It includes the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (DWSRF) program, established in 1996 to help public water systems finance infrastructure projects needed to comply with federal drinking water regulations and to meet the SDWA’s health objectives.
Under this program, states receive annual capitalization grants to provide financial assistance (primarily subsidized loans) to public water systems for drinking water projects and other specified activities.
Between FY1997 and FY2015, Congress had appropriated approximately $20 billion, and more than 12,400 projects had received assistance through the program.
EPA reports that, although all of the projects identified in the survey would promote the public health objectives of the SDWA, just $42.0 billion (10.9%) of reported needs are attributable to SDWA compliance.
For FY2017, President Obama requested $20.0 million for EPA to begin providing loan guarantees for water infrastructure projects under WIFIA.
114-254, the Continuing and Security Assistance Appropriations Act of 2017.
For FY2016, the President requested $1.19 billion for the DWSRF program, and Congress provided $863.2 million.
In the 114th Congress, the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act (WIIN Act; P.L.
114-322) made several revisions to the DWSRF program and authorized $100 million in DWSRF appropriations to Michigan to assist the city of Flint in repairing its drinking water infrastructure.
114-254, Congress appropriated the funding authorized in the WIIN Act to assist Flint.

Ron Churchill, Kevin Dumas, Paul Heroux and Jose Lemus — and anyone who might unexpectedly join you in the field of candidates for mayor of Attleboro — what’s your position on public access to Manchester Reservoir, the city’s biggest drinking water source?
Yet city ordinance forbids use of it for any passive recreation other than fishing.
The rules for Scituate Reservoir, which supplies water for most of Rhode Island’s population, include a ban on fishing.
In April 2014, Mayor Dumas asked the city council to do just that by amending the fishing-only ordinance to also allow passive recreation.
“I think we’re probably pretty close,” he told staff writer George Rhodes in May 2015.
This three-year span on the ordinance proposal is only a small slice of the time that Manchester access has been a controversy at city hall.
The council may well vote in favor of allowing passive recreation at Manchester, lifting a ban that has been widely ignored since it was first put on the books.
But little satisfaction will come if it does not also provide for public access to the reservoir in the form of allowing parking somewhere — somewhere other than Beagle Club Road.
If it were, someone already would have a place to develop an alternative parking area.
If I never let you know you were the best, Elsie, then shame on me.

Pure Water Monterey recycled water project hailed at groundbreaking, challenges remain.
But a key official acknowledged the already complex project still faces a number of hurdles before it begins construction or operation, including potential cost overruns that could end up on Monterey Peninsula water bills and a complicated discharge permit.
Local, state and federal public officials hailed a key milestone for the $100 million groundwater replenishment project backed by a public-private partnership between the Monterey Regional Water Pollution Control Agency, the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District and California American Water, as well as a range of other local public agencies, that would tap various Monterey Peninsula and Salinas Valley wastewater sources for treatment to drinking water standards for use by Peninsula homes and businesses, and for expanded Salinas Valley agricultural irrigation.
The ceremony was held at the recycled water plant project site near the existing Pollution Control Agency wastewater treatment plant.
The proposal is designed to provide 3,500 acre-feet of potable water for injection into the Seaside basin, where it will mix with other water sources and eventually be pumped out for later use, allowing Cal Am to purchase the water for its Monterey district customers by mid-2019, and allow a corresponding reduction in Carmel River water use well before Cal Am’s pending desalination plant project is expected to be online.
Water management district general manager Dave Stoldt dubbed the proposal a “project for the future” that could be replicated statewide as California prepares its water supply to meet the needs of the estimated 50 million residents expected by 2050.
However, the first round of bids on the core portion of the project — the plant and pump station — came in about $12.3 million higher than the $41.5 million budget, prompting the agency to pursue a second round of bids after making a series of changes designed to reduce costs and attract more bidders, including “elongating” the 18-month construction schedule to 21 months, and setting a meeting with contractors next week to solicit further cost-savings ideas.
However, if the bids remain significantly higher than budget, Sciuto said the agency might have to return to the state Public Utilities Commission to request an increase in the $1,720-per-acre-foot cost cap that Cal Am customers would pay for the water, and would likely also have to ask the agency board for permission to proceed with construction even with the cost overage.
Further complicating the issue, the agency is also seeking permission to add brine from the planned Cal Am desal plant as part of the permit.
This project is going to be finished.” Jim Johnson can be reached at 831-726-4348.

