| 1. Main Research Field of the Division |
| ◆Sewerage Planning Although the national average percent of sewered population has become 80.6%(as of the end of FY 2021) as the result of intensive investments in few decades, the percent in medium- and small-size municipalities is still low. Sewerage is regarded even in rural areas as a national minimum in Japan. In order to develop sewerage in the areas, effective and efficient planning is required because rural areas are sparsely populated. ◆Stormwater Control Urbanized areas with high population densities and high assets concentrations are still suffering from serious inundation due to stormwater. Especially, these few years some big cities in Japan were damaged by torrential rain with short duration. In addition, in combined sewer system mainly adopted by large cities, discharge of untreated sanitary sewage during heavy rainfall threatens water environment in public water bodies. In this context, comprehensive countermeasures are required for stromwater control. ◆Sewer System The sewer system accounts for about 76% of whole sewerage construction cost including collection and treatment system. Length of existing sewers in Japan is more than 450,000 km thanks to the sewerage development. Therefore it is increasingly necessary to conduct well-planed renovation and maintenance of sewer system. |
| 2. Major Theme of Research and Development |
| 2.1 Asset Management for Sewers |
| In recent years, road cave-ins and similar accidents have been frequently
seen. To prevent such accidents, the deterioration in sewers should be
accurately detected. Deterioration in sewers is commonly determined in
accordance with visual inspection criteria using TV cameras, but these
inspection criteria were established mainly for rigid pipes such as reinforced
concrete pipes. It is, therefore, difficult to detect deterioration with
the conventional criteria for PVC pipes, which are plastic flexible pipes
and account for about 50% of the total length of pipe in the country. Considering
such circumstances, NILIM has established visual inspection criteria (draft)
for detecting deterioration in PVC pipes. Accordingly, NILIM collected and analyzed TV camera survey data from local governments in order to identify the deterioration characteristics unique to PVC pipes and create visual inspection criteria for deterioration, and conducted TV camera surveys of PVC pipes laid more than 30 years ago, and load-proof performance tests and two-dimensional nonlinear static analyses (CAE) of deteriorated PVC pipes. Consequently, as deterioration characteristics of PVC pipe, the presence of overall section change and local section change, and the relationship between cracking and load bearing capacity were clarified. Based on these findings, we added the flatness and deformation of PVC pipes to visual inspection criteria and clearly positioned the inspection criteria for cracks. |
| 2.2 Research about countermeasures for sewage system against large-scale earthquake |
| When sewage systems are damaged by
earthquake, the damages affect public health and social activities such as
disorder of sanitation facilities and traffic disturbances. In this research, we collect information of past cases of damaged sewage systems, and construct the database system. When we construct the database system, we try to choose appropriate indexes for damaged factor of sewer pipes. |
| 2.3 Research on Promotion of Efficient Countermeasures for Urban Stormwater |
| In recent years, concentrated
heavy rain have occured frequently in many regions of Japan. As the frequency of heavy rains is increasing, concern is also increasing over the decline in stormwater penetration due to the progress of urbanization, as well as the increase in inundation damage potential due to the development of underground space use. For the purpose of the inundation damage reduction in the city, we study effective inundation countermeasures planning technique and utilization method of real-time rainfall data by XRAIN０ |
| 2.4 Demonstration Study of Breakthrough by Dynamic Approach in Sewage High Technology Project (B-DASH Project) |
| Ministry of Land, Infrastructure,
Transport and Tourism (MLIT) has started
Breakthrough by Dynamic Approach in Sewage High Technology Project (B-DASH
Project) since 2011, and The National Institute for Land and Infrastructure
Management (NILIM) has been an
implementing agency for the demonstration study. The purposes are achieving cost reduction and creation of renewable energy in sewerage work through the demonstration and widespread use of excellent innovative technology. |
| 2.5 Research on low cost sewer installation technology |
| In Japan, sewer service
accessibility rate reached to 76% in 2013. The remaining unsewered
municipalities are less populated. Consequently, installation cost per
household goes up. In addition, Japanese population is on the decrease. Current unsewered
municipalities are likely to lose their population further. However, as
basic human needs, sewer service has to be provided for everyone. Under
this situation, MLIT started experimental works project to lower the cost
of sewer. The project considers sub-standard technologies that cannot be
taken nationwide. |
| 3. Research staff |
| Head | YASUDA Masahiro | |
| Senior Researcher | MATSUURA Tatsuro | |
| Senior Researcher | HASHIMOTO Tsubasa | |
| Senior Researcher | HAMADA Tomoyuki | |
| Researcher | FUJII Ayako | |
| Researcher | HOSOI Nobutaka | |
| Guest Research Engineer | TOMITA Ryo | |
| Guest Research Engineer | YAMAMOTO Takuya | |
| Secretary | OTSUKA Saki |
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Wastewater System Division,Water Supply and Sewerage Department, National
Institute for Land and Infrastructure Management, Ministry of Land, Infrastructure,
Transport and Tourism Address: Asahi 1, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-0804, Japan Phone: +81-29-864-3343 Email: nil-gesuidou()ki.mlit.go.jp *Please replace "()" with "@". |