Japan's System for Verification of Sewerage Technology

Japan has two systems for evaluating and verifying sewerage technologies. The first one is "SPIRIT21", which is a system operated on the initiative of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT). And the other one is the Construction Technology Review and Verification System (CTRVS), which covers almost all the technologies relating to infrastructure development and management and is operated by 15 non-profit organizations, of which Japan Institute of Wastewater Engineering Technology (JIWET) is responsible for sewerage technology. The first topic of SPIRIT21 was "Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Control Technologies" and intensive development and evaluation was conducted from FY2002 through FY2004. The second project selected in SPIRIT21 was "LOTUS", which was the acronym for "Lead to Outstanding Technology for Utilization of Sludge". This project was conducted from FY2005 through FY2007, focusing on the material recycling and energy recovery related to sewage sludge. The basic purposes of CTRVS are to promote research and development undertaken by private enterprises and to facilitate the employment of those innovative technologies by government and local governments which manage their infrastructure asset. JIWET plays a leading role bridging the information gap between sewerage managers, i.e. local governments which want innovative solutions to the technical challenges they face. A total of 204 new technologies related to sewerage have been verified under the scheme of CTRVS for 17 years since the establishment of JIWET.