It’s April 7th, 2021 and welcome to First 100. You can sign up to receive First 100 by email by clicking here.
The boss
Safe drinking water for everyone in America is an important goal and Joe Biden’s American Jobs Plan is investing $ 111 billion. While the bulk of the funds will be used to upgrade water treatment and supply systems and clean up potentially harmful chemicals such as PFAS, most notably a $ 45 billion initiative to “replace 100 percent of the country’s utility pipes and service lines” was launched in moved to the foreground.
If we could do that, it would make a huge difference. Lead exposure has been credibly linked to childhood developmental disorders, kidney disease, hearing problems, brain damage, behavioral disorders and provocative crime. We got rid of leaded gasoline and paint in the 1970s and it still remains an ongoing problem. Some of it comes from tainted water flowing through lead pipes.
However, if you want to replace all of the lead water pipes in America, the first thing you need to do is to find all of the lead water pipes in America.
This is surprisingly not easy to do. You hear a lot about the water infrastructure of homes and buildings that are up to 100 years old, but in a similar context, there haven’t been many good records going back all the way. “There are 50,000 water systems across the country,” said Mary Grant of Food and Water Watch. “Many are tiny.” We do not have a good overview of the size of the lead pipe connections and a full survey will be required.
The EPA’s 30-year-old lead and copper rule, which sets a maximum lead content in water (currently 15 parts per billion), has just been updated to require all water systems to “identify and publish the locations of lead supply lines.” but they have until 2024 to complete it. And once the rule is finalized later this year, tests for lead will be run in daycare and schools for the first time (the EPA has just asked for an extension).
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The American Water Works Association estimated 6.1 million domestic lines in 2016 and a cost of $ 30 billion for full replacement. In addition to surveying to find all of the lead pipes, this will devour most of the $ 45 billion the White House has reserved for this initiative. But of course, if we’ve just started testing in schools, we have no idea how much lead is in that water. Lead levels have been found in the water at schools in Baltimore, Maryland, Portland, Oregon, and elsewhere. A 2018 Harvard study analyzed 12 states that require water tests for lead in schools and found 44 percent with at least one elevated sample.
This leads Grant to believe that the administration will have to spend a lot more money on permanent pipe removal if it is to cover all homes, schools, and daycare centers. The WATER Act, backed by Food and Water Watch, creates a $ 35 billion annual trust fund, but it also includes money for treatment systems and other matters.
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Finding the pipes doesn’t end the challenge. Lead pipes lead from the water pipe into the houses via a water meter. At least part of this line of services is by definition the property of a single homeowner or landlord. Some states may not allow you to replace this portion of the pipe without the owner’s consent. And usually the homeowner has to pay to have the lead pipes replaced on their side of the property line. The District of Columbia estimates this cost at $ 2,000 to $ 3,000, which is a difficult expense for many.
“We need a full lead service line replacement,” Grant told me. “Just doing the utility part would make the crisis worse.” This is because a partial replacement of the service line can cause so-called galvanic corrosion when the new, usually copper, pipe meets the old lead pipe on the loose line. This can eat away at the old pipe and increase the level of lead in the water. The CDC has warned that partial replacement “may be linked to an increased incidence of high blood levels in children”. In addition to service lines, internal house installations and fittings, especially in older houses, can also use lead.
Grant points out that the language in the bill needs to clarify that the federal investment made through the EPA Drinking Water State (SRF) grant and Water Infrastructure Improvement for the Nation (WIIN) is for the full replacement the line is provided only. And the funds should relieve the owners of having to pay their share of that replacement.
This poses another problem. At the moment, the owner must be ready to have the service lines replaced. The SRF does not allow a major domain to force the improvements. You can imagine a landlord who does not want to bear any additional costs, e.g. B. to accommodate the residents in a hotel for a week while the pipes are exchanged and refuse to work. “It needs to be made clear that this is a public health issue,” Grant said.
If, as the CDC says, exposure to lead is not safe, especially in children, then lead in water shouldn’t be the only priority. There is a credible argument that remedying lead in soil is a bigger problem than water, although of course the point here is that everything needs to be gotten rid of. In older schools with parking lots, lead has been idle for 50 years or more. Soil remediation could cost up to $ 100 billion, according to an estimate, so you can see why the administration made the selection. But the benefits to the health and wellbeing of children would be incredible, and since you can’t remove half the lead and get the benefits, you need to be comprehensive if you are to make any progress here.
What’s good is that the Biden team put lead mining, a critical priority for environmental justice, on the radar, even if they only looked at part of the problem. “Too often water is forgotten when talking about lead,” said Grant. “It’s almost forgotten infrastructure, out of sight, out of mind.”
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What day of Biden’s presidency is it?
Day 78.
I learned today
- Two reconciliation bills per fiscal year would give the Democrats, with their current majority, a total of six shots to push party line bills forward. (CNN)
- The strategy for reconciliation laws has already begun, starting with a comprehensive immigration reform. (Appeal)
- Voting Law HR1 is an unlikely choice for reconciliation, but there are bigger problems as its language is really a wildcard in parts and not even supported by the majority. (Vox)
- Janet Yellen’s diplomatic effort to create global tax havens is another example of monumental politics without the need for Congress. (The week)
- The biggest problem we have in America is certainly the lack of idle gossip in the White House. (Washington Post)
- About half of all new coronavirus cases are in four states, and the Biden government should definitely speed up vaccines. (Associated Press)
- Most educators were vaccinated, roughly 4 to 5. (CBS News)
- Not even tentative steps towards peace in the Middle East. (Politico)
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