The Environmental Protection Agency implements the Clean Water Act, the Nation’s primary tool to prevent pollution of our waterways and to clean up ones that are too polluted.
Unfortunately, at the direction of President Trump and longtime EPA opponent/current EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, EPA hatched a scheme to roll back clean water safeguards and other environmental rules.
To the contrary, clean water and other environmental and public health rules deliver huge benefits to Americans.
It’s sad and maddening that the Trump administration needs to be reminded of this fact, but they do, because they seem hellbent on attacking public safeguards despite their benefits and despite the strong public support for environmental rules.
On behalf of NRDC’s more than two million members and supporters, please end this attack on public protections.
But that value is there every day, as we use water for drinking, irrigation, and industrial supply, to say nothing of swimming, fishing and boating.
EPA rules under the Act provide significant benefits.
While polluting industries have deregulatory wish lists handy, citizens can’t meaningfully participate.
EPA allowed only four-and-a-half weeks for public input on the value of all the agency safeguards adopted in its 46-year-plus history, and today’s session allows only a few of us to very briefly address agency staff.
Americans strongly support protections for clean water and did not vote to make it easier to foul the nation’s waterways.

Omnibus spending bill funds clean water sector.
NACWA finds that several of the investment priorities of its membership — which includes public clean water utilities throughout the U.S., representing millions of consumers — are supported through maintained funding levels (from the previous year’s budget), and on some priorities, investment has even increased.
"Considering the significant FY18 cuts which had been proposed for EPA by the Trump Administration and supported by some in Congress, the near-level support for EPA through the second half of FY17 is a positive sign for clean water funding as legislators and water stakeholders move toward FY18 negotiations" says Adam Krantz, CEO of NACWA.
"We need to build on this agreement as a model for the FY18 budget to ensure that critical municipal clean water priorities are funded for next year as well."
Specifically, the Omnibus bill provides: $1.394 B for the Clean Water State Revolving Fund (equal to FY16) $171 M for nonpoint source control grants (increase of $6 M) $231 M for state clean water grants (equal).
$34.4 M for Title XVI Water Reclamation & Reuse Program (significant increase) The Omnibus also funds EPA geographic programs at or above FY16 levels: $300 M for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (equal to FY16) $73 M for the Chesapeake Bay Program (equal) $8 M for Long Island Sound Programs (nearly doubled) $8 M for Gulf of Mexico Programs (nearly doubled) Other Issues The Omnibus bill also strongly supports integrated planning efforts and urges EPA to work with communities to develop integrated plans.
Additionally, it includes a directive to EPA related to the Great Lakes CSO notification requirement that originally arose in the FY16 bill.
The Omnibus includes language reminding EPA that the CSO notification language was to be specifically limited to the Great Lakes for purposes of public notice requirements, and did not require immediate notice.
The bill recommends EPA give utilities flexibility, to ensure that ratepayers are not severely impacted by the cost of implementing the CSO public notice requirement.

UAE Will Tow Icebergs From Antarctica To Quench Drinking Water Problem.
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The iceberg could produce micro-climates and bathe the arid landscape in rain, Shehi added.
The company predicts that it could take up to a year to tow an iceberg to the country, specifically to Fujairah where the water is deep enough to accommodate the floating island.
What’s in store for the UAE’s drinking water then?
The icebergs could hold up to 750 billion liters of fresh water, Shehi said, adding that the government has found the plan sound and is now seeking funds for it.
Blocks of ice will be taken above the waterline and crushed into water before they will be stored in massive tanks and professionally filtered.

