Since the spring of this year, the Town of Penfield Sewer Department has been applying watertight sealing treatments to known leaking manhole structures to eliminate ground water infiltration into the sanitary sewer system. Leaking manholes add to the burden of waste water treatment facilities and cost the Town and its taxpayers thousands of dollars annually.

As of June 24, six infiltrating manholes have been repaired and are now watertight. This effort will prevent a projected 12.5 million gallons of ground water from entering the sanitary sewer system over a one-year period. At a treatment cost of $1.29/per thousand gallons, this yields an annual savings of $16,127.69. (The data from each repaired man hole was collected by close observation of videos/relative measurements made before and after sealing treatments.) Reducing the volume of waste water that needs to be treated also reduces treatment costs.

The cost to the Town to complete this work was $1,344 in labor and $1,346 in materials, for a total cost of $2,690. That’s a total return on investment of $13,438 the first year, and $16,128 savings each upcoming year!