Lead Levels in Water Misrepresented Across U.S.
Utilities Manipulate or Withhold Test Results to Ward Off Regulators
Cities across the country are manipulating the results of tests used to detect lead in water, violating federal law and putting millions of Americans at risk of drinking more of the contaminant than their suppliers are reporting.
Some cities, including Philadelphia and Boston, have thrown out tests that show high readings or have avoided testing homes most likely to have lead, records show. In New York City, the nation's largest water provider has for the past three years assured its 9.3 million customers that its water was safe because the lead content fell below federal limits. But the city has withheld from regulators hundreds of test results that would have raised lead levels above the safety standard in two of those years, according to records.
The result is that communities large and small may have a false sense of security about the quality of their water and that utilities can avoid spending money to correct the problem.
In some cases, state regulators have helped the utilities avoid costly fixes. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which is supposed to ensure that states are monitoring utilities, has also let communities ignore requirements to reduce lead. In 2003, records show, the EPA ordered utilities to remedy violations in just 14 cases, less than one-tenth of the number ordered in 1997.
Taken together, the records point to a national problem just months after disclosures that lead levels in the District's water are among the highest in the country, a problem the city's utility concealed for months. Documents from other cities show that many have made similar efforts to hide high lead readings, taking advantage of lax national and state oversight and regulations riddled with loopholes.
The Washington Post examined 65 large water systems whose reported lead levels have hovered near or exceeded federal standards. Federal, state and utility records show that dozens of utilities obscured the extent of lead contamination, ignored requirements to correct problems and failed to turn over data to regulators.
Jim Elder, who headed the EPA's drinking water program from 1991 to 1995, said he fears that utilities are engaging in "widespread fraud and manipulation."
"It's time to reconsider whether water utilities can be trusted with this crucial responsibility of protecting the public. I fear for the safety of our nation's drinking water," said Elder, now a water consultant. "Apparently, it's a real crapshoot as to what's going to come out of the tap and whether it will be healthy or not."
Recent attention to the dangers of the District's drinking water has prompted scientists and some members of Congress to call for revamping the lead rules in the 30-year-old Safe Drinking Water Act, which was aimed at limiting dangerous contaminants flowing out of the tap. EPA Administrator Michael Leavitt declined to be interviewed for this article, but his agency has said that a major overhaul to its regulations is unnecessary.
"We have not identified a systemic problem," EPA Acting Assistant Administrator Benjamin H. Grumbles told Congress in July. In an interview, Grumbles said, "We are going full throttle" to pinpoint lead levels across the country. "So far," he said, "we have not seen anything that closely resembles the District in the data we've received."
EPA data analyzed by The Post identified 274 utilities, which together serve 11.5 million people, that have reported unsafe lead levels since 2000. Those numbers do not include cities where testing methods concealed true lead levels.
Utility officials defend their testing methods, saying that they are not designed to deceive the government and that state regulators approved their practices. Others argue that they should not have to spend millions to remove lead that often leaches from their customers' own fixtures.
Some suppliers have worked hard to avoid lead problems. The utility in Kansas City, Mo., tested its water more frequently and treated it more aggressively than the law required. And after the District's problem surfaced, several other jurisdictions in the Washington region voluntarily tested their water and found less contamination than in the city.
Lynn Stovall, a Greenville, S.C., utility manager and member of the American Water Works Association, said many utilities are "hard-pressed" and need more public funding to comply with mounting regulations and improve aging plants.
"The drinking water community faces a complex array of expensive new federal requirements and new standards," Stovall told Congress at this summer's hearing on lead.
Lead exposure can cause serious health problems, including lower IQs in children and brain and kidney damage in adults. Although health experts agree that no amount of lead in drinking water is considered safe, there is some dispute about how much tainted water has to be consumed to cause permanent damage. Because the effect is cumulative, lead in water is particularly problematic in older, urban areas where children are more likely to also be exposed to lead paint, which utilities note is a more prevalent threat.
Despite the health risk caused by lead in water, efforts to eliminate it have run up against other realities, including the high cost of replacing underground pipes that contain lead. Recognizing that states lacked the resources to carefully monitor more than 90 contaminants covered by federal law, the EPA issued lists of priorities starting in 1996. In both cases, its top concern was microbes, which can sicken large populations overnight. Lead did not make the list, and this year, the EPA dropped drinking water altogether from its enforcement priority list, records show.
Competing interests were also in play in 1991 when the EPA wrote new rules on lead. The compromise that emerged requires that, when lead levels exceed 15 parts per billion, utilities must inform the public, treat the water to make it less corrosive or, in some cases, replace pipes.
Because of the cost, many utilities are reluctant to act. In the District, where the D.C. Water and Sewer Authority is under an order to replace service lines, water customers are expected to pay for most of the $350 million project over the rest of the decade.
