Underground Construction - March 2018 - 54

CALENDAR OF EVENTS
2018
March 15-16
Great Lakes Trenchless Association/
MISS DIG 811 2018 Annual Membership Conference & Expo; Soaring
Eagle Casino, Resort & Waterpark, Mt.
Pleasant, MI; (937) 313-1714, greatlakestrenchless.com
March 25-29
No-Dig Conference & Exhibition
(NASTT); Renaissance Palm Springs
Hotel, Palm Springs, CA; (703) 3515252, nastt.org

April 3
Pipeline Opportunities Conference; Westin Galleria, Houston,
TX; (281) 520-4450, kfrancis@
uctonline.com

April 4
UCTA Gulf Coast Chapter Luncheon;
HESS, Houston, TX;
April 8-11
WEF Collection Systems Conference,
Virginia Beach Convention Center,
Virginia Beach, VA; (703) 684-2400,
Ext. 7450; wef.org/collectionsystems
April 23
Louisiana Pipeliners Dinner Meeting;
Baton Rouge, LA; meetings@louisianapipeliners.org, louisianapipeliners.org
April 30-May 3
Offshore Technology Conference
(OTC); NRG Park, Houston, TX; (972)
952-9494, meetings@otcnet.org

May 14
Louisiana Pipeliners Dinner Meeting;
Lafayette, LA; meetings@louisianapipeliners.org, louisianapipeliners.
org
May 15-17
63rd Annual Appalachian Underground Corrosion Short Course; West
Virginia University, Morgantown, WV;
(304) 293-4307, info@ aucsc.com
June 1
Louisiana Pipeliners Scholarship Clay
Shoot; meetings@louisianapipeliners.
org or louisianapipeliners.org
June 4 -6
Fiber Broadband Association; Gaylord
Opryland, Nashville, TN; (312) 6735414, www.ftthcouncil.org

June 6
UCTA Gulf Coast Chapter Luncheon;
HESS, Houston, TX; uctaonline.org,
uctahq@gmail.com
June 8
UCTA Gulf Coast Chapter Scholarship
Sporting Clays Event; Westside Sporting Grounds, Katy, TX; uctaonline.org,
uctahq@gmail.com
June 11 - 14
American Water Works Association
138th Annual Conference & Exposition (ACE); Mandalay Bay Convention
Center, Resort & Casino, Las Vegas,
NV; (800) 926-7337; www.awwa.org
June 26-29
AGA Operations Conference; Omni
Shoreham Hotel, Washington, DC;
(202) 824-7000; www.aga.org.

(continued from page 56)

a significant lack of understanding in the most basic configurations of sewer collection systems.
The impact of this is that it risks
misrepresenting the results of the
study and grossly exaggerating the
potential hazards, if any, of the
CIPP steam cure method.
P-trap
NEHA and Whelton both claim
that "health officials have responded to building contamination
incidents because CIPP chemicals
have traveled through sewer pipes
and air intake systems into nearby buildings." That's interesting,
because anyone in the trenchless
sewer repair industry is aware
that all residences and commercial
buildings use "plumbing traps,"
or "p-traps," which "use a bending
path to capture water to prevent
sewer gases from entering buildings, while allowing waste to pass
through." This device has been
used since its initial invention in
1775 by Alexander Cummings,
and was essential to the design
of Thomas Crapper's flush toilet
during the 19th century, which
made toilets, and modern sanita-

54

MARCH 2018 | UConOnline.com

tion itself, affordable and accessible to all people.
The plumbing trap provides the
essential role of preventing sewer gases from entering enclosed
buildings. Therefore, if vapors
present during the CIPP install
process do, in fact, enter buildings
(which wasn't something that the
Purdue study tried to measure, by
the way), then it means the plumbing traps in said buildings failed or
were non-existent, and anyone inside the building is being exposed
to sewer gases. In case you were
wondering, these gases are very
bad. They include often lethal concoctions of hydrogen sulfide (H2S),
ammonia, methane, carbon monoxide, various acids, sulfur dioxide
and nitrogen oxides. It's important to note that any of these gases
can be lethal, especially if one is
exposed while in a confined space
(such as an enclosed room).
Also importantly, the risk and
danger posed from exposure to
sewer gas in a building is a systemic one. That is, if a building's
plumbing trap has failed or was
never installed, a person affected
would be exposed to these effects
constantly, compared to extrinsic and potential risk(s) of vapor

migration from a CIPP install,
which would be only an isolated
and singular event, over a span of
several hours (while the resin is
curing in the sewer pipe). Compare
that scenario to one where people
are eating, sleeping, playing and
working 24/7, such as in the case
of exposure to sewer gases.
During the presentation, I
submitted a question: "If [CIPP]
vapors go into sewer laterals and
then 'into buildings' wouldn't that
mean that the building is already
experiencing exposure to dangerous ambient sewer gases such as
H2S and methane etc.?" Unfortunately, the presenters and/or moderator(s) chose not to address this
question, so it was unclear whether they are even aware that the
logic they are basing their health
and safety case on is not supported
by the reality of basic sewer system
design. In fact, during the question-and-answer period, Dr. Whelton himself seemed to operate
under this flawed view, because he
conflated drinking water with sewer water repairs while answering
a question about whether or not
drinking water would be contaminated by CIPP vapors from repairs
in a sewer.

Yes, someone literally asked Dr.
Whelton whether a sewer CIPP repair would potentially make their
drinking water taste funny, and his
answer was essentially that it was
possible because the CIPP repair
creates a discharge of styrene in
the sewer, which could then get
into the water system. Whelton
offered no proof or further explanation for how it's possible that
any fluids in a wastewater pipe
would or could contaminate a
drinking water pipe, considering
that wastewater (sewer) collection
systems and potable (drinking)
water transmission systems are
completely separate utilities, with
a completely separate infrastructure. Given that some publications
are referring to Dr. Whelton as
"the top American authority on
CIPP risk," his apparent lack of basic knowledge about underground
infrastructure is quite disturbing.
Methodology
Moving on, I think it's relevant to
get into some of the methodology
employed in the study, because it
seems the more one looks at the
details, the more issues and questions come up. For example, a Photoionization detector (PID) was
http://www.uctaonline.org http://louisianapipeliners.org http://louisianapipeliners.org http://www.greatlakestrenchless.com http://www.greatlakestrenchless.com http://www.wef.org/collectionsystems http://www.uctaonline.org http://www.nastt.org http://www.ers.org http://www.louisianapipeliners.org http://www.awwa.org http://www.ftthcouncil.org http://www.aga.org http://www.UConOnline.com
Underground Construction - March 2018

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