DC's Lead Water Pipes Must Be Replaced

Testimony of Larry Martin, PhD
Sierra Club District of Columbia Chapter
Oversight Hearing on the Department of Energy and the Environment
Committee on Transportation and the Environment
February 28, 2023

Introduction

Chairman Allen, Councilmembers and staff. I am happy to appear here today to testify at the oversight hearing for DC Water. I’m also happy to see that the responsibilities of this committee, so ably managed in the past have moved on to your good offices and am confident that the District’s commitment to the health of our urban environment will be well cared for. My name is Larry Martin, and I am the chair of the Clean Water Committee of the Sierra Club District of Columbia Chapter. The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters nationwide. The DC chapter has about 3,000 dues-paying members.

I will be speaking today on the issues of lead service line replacement, the management of combined sewer overflows to our surface waters, and risk assessment for the biosolid from Blue Plains marketed as “Bloom.”

Lead Service Line Replacement

The Council established by law The Lead Service Line Planning Task Force to develop an interagency plan for the removal and replacement of all lead water service lines by 2030.^[1] The Council received a report from The Lead Service Line Planning Task Force in November of 2022 stating that as many as 115,000 district residents may be exposed to lead contamination in their drinking water.^[2] The Council’s response to require an independent evaluation of the report’s findings and recommendations demonstrate that councilmembers are acutely aware of the severe neurological and other health effects of lead exposure – whether by drinking water or other ingestion, and that public health research documents how lead exposure in childhood can lead to behaviors such as violence in adulthood.

The Task Force Report identified DC Water as having the highest involvement in all of the aspects of replacing lead service lines by 2030: Planning, Design & Project Selection, Permitting, Inspection, Inventory & Data Collection, and Education & Outreach. So, while it is not the only agency with responsibilities to solve this problem, it is effectively the lead. There are numerous recommendations in the Task Force report that focus on DC Water’s role in lead service lines (LSL) replacement that the Sierra Club supports and that need the attention of the Council. Today, we focus on one in particular, because it is key to the timely and cost-effective removal of all LSL in the District.

LSLs are thought to exist in two parts, the part that exists in public right of way and is the responsibility of DC Water, and the part that is on private property and is the responsibility of the owner.  For many years DC Water has been removing the LSL pipe in the public right of way and would, if requested, remove and replace the LSL on private property if the owner paid for it.  More recently, funds were budgeted by the District to subsidize LSL replacement on private property, thereby removing an obstacle: the cost of replacement. It is well known now that when DC Water replaces LSLs it is most efficient and far more cost-effective to do so block by block, as compared to scatter-shot one-off LSL replacements. The block-by-block strategy is our best hope for LSL replacement ASAP to meet the 2030 goal. However, we learn from the report that about 25% of property owners have refused to participate in the block-by-block program, even though the replacement is free for the property owner. Addressing this barrier to success was identified in the report as offering the greatest improvement in program effectiveness. “The Task Force recommends that the legislation be enacted to require that property owners either demonstrate they are not served by a lead service line (LSL), or (1) replace the LSL on their own or (2) participate in the DC Water block-by-block program” (pg. 7-8 Report of the Lead Service Line Planning Task Force). It is essential that this problem is addressed promptly for DC Water to be able to do its job. The Council’s role is to pass legislation to address this problem.

Sierra Club also wants to highlight two other recommendations from the report that our colleagues at NAACP have strongly advocated for – getting a definitive inventory of remaining LSLs endangering our communities and providing filters to anyone who has a LSL or service line of unknown material. “The Task Force recommends that DC Water create a project dedicated solely to updating the inventory” (pg. 11 Report of the Lead Service Line Planning Task Force). “While identifying and replacing LSLs, the Task Force recommends establishing a program and identifying funding to provide water filters to homes with lead service lines and those with no service line material information” (pg. 14 Report of the Lead Service Line Planning Task Force).

Sierra Club is aware of at least a couple of draft laws being developed that address LSL replacement. We expect that these bills will appear before this committee in the coming month. Coordination, harmonization, and passage of the legislation is critical to the effective implementation of DC Water’s LSL replacement program.

Risk Assessment of Blue Plains biosolid – Bloom

The Sierra Club has a national policy opposing the land application of sewage sludge due to its largely under-regulated management of toxic contaminants. The chemical class known as PFAS is illustrative of the contamination problem that is still not regulated at the national level. Sierra Club has sponsored research studies that demonstrate PFAS is present in the sewage sludge-biosolid product from Blue Plains that is marketed for land application under the name of Bloom.^[3] The science is still incomplete to inform whether there is any safe level of PFAS exposure. The DC Council provided funding in the 2018 budget to DOEE for DC Water to undertake a cumulative risk assessment of Bloom that would examine the potential cumulative risks of contaminants in Bloom. Sierra Club advocated for the funding and has been co-lead on the project, which is nearing completion of the first phase. The first phase will provide important background on potential contaminants in Bloom and present a plan for their analysis within a cumulative risk assessment. The joint undertaking by DC Water and the Sierra Club DC Chapter is an important demonstration of a science-based approach to environmental problem solving and decision making. When the results of the first phase of the study are complete, they will be shared with the Transportation and Environment Committee.

Combined Sewer Overflows & the Swim Ban

We note that DC is on schedule to comply with the EPA order to reduce combined sewer overflows (CSOs) into DC’s streams and rivers, and we participated in the recent public comment period to inform design of the Piney Branch CSO storage tunnel to reduce pollution of Rock Creek. We noted that design capacity may not reflect the increasingly severe storms resulting from climate change. Although control of CSOs is on schedule, it will be another decade before they are completed, and so contamination of our rivers during heavy storm events continues. The Sierra Club met earlier this year with DC Water and others to discuss improved public notification of river pollution resulting from the continued discharge of CSOs. We are pleased that DC Water shared our concern and expressed intentions of increasing public notification to increase public safety. Sierra Club supports lifting the swim ban on DC rivers. The 2022 Potomac Riverkeeper Swimmable Potomac Report notes that three years’ worth of data from the water quality sampling program supports the careful and safe contact with our area rivers – except around CSO outfalls during overflow events.^[4] Timely notifying the public when water contact is unsafe needs to be part of the lifting of the swim ban.