But that is not where the majority of water utilities are located.
“Small” (serving 10,000 people or fewer) and “very small” (serving 500 people or fewer) water systems account for 97 percent of the total water utilities in the U.S, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
“Very small” water systems account for more than 55 percent of U.S. health-based violations, according to 2016 data from the EPA.
Texas and California have the highest number of “very small” system violations, mostly in rural areas.
According to the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), the U.S. water distribution system loses nearly 15 percent of its treated water each day because of leaky, old pipes.
This proposal — which suggests financing infrastructural improvements through a reinvigoration of state funds, the establishment of a Federal Water Infrastructure Trust, and private funding — has gained increasing political currency on Capitol Hill.
Economies of scale will not improve conditions for those reliant on “small” and “very small” water systems.
Infrastructure expenditure can also include interventions at the “small scale.” While a complete overhaul of the national water supply systems would take too long and cost too much, there are other cheap and easy “point of use” solutions that would greatly improve quality of life for millions of Americans immediately.
Even using terms like “small” and “very small” for water systems that, taken together, supply more than 25 million people seems misleading, if not oxymoronic.
But perhaps the biggest paradox of them all must be how one of the world’s most developed nations could deny millions of people the basic human right to clean water.

One of its prime sources of water is the Rio Grande.
But climate change is making that increasingly difficult and is pushing the city to look for new sources of water.
Increasing temperatures will make the dry region even more vulnerable to drought, according to the federal government’s most recent national climate assessment.
The district manages the water distribution of some 90,000 acres of farmland along the Rio Grande Valley in New Mexico and Texas.
Since 1958, the amount of early April snowmelt going into the Rio Grande has dropped 25% due to less snowpack and evaporation.
Drought isn’t anything new for the 1,800-mile long river.
It has a capacity of about 2 million acre feet, King said.
For those who rely on the river, like the city of El Paso, they must look for alternative water sources out of necessity.
It is something that El Paso is used to.
That’s more than 20,000 times the amount of water El Paso used this year.

The Diaso Area Programmes (AP) Office of World Vision International in Ghana (WVI-G) has inaugurated US$11,000.00 solar powered water facility for two basic schools at Jameso-Nkwanta, in the Upper Denkyira West District.
The facility is to provide sustainable potable water supply to the school children and their teachers to end the perennial water problem facing the schools.
Mr Irvine Aboagye, the Diaso AP Manager speaking at the ceremony said the initiative was to enhance easy access to safe and healthy drinking water, which was a challenge to pupils and teachers in rural communities.
It would also ease the burden of the school children who had to commute about five kilometres to fetch water to drink during school contact hours, which was affecting teaching, learning and attendance as well the performance of the pupils.
Mr Aboagye said the project which was provided in partnership with Project Maji, an NGO, would produce about 433.33 litres of water a day for the benefit of about 2, 600 people in the Jameso-Nkwanta community.
Mr Isaac Ayariga, the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Officer of the Diaso AP urged the community and school water management committees to see to it that the water facility was well managed in a sustainable manner.
He also advised the community and school authorities to employ strict measures to ensure that the facility was free from theft, while coordinating efforts to generate funds to maintain it.
Nana Kwabena Amponsah, the Abusuapanin of the Jameso-Nkwanta thanked WVI-G for the facility and urged the school authorities, pupils and community members to cooperate to help prolong the lifespan of the facility.
By Gideon D. Ebbah

