{"id":170,"date":"2025-06-01T16:26:53","date_gmt":"2025-06-01T20:26:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/?p=170"},"modified":"2025-07-02T12:29:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T16:29:11","slug":"increasing-rainfall-is-scourge-of-combined-sewers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/2025\/06\/01\/increasing-rainfall-is-scourge-of-combined-sewers\/","title":{"rendered":"Increasing Rainfall Worsens Combined Sewer Overflows"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n

By Julianna D\u2019Addona
UConn Journalism<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

As pre\u00adcip\u00adi\u00adta\u00adtion increas\u00ades and storms become more severe across the Northeast, com\u00adbined sewage sys\u00adtems are being inun\u00addat\u00aded with mix\u00adtures of sewage and rain\u00adwa\u00adter. The net\u00adwork erupts, send\u00ading untreat\u00aded waste into Hartford\u2019s Park River and back\u00ading into some people\u2019s hous\u00ades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because of a warmer, more humid cli\u00admate, rain\u00adfall in the Northeast has been increas\u00ading over the past sev\u00ader\u00adal decades. A 2023 study by researchers and stu\u00addents at Dartmouth College projects that extreme storms\u2014at least 1.5 inch\u00ades of rain or snow in one day\u2014will increase by 52% by 2100. The study cre\u00adat\u00aded a model for 2070 to 2099 using his\u00adtor\u00adi\u00adcal pre\u00adcip\u00adi\u00adta\u00adtion data from  the National Center for Atmosphere Research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hartford is already see\u00ading the effects of more rain, said Dr. Mark Mitchell, for\u00admer Hartford direc\u00adtor of health and found\u00ading mem\u00adber of the Connecticut Coalition for Environmental Justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith cli\u00admate change, we\u2019ve got\u00adten a lot more down\u00adpours. That\u2019s one of the things you see with cli\u00admate change,\u201d Mitchell said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Warmer air fuels more intense storms, and the tem\u00adper\u00ada\u00adture in Connecticut has increased by about 3 degrees F, accord\u00ading to data pro\u00advid\u00aded to the state from the University of Connecticut Institute for Resilience and Climate Adaptation (CIRCA).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CIRCA\u2019s cli\u00admate assess\u00adment reports are designed to help cities and towns pre\u00addict and deal with increased flood\u00ading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mary Looney, who worked as a munic\u00adi\u00adpal stormwa\u00adter edu\u00adca\u00adtor for the University of Connecticut\u2019s Center for Land Use Education and Research, said, \u201cWhat we\u2019re see\u00ading is real\u00adly intense peri\u00adods of drought, of dry weather\u2014and then, we\u2019re get\u00adting real\u00adly real\u00adly intense rain\u00adfall; we\u2019re see\u00ading sev\u00ader\u00adal inch\u00ades in an hour.\u201d Looney cur\u00adrent\u00adly works for the Bristol-Burlington Health District.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSuch intense rain\u00adstorms are going into one pipe that often\u00adtimes can\u00adnot han\u00addle the flow and veloc\u00adi\u00adty of the water that is going into it,\u201d Looney said.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is over\u00adwhelm\u00ading our sys\u00adtems,\u201d Looney said. \u201cIt\u2019s lead\u00ading to more com\u00adbined sewer over\u00adflows, more bac\u00adte\u00adria exceedances. It\u2019s con\u00adse\u00adquen\u00adtial for our shell fish\u00ading indus\u00adtries, for any\u00adone who\u2019s eat\u00ading raw shell\u00adfish and items like that. So, it def\u00adi\u00adnite\u00adly harms the pub\u00adlic in a way that is not often thought of right off the bat.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

TOP IMAGE: Over time, rain\u00adfall is increas\u00ading in Connecticut. Although 2025 has been a rel\u00ada\u00adtive\u00adly dry year, 2023\u201324 was very wet. The added rain makes com\u00adbined sewage over\u00adflows worse. Map from the Northeast Regional Climate Center.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Julianna D\u2019AddonaUConn Journalism As pre\u00adcip\u00adi\u00adta\u00adtion increas\u00ades and storms become more severe across the Northeast, com\u00adbined sewage sys\u00adtems are being inun\u00addat\u00aded with mix\u00adtures of sewage and rain\u00adwa\u00adter. The net\u00adwork erupts, send\u00ading untreat\u00aded waste into Hartford\u2019s Park River and back\u00ading into some people\u2019s hous\u00ades. Because of a warmer, more humid cli\u00admate, rain\u00adfall in the Northeast has\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1075,"featured_media":1128,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[19],"class_list":["post-170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment","tag-environment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/files\/2025\/06\/Rain-departure-2023-24-NE-Climate-Center-closeup.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1075"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=170"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1144,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170\/revisions\/1144"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaljournalism.uconn.edu\/hartford-north-end-chronic-flooding-sewage\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}