Application of Laboratory Experiment Results into Practice: Clogging of Stormwater Infiltration Systems

Infiltration systems, which are a popular method to manage stormwater, have a history of failure due to clogging within a relatively short period. As yet there is not a single method available to predict the clogging, despite the substantial amount of investments is being made in implementing these systems. Therefore, a detailed laboratory study of stormwater infiltration systems was carried out with the aim of gaining a fundamental understanding of the clogging process. One of the conclusions of the study is that the sediment mass of sediment particles less than 6μm are the main driving force of system clogging. The objective of the study presented in this paper was to simply assess clogging time of a range of applications of infiltration systems using the laboratory findings. MUSIC was used to generate the TSS inflows in to the systems installed at several catchments; flow and TSS were modelled from low, standard and high density developments in, Melbourne and Brisbane. The discharges were treated by infiltration systems that represented 1%, 2%, 5%, 10%, 15% and 25% of the effective impervious areas of these catchments. By integrating the laboratory results and MUSIC modelling, a number of look-up charts and tables were produced that could be used for a quick estimation of the clogging time of infiltration systems.