Atlas Copco USA’s Water for All Program Helps Navajo Special Education School Access Clean Water.
ROCK HILL, S.C., May 5, 2017 /3BL Media/ — Atlas Copco USA’s Water for All organization recently donated to human rights non-profit DigDeep to support St. Michaels Association for Special Education (SMASE) in Window Rock, A.Z., the only special needs school on the Navajo Reservation.
The school needs potable water to clean sensitive medical equipment, such as tracheotomy and gastrostomy tubes, but the water contains high amounts of lead and arsenic, ranges from yellow to brown in color, and leaves behind a white, grainy film.
“When I run out of bottled water in my classroom, I’m frantically running from building to building trying to get enough water to give a student her medicine.
It’s very stressful.” SMASE is partnering with DigDeep, a human rights non-profit working to ensure that every American has clean, running water, to build a water treatment system that will supply safe water to sinks, toilets and showers in the school.
Atlas Copco is a world-leading provider of sustainable productivity solutions.
Atlas Copco Compressors LLC is part of the Compressor Technique Business Area, and its headquarters are located in Rock Hill, S.C.
The company manufactures, markets, and services oil-free and oil-injected stationary air compressors, air treatment equipment, and air management systems, including local manufacturing of select products.
DIGDEEP’s focus on both water access and conservation is unique, and DIGDEEP is the only global water non-profit building water projects with marginalized communities here in the U.S. — where more than 1.7 million people still don’t have it.
DIGDEEP is committed to changing the way people think about water, and 100% of all donations support projects in the field.

One in four Americans drink water that fails safety standards.
How safe is your drinking water?
A new report from the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) looked at 2015 drinking water data from across the United States and found that of the nation’s 52,000 community drinking water systems, a third reported violations of the of the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA).
These systems quench the thirst of 77 million, or one-fourth of the American population, according to the NRDC.
“Drinking water systems that serve fewer than five hundred people account for almost 70 percent of the drinking water violations, and almost 50 percent of all of the health based violations.” Enacted in 1974, the SDWA requires that the EPA identify and regulate drinking water contaminants—which includes any physical, biological, chemical, or radiological substance in the water.
The list, which includes just under 100 contaminants, encompass everything from lead to viruses to uranium.
In the aftermath of Flint, it came to light that at least 33 cities in 17 states had cheated on water tests to mask potential lead contamination.
We know that at least some of these chemicals are making their way into waterways that provide drinking water.
And then there’s the matter of bottled water, which is regulated instead by the FDA.
Apart from the volume of pollution that plastic bottles cause, and the health risks associated with the bottles themselves, bottled water has fewer regulations than tap.

Brown and barren land: Bolivia’s historic drought – in pictures.
Towards the end of last year, the government of Bolivia declared a state of emergency after the worst drought in 25 years affected at least seven of the country’s major cities.In November and December 2016 and January 2017, photographer Marcelo Perez visited reservoirs that supplied drinking water to La Paz, the capital, and neighbouring city El Alto to document the critical levels they had reached.
The Inkachaka, Ajunkota and Hampaturi dams supply drinking water to more than 30% of the population of La Paz.
I expected to see military or personnel from the water company, but the place was totally empty.
Bolivians staged protests in major cities, mirroring the demonstrations of the Cochabamba ‘water war’ in 2000.
Moreira resigned in January.
Water rationing was used for the first time in La Paz, affecting 80,000 people.
The Chacaltaya glacier – once the world’s highest ski resort – has already completely disappeared.
The two Tuni-Condoriri glaciers that provide water to El Alto and La Paz lost 39% of their area between 1983 and 2006.
Here, a rubber emergency channel drains water from a lagoon to ease water shortages.

Recycling: Time to dispose of hazardous wastes.
We’re hearing a lot about water pollution these days.
Residents of Cape Cod have the ability to minimize the volume of pollutants that could end up in our drinking water supplies simply by participating in their local Household Hazardous Waste Collection day.
Barnstable County’s Cape Cod Cooperative Extension, with funding through various towns, offers monthly collection days for residents to drop off unwanted paint items, yard chemicals, cleaning chemicals and auto fluids.
Is there a chemical cleaner of some undetermined age that’s been there a while?
How about oven or drain cleaner that you decided you didn’t like the smell of?
They’re all held at the easy access Harwich Transfer Station on Queen Anne Road.
Hazardous Waste Collection Days .
Held at Provincetown transfer station, 90 Race Point Road: 9 a.m. to noon on Oct. 7. .
Indicate type of art you practice and your telephone number.