Under the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed rule, water systems would have to replace lead service lines in 10 years, with limited exceptions.
The proposal comes nearly a decade after the start of the Flint water crisis, in which about 99,000 Flint, Mich., residents were exposed to lead.
That exposure was caused by a water supply switch that caused lead pipes to corrode and lead to leach into the water.
There is no safe level of exposure to lead, which damages children’s brains and nervous systems.
There are currently about 9.2 million lead pipes serving water to homes in the U.S.
In the meantime, the EPA’s proposal would lower the level of lead at which systems are required to take action.
Currently, if 10 percent of water samples are found to have at least 15 parts per billion of lead, water systems need to take mitigation actions.
The EPA’s proposal would drop that number down to 10 parts per billion.
“Moving from 15 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion is a very significant public health improvement. It is going to compel a significant number of water systems to be taking interim measures like corrosion control,” Radhika Fox, the EPA’s top water official, told reporters.
Read more at TheHill.com.
