The wastewater industry is facing a perfect storm that is leaving public works departments scrambling for workers. The industry’s aging workforce is approaching retirement age, and they will take decades of experience with them; meanwhile cash-strapped utilities are seeing budget shortfalls just as much of the nation’s wastewater infrastructure reaches a critical age. At the same time, fewer young people are pursuing careers in the trades. The looming labor shortage, however, has a silver lining for job seekers: A career in the wastewater industry can be both rewarding and lucrative.

When sewer systems work, they’re largely invisible to the public. Wastewater flows, unseen, through pipes from homes, businesses and industries to treatment plants, where it is cleaned and returned to the environment. 

But standing pools of water and foul odor—signs a sewer is not functioning properly—are increasingly common.

Many wastewater operators are fighting an uphill battle. Underground infrastructure across North America is reaching a critical age, and regular inspection and maintenance are essential to ensuring system function. But those require skilled labor and money—which are in short supply in many municipalities.

Digital workflows deliver many benefits to sewer inspection teams. Now, municipalities and contractors who are looking to streamline their workflows for peak efficiency can learn about the fundamentals in our new whitepaper, Digital Workflows for Wastewater Inspection and Maintenance.

Many wastewater pros focus exclusively on gathering inspection footage, but that task is only a small part of the wastewater assessment workflow. And throughout the inspection process, there are a lot of handoffs: from supervisors who are assigning work to inspection crews; from crews who take videos and record observations to the teams assessing and prioritizing future work; from contractors to municipalities when work is completed; and more. Not surprisingly, crews that can transfer inspection and rehab information smoothly tend to work more quickly and efficiently.

Most of the work tackled by the ROVVER X sewer inspection crawler is routine sewer inspection work: driving up main lines, capturing CCTV footage for mandatory, scheduled assessments. But this nimble, powerful crawler is designed to withstand even the most punishing underground environments. That durability, plus its compact, portable design, means that over the years it has been deployed in a range of off-road — and off-label — sites.

Every day, wastewater pros around the world leverage equipment and software to keep communities clean and healthy. Key to this task is collecting and analyzing data to plan maintenance, improve performance and achieve compliance. Video from crawlers and other visual assessment methods, in addition to laser profiling and sonar data, can provide a complete picture of underground infrastructure.

The design and planning of a sewer system plays a key role in protecting our lakes, rivers and oceans—and the people and wildlife who swim in and drink from them. Treatment plants reduce pollutants, including the human waste, food scraps, chemicals and oils that accumulate in wastewater, so that it can be safely released into the environment.

For both contractors and municipalities, there’s a lot that goes into running a successful wastewater maintenance operation. The precarious work requires vigor, patience and skill. It requires planning, organization and solutions-based mindsets. And it requires capable, productive equipment. Above all else, a successful wastewater operation needs a loyal team that’s committed to the work.

Damaged pipes, varied materials, laterals and main lines—ROVVER X is the ever-adaptable inspection crawler that can do it all. Whether you’re conducting routine assessments or on an emergency call out, Envirosight’s versatile crawler is easily configured for unique pipe conditions. The system is designed to be adaptable, so that inspection crews can get more bang for the buck and avoid investing in additional unnecessary equipment