AWWA JAW62911

This bimonthly roundup features highlights of the hottest news stories of recent months as reported in WATERWEEK, AWWA's weekly newsletter to member utilities. Topics covered include: the largest US drinking water utilities and smaller systems served by them face deadlines this year to comply with certain early implementation requirements of the companion Stage 2 Disinfectants and Disinfection Byproducts Rule (D/DBPR) and Long-Term 2 Enhanced Surface Water Treatment Rule (LT2ESWTR); US water suppliers that exceed disinfection byproduct (DBP) standards under the US Environmental Protection Agency's (USEPA) newly promulgated Stage 2 D/DBPR will not be required to include any information about potential reproductive and developmental health effects in public notices; as directed by the Portland City Council in a January resolution, city officials recently filed a formal notice of intent to challenge USEPA's newly promulgated LT2ESWTR with the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia; the White House budget request for FY 2007 again seeks to reduce spending for the Clean Water State Revolving Fund (SRF), this time amounting to $199 million less than the FY 2006 level of $886.8 million. It would, however, boost funding for the Drinking Water SRF by $4 million, to $841.5 million; state environmental officials have urged USEPA to boost funding dramatically for grants to support state programs that implement agency regulations, including clean and safe water regulations; recent comments by AWWA assert that USEPA should revise its draft policy to ensure that wastewater bypass storm flows are adequately monitored and disinfected and that downstream water utilities are immediately notified of such bypass events; AWWA and a dozen other organizations have joined USEPA in vowing to take a collaborative approach to protect sources of drinking water from contamination; as announced by USEPA, which spearheaded the initiative, the 14 signatories to the Source Water Collaborative committed to work together to protect lake, river, and aquifer sources of drinking water in the face of expanding population and development; water and wastewater utilities should work with local and state governments to establish mutual-aid and assistance networks, AWWA and six other water sector organizations urge in a joint policy statement; nearly one month after the deadline for water systems to meet USEPA's tougher new arsenic standard of 10 µg/L, fewer than a third of the 4,100 systems expected to exceed the limit were in compliance, according to information provided by states to USEPA's Drinking Water Protection Division; and, human health effects data that could support a safe arsenic exposure level "are lacking or problematic," concludes a USEPA Science Advisory Board (SAB) panel that is reviewing several agency cancer risk assessments for organic and inorganic arsenic.