Industry · August 9, 2023
Concrete Washout That Keeps TCEQ Happy
Movable, legal, and recoverable at the end of the job instead of becoming a disposal line item.
The short version
Cut-top C-grade containers make compliant, forkliftable washout containment. Concrete washout discharge to storm sewers is prohibited under the TCEQ construction general permit — contained washout isn't optional.
Concrete washout water runs at a pH around 12. It's caustic, it kills aquatic life efficiently, and under the TCEQ construction general permit it cannot be discharged to a storm sewer. That makes containment a compliance requirement rather than a nicety.
The usual options are a purpose-built roll-off, a lined pit, or a cut container. The third one is movable, cheap enough to treat as consumable, and recoverable at the end of the job.
The build
- C-grade container — structurally sound, cosmetically rough, honestly priced. There's no reason to spend more.
- Top cut below the gasket line, deburred, edge-capped.
- Cage retained, which is what makes it forkliftable when full and heavy.
- Pallet base intact so a machine can pick it up and reposition it as the pour moves.
That last point is the practical advantage over a lined pit. Washout needs to be near the pour, and the pour moves. A container follows it; a pit doesn't.
Sizing and placement
| Operation | Containers | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Small residential pour | 1 | Chute and tool washout only |
| Mid-size commercial | 2–3 | One near the pump, one at the truck line |
| Ongoing multi-phase project | 3–6, rotating | Swap full units out rather than trying to empty in place |
Place them on level ground, away from drains and watercourses, and inside the site's perimeter controls. Signage helps — an unlabelled open container on a jobsite eventually receives things that aren't concrete washout.
Letting it harden
The standard approach is to let the solids settle and the water evaporate, then break out the hardened concrete. In Texas summers evaporation does most of the work; in a wet spring it doesn't, and you need enough freeboard that rainfall doesn't overtop the container.
End of job
This is where a container beats the alternatives. Rather than paying to dispose of the containment itself, the container comes back to us: hardened concrete is broken out and crushed, and the HDPE and steel go to material recovery.
The credit on a washout container is smaller than on a clean one — it's had a hard life — but it's a credit rather than a disposal charge, and that's a swing of a couple of hundred dollars per unit on the wrong side of a project budget.
The rest of the jobsite fleet
While we're here, the other jobs C-grade containers do well: jobsite water before the meter is set, dust suppression, curing compound, form release at precast yards, and hydroseed slurry with an agitator port cut in the lid.
All of them share the same logic. The container is cheap enough that losing one to jobsite abuse isn't a disaster, sound enough that it won't leak while it's working, and recoverable at the end rather than becoming waste.
Delivery to a site with nothing on it
Most jobsites have no dock and often no forklift, especially early. We run a moffett-equipped truck — a piggyback forklift that rides on the trailer — for exactly this. Note it when you order, because a standard flatbed cannot unload itself and a wasted delivery costs everyone a day.
Published August 9, 2023 · Filed under Industry
