New federal rules require finding and replace pipes that could contain lead. But there is disagreement over who pays for the lines on private property.
Adam Bojorquez knelt on the curb and pointed a cell phone into a hole, quickly snapping pictures of the water service line below the ground. He measured its depth and diameter, gathering information to be uploaded into a San Antonio Water System database, along with the most vital detail: the pipes, on both sides of the water meter, were made of copper.
To comply with new federal rules, SAWS is working to determine how many of its hundreds of thousands of service lines — which run from water mains to residences — are made of lead or galvanized materials that can carry lead. If ingested through drinking water, lead can cause significant health problems, health experts say. SAWS' inspections are a requirement under recent rules from the Environmental Protection Agency, which mandate that water utilities complete an inventory of their entire system to identify any pipes made of lead or certain galvanized materials that can carry lead. It’s a big — and potentially expensive — undertaking, and it’s going on at utilities all over the country. The lengthy investigation is just the first step in complying with new rules: Utilities will need to remove any of those potentially dangerous pipes by 2037. The federal rules have also led to confusion about where a utility’s responsibility ends and a property owner’s begins, with different utilities in the San Antonio area taking different approaches. SAWS has been searching for lead pipes in its system for two years and hasn’t found one yet, said Kirstin Eller, the utility’s potable water quality supervisor. But SAWS still has more than 370,000 “unknown” lines that need to be investigated. Taking stock of service lines Under a rule issued in 2021, the “Lead Copper Rule Revision,” utilities were required to submit their initial inventories by October 2024. That regulation was in response to the Flint, Michigan, water crisis, Eller told the San Antonio City Council’s Municipal Utilities Committee. The Michigan city’s water became contaminated with lead and other chemicals, creating health issues for thousands of residents. Last year, the EPA issued another rule, “Lead and Copper Rule Improvements,” requiring water utilities to replace all lead lines and at-risk galvanized lines that are under a utility’s “control” by 2037. Utilities were required to notify customers of their service line status last fall, and must continue identifying any unknown lines and updating the inventories annually. Service lines have joint ownership: The water utility owns the line from the main to the meter, while the property owner owns the line that runs from the meter to the building. The inventories must include information about the materials of both parts of the lines. Homes built after 1989, when Texas outlawed lead, are considered to have “non-lead” pipes, but for any older homes, the material must be documented. That can be done in several ways: building and utility records can provide proof of materials, and residents can self-submit the material if they’ve inspected the line or replaced it themselves. If SAWS previously replaced lines in an older area, the utility can use those records to rule out lead as well, Eller said. In the 1980s and 1990s, more than 800 lead water lines were removed in San Antonio. For smaller utilities, the inventory effort is largely complete and officials have estimates of what will need to be replaced, which is required by the more recent 2024 rule revision. New Braunfels Utilities identified about 3,300 lines that are “galvanized requiring replacement.” Galvanized pipes can be made of steel or iron with an internal coating. When there are lead pipes upstream of a galvanized pipe, water can carry lead into the galvanized pipe, where the coating then acts like a magnet. The lead becomes attached to that pipe, and can be released over time in the water flowing to customers. That means galvanized lines that were previously downstream of a lead pipe could pose a threat to residents and must now be removed. NBU has also identified 942 “unknown” lines, and is continuing to locate more. Two lead pipes were found on NBU’s side of the meter, and were replaced when they were found, the utility said. NBU has applied for $25 million in federal funding, available through the Texas Water Development Board, in order to do that replacement work, which it aims to start in October 2027. Mark Steelman, NBU’s chief operating officer, said that money will be used to replace lines on both the utility’s and customers' sides of the meters, because the utility’s interpretation of the new rule is that it will be responsible for both parts. “As the regulation is written, they’re considering the application of this rule to include the service line from the main all the way to the home, past the water meter,” he said. “If we’re going to abide by the letter of the rule, that would include the service line that extends all the way to the residents' home, that would be the responsibility of the water system.” Unless property owners deny the utility permission to replace the line, replacing it is NBU’s responsibility, he said. “At this time, that is our understanding,” he said. Other utilities are interpreting the rule differently, with plans to cover the costs of their service line replacements but not the costs of the customers' private lines. San Marcos' utility department has narrowed its list of “unknowns” to fewer than 300, said Paul Kite, assistant director for the utility. The city has identified more than 17,000 non-lead pipes and almost 2,700 galvanized pipes. About 80% of those are on the customers' side, he said. The city will start planning to fund the replacements on the public pipes. Kite said he expects the city will start borrowing money for that effort in next year’s capital improvements planning cycle. San Marcos officials are working to find funding to help customers pay for the replacements on their side, he said, but haven’t determined that yet. Boerne Utilities has about 660 unknown city service lines and 1,660 unknown customer service lines, a city spokesman said. Residents have been notified if their lines are unknown, and the city is asking those people to have their lines examined and submit documentation of the material. 