A brief history of sewers
Fans of Game of Thrones might remember a moment from season two when Tyrion describes how his brother and sister attained positions of power and responsibility at an early age and contrasts it with what happened when he reached manhood.
He became “a most highborn plumber” ensuring that the human waste from his home found its way to the sea. Tyrion might have had a more responsible job than he realised. Effective waste disposal is crucial to human health and the health of the environment.
From a river of gold to a river of death
There are many factors which go into the creation and maintenance of a great city, but at a fundamental level a metropolis needs to provide its inhabitants with a place to live, food, water – and a means to dispose of the waste they produce. It can become a very serious, indeed deadly, problem, when the same water source is used both for drinking water and for waste disposal as was the case in London up until the mid 19th century. As the population of London grew so did both the amount of waste produced and the need for drinking water. Over the course of time, the sewage essentially overwhelmed the river until it became a source not of life but of death as it spread waterborne diseases such as the 1854 cholera outbreak. Matters came to a head in 1858 when the long, hot summer created the perfect conditions for the “Great Stink”, which saw London enveloped in a foul stench. As it happened, Parliament was in session at the time and MPs soon became convinced of the need to do something about the smell from the river. Enter Joseph Bazalgette as the head of an engineering project which would probably have been considered pretty massive if it had been proposed today.
From “out of sight and out of mind” to modern waste treatment
Bazalgette’s remit was easy to summarise but much harder to implement. It was to get the waste out of central London (as then was) without turning the Thames into a cesspit. When considering this, it’s worth remembering that the middle of the 19th century was still a time when the phrase “horsepower” was used in its literal sense. This meant that in addition to the human waste created by the growing population (of 2.5 million and counting) there was a copious quantity of horse manure produced as well as waste from animals kept for other purposes. It was an enormous task which needed to be undertaken with a much lower level of technology than is available today and so it is hardly surprising that the Bazalgette’s solution, although ingenious, was hardly up to modern environmental standards. Bazalgette constructed a system of sewers and embankments with sewers in them which moved the waste out of central London until it was pumped into the Thames at what were then remote locations. In short, it was less a case of “reduce, reuse and recycle” and more a case of “what the nose doesn’t smell, the heart doesn’t grieve for”. It was, however, a start and as the old saying goes “a journey of a thousand miles, starts with the first step”. Fast forward over 150 years to today and the Thames is now clean enough to be used for watersports and while London still has its problems with pollution, it does have a very effective sewage system – but not a perfect one. London’s sewage system is not capable of dealing with everything which gets sent into it, although you could question whether that should be classed as a flaw in the system or user error. One way or another, though, London will have to find a solution to this problem, but if history is any guide, it surely will.
