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this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2023
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This is great. 10 years seems long, but it is a huge project. Glad it will be started soon.
Edit: Aw shit. This is only a proposal. At least we are talking about it.
Huh, my reaction is how would you even find them all so quickly
There's likely records of most currently used infrastructure. At least enough that the amount you have to go spelunking for would be negligible.
These are service lines, as in assuming all the mains are already lead-free, these are the feeds onto each house. Many of them owned by the homeowner, not the utility. An estimated 9 million of which are lead.
When’s the last time leaded pipes were allowed? Surely at least half a century ago. I find it hard to believe there are good records that old, for every house, many of which lines are not even owned by the utility.
I’m picturing something much more exhaustive, like:
I have no way of knowing what records the water utility has but my house is almost 80 years old and the town’s property records are awfully spotty. And I’m in one of the newer houses in my town - my search included some back to 1890
Edit: 1986. Leaded pipes were allowed that recently, wtf. ( and Florida is number one in leaded pipes remaining: that explains a lot)
I think they were banned that year but basically nobody installed them after the late 70s.
But yeah some places are dabbling with machine learning or algorithmic data set collection. Most are just using what historic records they have and doing shovel tests for the rest.
You don't need to do that though. Unless there are records otherwise you can just assume it is lead because they all are. Bring in a underground crew to the neighborhood and they can go house to house replacing service lines. Transporting equipment to one house for this is often more expensive than the work itself, but since they are doing an entire neighborhood they can do 10 houses in a day and the cost isn't too much. Just dig the pipe into wherever, then go inside and hook it up.
Of course many houses have lead pipes as well. That is a lot more money. I'm working on getting the lead out of my house (copper pipes, but old enough to assume they have lead solder), but there are a lot of pipes in the walls that I don't really have an easy way to get at without a major remodel. (I have a RO drinking water system to every sink so the lead pipes are mostly used for hand washing not drinking)
I think service water line replacement takes longer than a day. Probably a half a day to dig the trench and expose the utilities - and hopefully they aren't under a driveway or a roadway, and then do the connection. Repave afterward.
The other issue is a lot of houses have lead pipes and lead solder in the copper piping, so they may still have life contamination after replacement of the water lines.
I just has natural gas installed, the outside work was a couple hours, but a crew that did a neighborhood could do a lot of things in parallel
And within the home, there's a lot of local, federally-funded programs where your water department will come out and test to see if you have lead pipes, and either help or completely cover the replacement costs.
I assume you can test the water at the outlet for lead.
Most of the time these pipes are not actually leeching lead into the water supply. Most of the time. The whole problem is kind of that it happens just often enough, and just locally enough that monitoring doesn't catch it immediately.
The water authority where I live makes a point of saying they keep the water on the alkaline side to prevent leaching lead from pipes and solder. Presumably that costs money
They must know where at least some of them are so I guess they can start with those and work outwards on the connection. After all I lead the pipe is likely connected to another lead pipe.
Then I guess it's just a matter of doing a lot of water monitoring for the remaining pipes.
Nope, you have to use historic records or dig holes in the ground. Lead Service Line Inventory projects can take a while, and many cities are already going as fast as they can.
30+ years after we found out they were bad for us "guys, we should talk about replacing those pipes..."
Good. Drinking water is easy more important than many people realize. I hope we are always updating our pipes to the current standards.
Lots of other pipes have been replaced, it's just a few hours that are left. Detroit, Pittsburgh and other older cities.
It's a bit more than just a proposal.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/11/30/fact-sheet-biden-harris-administration-announces-new-action-to-protect-communities-from-lead-exposure/#:~:text=Today%2C%20as%20part%20of%20President,secure%20safe%20drinking%20water%20for