Three years ago when we had the extension built, I had also had a rainwater harvester put under the ground in front of the house. It's
6.5m^3 and feeds the toilets, waters the garden and keeps the pond topped. It takes 90% of the rainwater from the roof of the house.If the harvester runs dry, I have an automatic system to top up the toilet header tank with mains water.
The harvester has an overflow in the form of a u-band in the turret of the tank which exits via 110mm drainage pipes into a 3-metre soakaway. The level of the overflow is approx 70cm below ground level.
So, guess what? After over 2 years of lovely rain collection and hassle-free use, what has happened? Well, it has rained *so* much this year that the ground water table appears to have risen to approximately
70cm below ground level and has been sitting there for weeks. The soakaway is therefore completely useless.Which means that water is actually pumping back up from the soakaway through the 110mm pipes, round the u-bend, and trickling slowly into the tank at about 1 pint every minute. The water, of course, is now murky, muddy and horrible!
What a bloody mess! When is the water going to drain away? Does climate change mean that the water table will forever remain high (Whittlesford, South Cambs), so the system is stuffed?
I suppose I could dig up the soakaway pipe and insert a one-way valve to interrupt the flow.
Or I could block off the overflow entirely and use electronic means to pump excess water out using the pump, and deliver the excess water down the garden somewhere!
I'm not sure I can route the overflow outlet to the sewer instead of soakaway because the sewer is probably not deep enough. It's about 70cm deep itself where it passed by the house.
What a bloody pain in the neck.
Any other ideas?
Michael