Retests of drinking water at Mooresville’s Lake Norman High School found none of the chemical used in rocket propellant that had caused alarm last week, the school district said Thursday.
Iredell-Statesville Schools had supplied bottled water to the school after perchlorate, which can affect the thyroid, was found in water from one faucet.
Water from the suspect faucet was retested twice last week, and two additional faucets at the school were tested.
“The first reading at LNHS was really a puzzle to everyone,” Kenny Miller, assistant superintendent of facilities and planning, said in a statement Thursday.
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#ReadLocal No perchlorate had been detected in water samples taken at Lakeshore Elementary and Lakeshore Middle schools, which use the same water line that supplies Lake Norman High, Miller added.
It has asked its consultant, Reliant Environmental, how and where that could have occurred.
While long-term exposure to perchlorate causes cancer in lab rats, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry says it’s not considered likely to do so in humans.
Iredell-Statesville Schools had decided to test water at its schools in part because of controversy over lead found in water at some Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools.
A toxicologist suggested that the tests include perchlorate, which would not normally be part of them, because of the thyroid cancer issue and because some states outside North Carolina regulate the chemical in water.

Rwanda’s Sustainable Water Supply and Sanitation Programme will receive funding from the African Development Bank (AfDB).
A major construction programme is on the way.
In Rwanda, the rate of access to drinking water and sanitation has exceeded 80% since 2014.
Yet there are peri-urban and rural areas that show disparities.
It is currently the country’s largest investment programme according to the African Development Bank (AfDB), which has also announced that it will finance the project, with a total of 115 million euros.
Funding for this new phase of Rwanda’s Sustainable Water Supply and Sanitation Programme will provide safe drinking water to 1.5 million people, 700,000 of whom live in villages or peri-urban areas.
In the city of Kigali, for example, the government plans to build a drinking water supply system that should also benefit people living on the periphery.
They will be supplied by the Gasanze, Kanyinya and Bweramvura pumping stations.
With regard to sanitation, it is planned to build a centralised sewer system comprising an 86.5 km network and 3.1 km of sewer main pipes.
Like the AfDB, other development partners have invested in this programme.

They’re part of the first group to receive clean drinking water from the city utility as part of the on-going Kelowna Integrated Water project.
The Del Medico family was the first to have their water changed over.
City utility crews connected their property earlier this month, and the family is thrilled.
“The whole process has been awesome; we couldn’t be happier.
We can finally drink the water straight from the tap,” said John Del Medico.
“We waited a long time and now the water is perfect, ready to go.” Although these initial homes were connected mid-way through the project, it will take some time before other Southeast Kelowna residents are also connected to the new city water system.
“It’s a great feeling to see residents have access to clean water,” said Patrick Aylard, project manager.
“Although we could connect these first few homes because they were so close to existing City utilities, connecting other houses to the new system will take a bit longer.” RELATED: Kal/Wood Lake study cites need to protect drinking water It’s anticipated that other Southeast Kelowna residents will be connected to City water in 2020, when construction of new water mains and facilities is complete.
Construction of the Jean Road and Stellar Road facilities is expected to be complete by the end of 2019.
For more information and to sign up for project updates, visit kelowna.ca/water To report a typo, email: newstips@kelownacapnews.com.

The Himalayan region supports about 20 percent of the world’s population.
Among the 12 states in the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR), Assam is found to be the most vulnerable to the changing climate, according to a Department of Science and Technology (DST) vulnerability assessment.
The study, "Climate Vulnerability Assessment for the Indian Himalayan Region Using a Common Framework", was done by the Indian Institute of Technology-Guwahati and the Indian Institute of Technology-Mandi in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, to help understand climate change vulnerabilities which could inform development of adaptation strategies and ecosystem management for the Himalayan region.
The study was part of the Swiss-funded Indian Himalayas Climate Adaptation Programme (IHCAP).
The assessment is significant for India as a majority of its population is dependent on agriculture which requires water.
Look out for them in 2019 Measuring climate change vulnerability The study explained that states with low per capita income, the low area under irrigation, low area under forests per 1,000 households and high area under open forests will receive a high vulnerability score.
"For example, Assam has the least area under irrigation, least forest area available per 1,000 rural households and the second lowest per capita income among the other IHR states, and thus scores the highest vulnerability score," the report observed.
"The state has seven major drivers of vulnerability – highest yield variability, no area under crop insurance, largest area under open forests, and largest area under slope (more than 30 percent as compared to other states.
"Relatively high vulnerability arising out of lack of irrigation has been compensated by the fact that the yield variability of food grains is much lower in the state, leading to not so high sensitivity of agricultural production.
But, as per the study, mountainous regions are one of the most fragile environments across the world and other preliminary studies reveal that the IHR will experience higher levels of climate change and its associated impacts.

