. ”

“ The sand, washed by the rains of ages, holds the water without soiling it more than a glass tumbler would, and the Londoners say that in this way, by making artificial channels and a big reservoir, they can collect twenty-eight thousand gallons a day of water nearly pure. ”

“ Americans are thankful for the amount of water with which our country is blessed-for our more than two million miles of streams, our more than 30 million acres of lakes and reservoirs, our other surface waters, and our subterranean reserves known as aquifers. We also appreciate our public water systems, whose complex processes provide us with some 12 billion gallons of generally inexpensive and high-quality drinking water daily. ”