Withholding Results
Water suppliers are required by law to test for lead regularly -- the largest utilities must check the water in at least 50 homes once every three years. They must follow a strict regimen, trying consistently to test the same "high risk" homes most likely to have lead problems. High-risk homes are defined as those with lead service lines or built in the 1980s, before lead solder in plumbing was banned.
Because so few homes are tested, the results of just one or two can mean the difference between passing and failing. Utilities are required to report to regulators all their test results -- good and bad.
The D.C. Water and Sewer Authority knew in the summer of 2001 that its water contained unsafe lead levels, but it withheld six high test results and said the water was fine, records show. When it tested over the next two years, records show, WASA dropped half of the homes that had previously tested high for lead and avoided high-risk homes.
The EPA, which cited WASA for violations in June, called the utility's practices unprecedented and a "serious breach" of the law.
Documents show that water systems across the country have used similar practices.
In such cities as Boston and Detroit, records indicate that utilities have failed to test the high-risk homes they were required to check. State regulators and the EPA discovered in the spring that at least one-fourth of the locations tested in the Boston area were not high risk and ordered the utility to revamp its program, records show.
More ... http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7094-2004Oct4.html (Over 10000 characters limit)
EPA is our last defense line against these issues. Now more than 50% of EPA staffs has been quitted or resigned when Bush took over the White House because they can not agree with his environment policy since Bush clearly does not care about environment. EPA staffs cannot work if their 'big father' refuse to cooperate with them. I think people have to start worrying about our water system. Remember Rome and lead poisoning issues? Politicans in Rome went nuts due to lead poisoning. Now that's what will happen, my friends.
More information about Lead and its toxicity: http://www.emedicine.com/EMERG/topic293.htm
Since children is more sensitive to lead poisoning due to small size and organs yet not develop so-called 'immune' to the certain level of lead posioning. In other words.. Your children and new generation of children may will become more violence, sick, mental retard, list go on and on. The result may not show until after certain length of time. Parents, be prepare for that. The significant percent of sick children already showed in rurals & cities... by what? I don't know but we will see.
Many countries already banned lead many, many years ago compare to USA. They know that it is bad for their people yet USA corporates does not care until several years ago, EPA and others threw some fusses and won the lawsuit. We finally banned it. Sad eh? Bush & his admin recently state that they plan to lift the ban on asbesto, uh hu. asbesto is very, very dangerous substance. It can give you the lung cancer very faster than others. It is called 'lung cancer mesothelioma'. Some says that it is incurable.
Utilities Manipulate or Withhold Test Results to Ward Off Regulators
Cities across the country are manipulating the results of tests used to detect lead in water, violating federal law and putting millions of Americans at risk of drinking more of the contaminant than their suppliers are reporting.
Some cities, including Philadelphia and Boston, have thrown out tests that show high readings or have avoided testing homes most likely to have lead, records show. In New York City, the nation's largest water provider has for the past three years assured its 9.3 million customers that its water was safe because the lead content fell below federal limits. But the city has withheld from regulators hundreds of test results that would have raised lead levels above the safety standard in two of those years, according to records.
The result is that communities large and small may have a false sense of security about the quality of their water and that utilities can avoid spending money to correct the problem.
In some cases, state regulators have helped the utilities avoid costly fixes. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which is supposed to ensure that states are monitoring utilities, has also let communities ignore requirements to reduce lead. In 2003, records show, the EPA ordered utilities to remedy violations in just 14 cases, less than one-tenth of the number ordered in 1997.
Taken together, the records point to a national problem just months after disclosures that lead levels in the District's water are among the highest in the country, a problem the city's utility concealed for months. Documents from other cities show that many have made similar efforts to hide high lead readings, taking advantage of lax national and state oversight and regulations riddled with loopholes.
The Washington Post examined 65 large water systems whose reported lead levels have hovered near or exceeded federal standards. Federal, state and utility records show that dozens of utilities obscured the extent of lead contamination, ignored requirements to correct problems and failed to turn over data to regulators.
Jim Elder, who headed the EPA's drinking water program from 1991 to 1995, said he fears that utilities are engaging in "widespread fraud and manipulation."
"It's time to reconsider whether water utilities can be trusted with this crucial responsibility of protecting the public. I fear for the safety of our nation's drinking water," said Elder, now a water consultant. "Apparently, it's a real crapshoot as to what's going to come out of the tap and whether it will be healthy or not."
Recent attention to the dangers of the District's drinking water has prompted scientists and some members of Congress to call for revamping the lead rules in the 30-year-old Safe Drinking Water Act, which was aimed at limiting dangerous contaminants flowing out of the tap. EPA Administrator Michael Leavitt declined to be interviewed for this article, but his agency has said that a major overhaul to its regulations is unnecessary.
