A central source for insights, tools, and updates on acoustic sewer inspection technology, wastewater infrastructure assessment, and cost-effective solutions for municipal inspection services and collection system optimization.
In 2011, the Georgia Environmental Protection Division issued a consent decree requiring Augusta to evaluate and conduct point repairs across its entire collection system. In response, Augusta Utilities began integrating acoustic inspection as a rapid, cost-effective way to meet this mandate.
The city needed to inspect over 1,000 miles of sewer and prioritize maintenance with limited resources, all while addressing a legal compliance issue.
Augusta implemented the SL-RAT in 2013 as a complementary tool to support their corrective action plan. A two-person crew screened an average of 7,500 feet of pipe per day. The team used the SL-RAT to assess over 3 million feet of sewer pipe in two years and integrated the acoustic data with Cityworks for real-time GIS updates. They explained the value of the SL-RAT in a report for the NASTT No-Dig Conference.
Augusta reduced sanitary sewer overflows by nearly 33% in the first year. Acoustic inspection revealed that 60–85% of pipes scheduled for cleaning based on time intervals still had sufficient flow capacity, enabling the utility to direct resources to areas that needed it most.
“If you can stay ahead of the curve, that’s what you’re looking for. Something that will stop you from having to react, and then you get to be proactive and fix some of these problems.”
