Mr Smith from Basingstoke


Question: How far does a septic tank need to be from a building?

Answer: As far as building regulations are concerned here is what they say:

"Septic tanks should be sited at least 7m from any habitable parts of buildings, and preferably downslope."

As for the soakaway/drainage field this should be as follows

  1. at least 10m from any watercourse or permeable drain;
  2. at least 50m from the point of abstraction of any groundwater supply and not in any Zone 1 groundwater protection zone;
  3. at least 15m from any building;
  4. sufficiently far from any other drainage fields, drainage mounds or soakaways so that the overall soakage capacity of the ground is not exceeded.

Hope this answers your question Mr Smith