'Chasing those outliers' SAWS, which is by far the largest utility in the region with more than half a million customers, is still working to identify the material of more than half of its 642,000 service lines. About 60% of those are still classified as unknown materials, Eller said. The city-owned utility said it expects to spend about $11.7 million on the investigations and inventory through 2027, with “additional costs in the future for managing this issue.” Residents who have been notified that their line material is unknown can request a free inspection from SAWS. More than 11,000 people have signed up for those, she said. “Its going to be a slow process to get through all of those,” Eller said. “We’re committed to getting through them as quickly as we can.” If records of the line material aren’t available, then SAWS starts with a meter box inspection, looking at the lines on either side of the meter. But the lines themselves aren’t always visible inside the box, so the next step is an approach called “potholing.” The Rios Group, a Fort Worth-based firm, has been hired for some of that work, which Bojorquez and Emilio Mendez were doing on a recent weekday. Using a hydro-excavation truck with high pressure air and a vacuum hose, they dig a hole on either side of the meter until they uncover the service line. Technicians then upload information about the pipe to a database for SAWS and another contractor, Arcadis, to review. The team aims to complete 10 potholing investigations per day, said Michael Velasquez, who was supervising the work. In some areas of the city with rocky soil, it takes longer to excavate the line, and delays can also come in the form of wildlife: technicians have encountered snakes and venomous widow spiders, he said. SAWS is also inspecting lines when crews install new advanced meters, a system-wide initiative already underway, and residents can also have a plumber inspect their pipes or evaluate the lines themselves and submit that information, she said. While the 370,000 unknown lines include pipes on both sides of the meter, the list is “dominated by the customer side,” Eller said, because the utility doesn’t have records for lines on private property. So far, no lead lines have been found, Eller said. If a lead or “galvanized requiring replacement” line is found on a customer’s side, SAWS will offer to replace it at the customer’s expense. Unlike NBU, the utility said it is not financially responsible for work on private property. The utility could be able to provide funding to help customers with those costs, Eller said, but SAWS hasn’t determined what that program would look like because it doesn’t yet know the scale of replacements. “We are in the process of developing some funding options,” she said, but “it’s difficult because we don’t know what we’re funding.” The largest numbers of unknown pipes are in city council District 1 and District 5, she told the council committee. SAWS has prioritized inspections in areas where it thinks lead is most likely, as well as properties that customers have requested. For example, crews recently checked old houses from the former Kelly Air Force Base, thinking they might have lead pipes, Eller said, but none were found. To accelerate the process of inspections, SAWS is working with the EPA to test technology that could help identify the lines faster and without digging holes. But those approaches haven’t yet been approved and are still undergoing analysis. SAWS has also applied for federal funding to help with the effort. Eller said unlike cities in northern states, where lead was far more commonly used, San Antonio’s task is less daunting, because fewer pipes will ultimately need to be replaced. “We’re chasing those outliers,” she said. “I’m not going to say it’s not there, but we really feel like we’re looking for that needle in the haystack.” Questions about control Nationwide, the new rules have come under scrutiny, raising questions about replacing the lines on private property and cost burdens of that work. Opponents have accused the EPA of both overstepping and of falling short. The American Water Works Association, which is an organization of water supply utilities and professionals, has filed suit over the 2024 Lead and Copper Rule Improvements rule. In December, it asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to review whether the EPA violated laws with the new rule, particularly by requiring utilities to replace service lines that are deemed to be under their control. The association is “deeply concerned” about the new rule’s “approach to lead service lines on private property,” the association said in a statement about the petition. The new rule “presumes that a water system 'controls' a lead service line when it has 'access' to that line,” the association said, which it believes violates the Safe Drinking Water Act. “By attempting to define access and control as one and the same, the effectively expands the definition of a public water system to include private property and makes water utilities responsible for issues on private property they cannot necessarily address,” the association said. The association said a study it sponsored found nationwide replacement costs could be more than $100 billion, burdening customers financially, and said the requirement to replace all problematic service lines by 2037 “is not feasible.” The Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental advocacy group, has also criticized the EPA for the control provision — but said the rule doesn’t go far enough. The rule “made several significant improvements in the protection of the public,” but still left some gaps, senior strategic director Erik Olson wrote on the council’s website. “The final LCRI fails to require utilities to replace lead pipes that they claim they can’t access,” Olson said. The language about control in the new rule “may encourage some water utilities to disingenuously argue that they cannot access and therefore don’t control their lead service lines and don’t have to replace them,” he said, which could become a “significant loophole.” The group also criticized the EPA for not requiring utilities to pay for replacement of the full line. “If water utilities fail to pay for full replacement, this will leave significant cost burdens on individual households that wish to see their entire line replaced and will make it difficult to reach the 100 percent replacement rate sought under the rule,” he said. “That means that too often, lower-income people will continue to drink water contaminated by lead pipes.”
Environmental Protection Agency American Water Works Association Rios Group San Antonio Water System LCRI Boerne Utilities Natural Resources Defense Council San Antonio City Council U.S. Court Of Appeals For The District Of Columbi Municipal Utilities Committee Texas Water Development Board Arcadis Kirstin Eller Adam Bojorquez Mark Steelman Paul Kite Michael Velasquez Erik Olson Emilio Mendez San Antonio Michigan Texas Flint San Marcos Fort Worth District 5 District 1 Kelly Air Force Base Lead And Copper Rule Improvements Lead Copper Rule Revision Lead And Copper Rule Improvements Safe Drinking Water Act
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