The Environmental Protection Agency is pouring more money into the efforts to remove lead from local drinking water systems, more than a year into St. Louis’ work to comply with an order to replace lead pipes.
The EPA announced last week the release of $3 billion in federal funding for the effort. The agency, under the Biden administration, issued a rule last year requiring the identification and removal of lead pipes in city drinking water systems within the decade.
Lawmakers, including representatives from Illinois, had recently called on the EPA to release promised federal funding they said was being held up and slowing the process.
In St. Louis, it’s been a year of working to complete Step 1 of the effort: identifying which pipes actually need replacement.
“We don't have an agreement in place yet for the replacements, just for the inventory, and we're working towards the replacement plan,” said Niraj Patel, St. Louis water commissioner.
The city’s Water Division is surveying residents and conducting home inspections to get a true count of lead service lines. St. Louis is estimated to have one of the highest numbers of lead services lines in the country, according to analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The city categorizes a pipe’s status as “unknown” when it is on private property, and updated records may not accurately reflect if service lines are made of lead. Right now, site visits are the only way to determine the pipe material, in a process that Patel said can be sluggish.
“There is new technology out there that is predictive modeling that many states have adopted and are going towards to reduce this huge unknown category and help us find the lead. It may be able to take a subset of data that has 50,000-plus unknowns like we have here in St Louis and clear many of them based on validated service line inventory results,” said Patel. “It just has not yet progressed to being able to be used in the state of Missouri.”
Patel said grant money has helped with the survey efforts in St. Louis, but much more money will be needed to actually get the pipes out of the ground.
“We would be ready to progress on replacing those lines if there was sufficient funding,” said Patel.
Recent and regular testing of St. Louis water does not detect lead levels at or above the EPA action level. Individual home water testing is available free to city residents.
The Trump administration’s EPA has not made major adjustments to the rule, but ongoing legal challenges could alter the timing and funding guidance.
Patel noted that the lead pipe removal initiative is one of several updates the city needs to make on its water system, including to mains and treatment plants.
“It’s something that we need to be practical about how we approach this and make sure that the ratepayers, the city residents, aren't absorbing all of this unnecessarily,” said Patel. “Accessing the federal funding, I think, is critical.”
The cost of replacing lead pipes in St. Louis is higher than originally thought, with cost estimates now upward of $12,000 each, according to Patel.
In a release, the EPA says federal money is likely to stretch further than anticipated, though, as the number of lead pipes nationwide is likely lower than previously estimated. The agency has launched a dashboard to highlight updated lead service line information from each state.
Water testing information for St. Louis and links to reporting lead service lines on private property are available on the city’s website.
