Safe Drinking Water Act (1974)

The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA, 1974) is the main federal law that ensures the quality of drinking water in the Unites States. When implemented, it extended coverage of federal drinking water standards to all public water supplies. Previous standards, established by the United States Public Health Service beginning in 1914 and administered by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) since its creation in 1970, had legally applied only to water supplies serving interstate carriers (e.g., planes, ships, and rail cars engaged in interstate commerce). However, many states and municipalities complied with them on a voluntary basis. Under the SDWA, public water supplies were defined as those publicly or privately owned community water systems having at least 15 connections or serving at least 25 year-round customers or non-community water supplies serving at least 25 non-residents for at least 60 days per year.

The SDWA required the EPA to promulgate primary drinking water regulations to protect public health and secondary drinking water regulations to protect the aesthetic and economic qualities of the water. The EPA was granted authority to regulate: 1) contaminants which may affect health (e.g., trace levels of carcinogenic chemicals which may or may not have an impact on human health); 2) compounds which react during water treatment to form contaminants; 3) classes of compounds (if more convenient than regulating individual compounds); and 4) treatment techniques, when it is not feasible to regulate individual contaminants (e.g., disinfection is required in lieu of standards on individual disease-causing microorganisms ).

Recognizing the right and the responsibility of the states to oversee the safety of their own drinking water supplies, the SDWA authorized the EPA to grant primacy to states willing to accept primary responsibility for administering their own drinking water program. To obtain primacy, a state must develop a drinking water program meeting minimum federal requirements and must establish and enforce primary regulations at least as stringent as those promulgated by the EPA. States with primacy are encouraged to enforce the federal secondary drinking water regulations, but are not required to do so.

Other provisions of the SDWA authorized control of underground injection (e.g., waste disposal wells ); required special protection of sole-source aquifers (those providing the only source of drinking water in a given area); authorized funds for research on drinking water treatment; required the EPA to conduct a rural water supply survey to investigate the quality of drinking water in rural areas; allocated funds to subsidize up to 75% of the cost of enlarging state drinking water programs; required utilities to publicly notify their customers when the primary regulations are violated; permitted citizens to file suit against the EPA or a state having primacy; and granted the EPA emergency powers to protect public health.

Dissatisfied with the slow pace at which new regulations were being promulgated by the EPA, which had in 1983 initiated a process to revise the primary and secondary standards , Congress amended the SDWA in 1986. The 1986 amendments required the EPA: to set primary standards for nine contaminants within one year, 40 more within two years, 34 more within three years, and 25 more by 1991; to specify criteria for filtration of surface water supplies and disinfection of groundwater supplies; to require large public water systems to monitor for the presence of certain unregulated contaminants; to establish programs to demonstrate how to protect sole-source aquifers; to require the states to develop well-head protection programs; and to issue, within 18 months, rules regarding injection of waste below a water source.

The 1986 SDWA amendments also prohibited the use of lead solder, flux, and pipe; authorized the EPA to treat Indian tribes as states, making them eligible for primacy and grant assistance; required the EPA to conduct a survey of drinking water quality on Indian lands; authorized the EPA to initiate enforcement action if a state fails to take appropriate action within 30 days; and increased both civil and criminal penalties for failure to comply with the SDWA.

Since 1986 was a Congressional election year and every member of Congress wanted to go on record as having voted for safe drinking water, the amendments passed unanimously. However, Congress failed to provide federal funds to assist state programs in complying with the many new provisions of the SDWA. The average annual cost per state to comply with the SDWA by the year 1995 has been estimated to be nearly $500 million.

Further amendments to SWDA were passed in 1996. The new amendments established a Drinking Water State Revolving Fund to finance state compliance costs for water treatment facilities, easier access to water quality information for consumers, and contamination prevention initiatives. The mandate for contaminant testing was changed to a risk-based prioritized system that granted the EPA the authority to decide whether or not to regulate a contaminant after completing a required review of five contaminants every five years. The amendments also called for specific risk assessments and final regulation of radon , arsenic , DBP/cryptosporidium, and sulfate.

As of 2002, the SWDA ranks the following drinking water standards as rule making priorities:

• Arsenic– The SWDA requires the EPA to revise the existing 50 parts per billion (ppb) standard for arsenic in drinking water; the EPA implemented a 10 ppb standard for arsenic in January 2001; After the Bush administration briefly withdrew the standard, the new rule became effective in February 2002. All U.S. water systems must be in compliance by 2006;
• Ground Water Rule– The EPA is proposing to regulate the appropriate use of disinfection in ground water and of other components of ground water systems to ensure public health protection.
• Lead and copper– The EPA estimates that approximately 20% of human exposure to lead is attributable to lead in drinking water.
• Microbials and disinfection byproducts– The EPA considers that a major challenge for water suppliers is how to balance the risks from microbial pathogens and disinfection byproducts.
• MTBE– MTBE (methyl-t-butyl ether) belongs to a group of chemicals commonly known as fuel oxygenates and has replaced lead as an octane enhancer since 1979.
• Radionuclides– The EPA has updated standards for radionuclides in drinking water.
• Radon– Radon is a naturally-occurring radioactive gas associated with cancer , and that may be found in drinking water and indoor air. The EPA has developed a regulation to reduce radon in drinking water.

[Stephen Randtke and Paula Anne Ford-Martin ]

RESOURCES

BOOKS

Ingram, Colin. The Drinking Water Book: A Complete Guide to Safe Drinking Water. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 1991.

Lewis, Scott A. The Sierra Club Guide to Safe Drinking Water. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books, 1996.

National Research Council. Setting Priorities for Drinking Water Contaminants. Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1999.

Subcommittee on Arsenic in Drinking Water, Committee on Toxicology, Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology, Commission on Life Sciences, National Research Council. Arsenic in Drinking Water Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1999. Available online at http://books.nap.edu/books/0309063337/html/index.html. Accessed June 2, 2002.

OTHER

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Water. The Safe Water Drinking Act. [cited June 2, 2002]. <http://www.epa.gov/OGWDW/sdwa/sdwa.html>.

ORGANIZATIONS

Water Environment Federation, 601 Wythe Street, Alexandria, VA USA 22314-1994 (703) 684-2400, Fax: (703) 684-2492, Toll Free: (800) 666-0206, Email: [email protected], <http://www.wef.org>