Health officials suspect that a suburban St. Louis hotel’s water supply may be to blame after two unrelated guests were diagnosed with Legionnaires’ disease.
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services said late Wedneday that it and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are warning recent guests of the Marriott St. Louis West hotel in western St. Louis County that they could have been exposed.
An investigation continues.
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Symptoms are similar to pneumonia — cough, shortness of breath, fever, muscle aches, headaches, sometimes confusion, nausea or diarrhea.
Former guests at the St. Louis County hotel who develop symptoms are encouraged to seek medical help and take steps to alert the state health department.
In 2015, three guests at a hotel in Hannibal, Missouri, became ill and one died after exposure to Legionnaires’ disease.
In Illinois, the state has launched a $230 million plan to redevelop the Illinois Veteran’s Home in Quincy over concerns about water infected with the bacteria that causes Legionnaires’ disease.
Outbreaks at the home have occurred every year since 2015 and 14 people have died.

Seven inmates filed a class action against Cuyahoga County and county officials in Cleveland federal court.
They say detainees are also routinely denied access to proper medical care and religious services in violation of their civil rights.
The county’s jails have a stated 1,765-person capacity but they currently hold more 2,400, the inmates say.
“Defendants have long been on notice of the horrific conditions and constitutional deprivations occurring daily at CCCC, yet have failed to timely or effectively remedy the deplorable state of affairs,” the 61-page lawsuit states, abbreviating the Cuyahoga County Corrections Center.
“It’s creating a sense of dread among inmates that’s truly dangrous,” Gelsomino said in a phone interview.
Two of the jails are on the same site at Cuyahoga County Corrections Center.
Two others are in Euclid and Bedford.
The goal of the lawsuit is to completely reform the jails, increase staffing and reduce in-custody deaths, the attorney said.
“Seven deaths in one year in a facility is far beyond any average or acceptable number,” Gelsomino said.
A dozen inmates were reportedly packed into one cell, two pregnant inmates were forced to sleep on the floor, and mice and other vermin were seen during food service.

GAZA, PALESTINE — Israeli company SodaStream announced today it will open a new factory in the besieged Gaza Strip.
The announcement comes on the heels of a statement from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) announcing it would cut food and general relief to Gaza, at a time when Palestinians living under an illegal blockade need it most.
In a statement on Wednesday, the WFP announced it would slash humanitarian relief to suffering Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as well as the occupied West Bank territories next year, blaming Washington’s own cuts to their organization.
According to the WFP, the budget cuts suggest that upwards of 166,000 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and besieged Gaza Strip will suffer a 20 percent reduction in food aid overall.
According to the World Food Programme’s own statistics, nearly a quarter of Gaza’s population, or 1.3 million people, lack access to nutritious food.
These agreements put Israeli institutions in charge of 71 percent of Palestinian water.
However, the Israelis also have a history of arbitrarily turning off Gaza’s water supplies.
SodaStream to mooch scarce Gaza water?
This SodaStream factory was located in one of the largest illegal Israeli settlements built on stolen Palestinian land, on the ruins of seven Palestinian villages whose inhabitants were forced out to make way for a Jewish-only town, in contravention of international law and decades of stated U.S. policy.” The BDS movement claims SodaStream is still subject to boycott, despite moving its factory, owing to the company’s complicity in Israel’s general policy of forcibly removing indigenous Palestinians from their homes.
Top Photo | A Palestinian girl holds plastic bottles waiting to fill them with drinking water at a public tap in town of Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip, July 27, 2014.