Effluent sewer
Effluent sewers also currently serve fewer people than septic systems, which also use septic tanks, but simply dispose of the effluent by draining it into a leach field. About one quarter of United States homes dispose of their wastewater with septic tanks. However, effluent sewers are being looked at as a sewage treatment solution in areas where gravity sewer systems are not well-suited or when the high capital cost to build a gravity system is prohibitive. Areas that are less than ideal for gravity systems include areas that are large, but extremely flat and areas that require long-distance pumping, such as where homes are widely spread out or when several small villages or towns connect their sewage systems so that a centralized plant can be built.
Newtown Creek
Then, in 1967, the city built the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant, which is now the largest sewage treatment facility operated by the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. Located on the south bank near the creek's mouth in Greenpoint, the plant handles a large portion of the drainage from the East Side of Manhattan. Sewage from the Financial District, Greenwich Village, the Lower East Side, Midtown East and the East Side up to 71st Street flows through of sewer pipes into interceptor pipes to the Thirteenth Street Pumping Station at 13th Street and Avenue D, from where it is sent under the East River to the plant. Normal influx is per day, which increases to during wet weather. When a significant overflow occurred during the New York City blackout of 1977 ( of raw sewage spilled into the East River), the federal government ordered in 1995 that the city build back-up facilities. Despite this, the Northeast blackout of 2003 produced of raw sewage spilled.