"We have not identified a systemic problem," EPA Acting Assistant Administrator Benjamin H. Grumbles told Congress in July. In an interview, Grumbles said, "We are going full throttle" to pinpoint lead levels across the country. "So far," he said, "we have not seen anything that closely resembles the District in the data we've received."
EPA data analyzed by The Post identified 274 utilities, which together serve 11.5 million people, that have reported unsafe lead levels since 2000. Those numbers do not include cities where testing methods concealed true lead levels.
Utility officials defend their testing methods, saying that they are not designed to deceive the government and that state regulators approved their practices. Others argue that they should not have to spend millions to remove lead that often leaches from their customers' own fixtures.
Some suppliers have worked hard to avoid lead problems. The utility in Kansas City, Mo., tested its water more frequently and treated it more aggressively than the law required. And after the District's problem surfaced, several other jurisdictions in the Washington region voluntarily tested their water and found less contamination than in the city.
Lynn Stovall, a Greenville, S.C., utility manager and member of the American Water Works Association, said many utilities are "hard-pressed" and need more public funding to comply with mounting regulations and improve aging plants.
"The drinking water community faces a complex array of expensive new federal requirements and new standards," Stovall told Congress at this summer's hearing on lead.
Lead exposure can cause serious health problems, including lower IQs in children and brain and kidney damage in adults. Although health experts agree that no amount of lead in drinking water is considered safe, there is some dispute about how much tainted water has to be consumed to cause permanent damage. Because the effect is cumulative, lead in water is particularly problematic in older, urban areas where children are more likely to also be exposed to lead paint, which utilities note is a more prevalent threat.
Despite the health risk caused by lead in water, efforts to eliminate it have run up against other realities, including the high cost of replacing underground pipes that contain lead. Recognizing that states lacked the resources to carefully monitor more than 90 contaminants covered by federal law, the EPA issued lists of priorities starting in 1996. In both cases, its top concern was microbes, which can sicken large populations overnight. Lead did not make the list, and this year, the EPA dropped drinking water altogether from its enforcement priority list, records show.
Competing interests were also in play in 1991 when the EPA wrote new rules on lead. The compromise that emerged requires that, when lead levels exceed 15 parts per billion, utilities must inform the public, treat the water to make it less corrosive or, in some cases, replace pipes.
Because of the cost, many utilities are reluctant to act. In the District, where the D.C. Water and Sewer Authority is under an order to replace service lines, water customers are expected to pay for most of the $350 million project over the rest of the decade.
Withholding Results
Water suppliers are required by law to test for lead regularly -- the largest utilities must check the water in at least 50 homes once every three years. They must follow a strict regimen, trying consistently to test the same "high risk" homes most likely to have lead problems. High-risk homes are defined as those with lead service lines or built in the 1980s, before lead solder in plumbing was banned.
Because so few homes are tested, the results of just one or two can mean the difference between passing and failing. Utilities are required to report to regulators all their test results -- good and bad.
The D.C. Water and Sewer Authority knew in the summer of 2001 that its water contained unsafe lead levels, but it withheld six high test results and said the water was fine, records show. When it tested over the next two years, records show, WASA dropped half of the homes that had previously tested high for lead and avoided high-risk homes.
The EPA, which cited WASA for violations in June, called the utility's practices unprecedented and a "serious breach" of the law.
Documents show that water systems across the country have used similar practices.
In such cities as Boston and Detroit, records indicate that utilities have failed to test the high-risk homes they were required to check. State regulators and the EPA discovered in the spring that at least one-fourth of the locations tested in the Boston area were not high risk and ordered the utility to revamp its program, records show.
More ... http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7094-2004Oct4.html (Over 10000 characters limit)
EPA is our last defense line against these issues. Now more than 50% of EPA staffs has been quitted or resigned when Bush took over the White House because they can not agree with his environment policy since Bush clearly does not care about environment. EPA staffs cannot work if their 'big father' refuse to cooperate with them. I think people have to start worrying about our water system. Remember Rome and lead poisoning issues? Politicans in Rome went nuts due to lead poisoning. Now that's what will happen, my friends.
More information about Lead and its toxicity: http://www.emedicine.com/EMERG/topic293.htm
Since children is more sensitive to lead poisoning due to small size and organs yet not develop so-called 'immune' to the certain level of lead posioning. In other words.. Your children and new generation of children may will become more violence, sick, mental retard, list go on and on. The result may not show until after certain length of time. Parents, be prepare for that. The significant percent of sick children already showed in rurals & cities... by what? I don't know but we will see.
Many countries already banned lead many, many years ago compare to USA. They know that it is bad for their people yet USA corporates does not care until several years ago, EPA and others threw some fusses and won the lawsuit. We finally banned it. Sad eh? Bush & his admin recently state that they plan to lift the ban on asbesto, uh hu. asbesto is very, very dangerous substance. It can give you the lung cancer very faster than others. It is called 'lung cancer mesothelioma'. Some says that it is incurable.
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