News

President Biden’s FY 2022 Discretionary Funding Request

Please see the President’s “skinny” budget request.  The discretionary request proposes $769 billion in non-defense discretionary funding in FY 2022, a 16% increase over the FY 2021 enacted level, and $753 billion for national defense programs, a 1.7% increase. Specific requests of interest may include:

• Invests more than $1.4 billion, including $936 million toward a new Accelerating Environmental and Economic Justice initiative at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
• An increase of more than $1.4 billion from the 2021 enacted levels for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) climate work
• Provides $100 million more than 2021 enacted levels for Rural Water and Wastewater Grants and Loans
• The President’s 2022 discretionary request includes $11.2 billion for EPA, a $2 billion or 21.3% increase from the 2021 enacted level with specific priorities mentioned below: 
  • Restores Critical Staff Capacity to Carry Out EPA’s Core Mission
  • Tackles Climate Change with the Urgency Science Demands
  • Delivers Environmental Justice for Overburdened and Marginalized Communities
  • Invests in Critical Water Infrastructure and Creates Jobs
  • Protects Communities from Hazardous Waste and Environmental Damage
  • Tackles Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) Pollution
  • Overhauls and Strengthens External Civil Rights Compliance Office

A copy of the “skinny” budget can be found here.

OECA Extends Inspection Flexibilities

The Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA) sent a letter to state partners extending inspection flexibilities to count both off-site and onsite compliance assurance activities in meeting your compliance monitoring commitments through September 2021. EPA will evaluate the need to extend this date further at that time, if appropriate. This letter extends the flexibilities issued by OECA in July 2020. The letter also provides additional clarification on processes and documentation.

EPA Releases Updated PFBS Toxicity Assessment

On April 8, 2021, EPA released an updated toxicity assessment for perfluorobutane sulfonic acid (PFBS) as part of EPA’s commitment to restore scientific integrity to all of the agency’s actions and increase the amount of research and information available to the public on PFAS chemicals.

EPA, federal agencies, states, tribes, and local communities can use the PFBS toxicity assessment, along with specific exposure and other relevant information, to determine if and when it is necessary to take action to address potential health risks associated with human exposures to PFBS under appropriate regulations and statutes.

The assessment released on April 8 has gone through all appropriate reviews, includes input EPA received from external peer review, upholds the tenants of scientific integrity, was authored by expert career scientists in EPA’s Office of Research and Development, and has not been compromised by political staff – these were all issues with a version of the assessment that was posted during the previous administration.

For more information on the updated PFBS toxicity assessment, click here. For more information on PFAS, click here.

EPA Administrator Announces Agency Actions to Advance Environmental Justice

On April 7, 2021, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Michael S. Regan directed all EPA offices to clearly integrate environmental justice considerations into their plans and actions. The new measures announced are one of EPA’s response to the Biden-Harris Administration’s directive to all federal agencies to embed equity into their programs and services to ensure the consistent and systematic fair, just, and impartial treatment of all individuals.

For more information, click here.

ECOS Seeking Water Reuse Projects

ECOS is soliciting examples of water reuse projects that showcase the successful integration of low-input solutions to meet local water needs as an action of the National Water Reuse Action Plan. Low-input solutions include projects that can be considered low-energy, low-cost, or low-maintenance, or that have another feature that makes them accessible to a variety of practitioners while still meeting public health and environmental goals. Feel free to share this request and the full solicitation with colleagues or those who might be interested. Please submit examples to Layne Piper of ECOS by April 23, 2021. ECOS will collect additional information from selected projects to develop into case studies, and some projects will have the opportunity to be featured in a webinar later this year.

USGS Update: The Quality of Our Groundwater—Progress on a National Survey 

A U.S. Geological Survey study of groundwater quality across the nation that began in 2013 now includes water-quality information for 18 of the most heavily used aquifers in the nation. In addition to summary fact sheets for 15 principal aquifers previously released, fact sheets are now available for the Edwards-Trinity aquifer system (primarily Texas, parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas), the Stream Valley aquifers in the western U.S. (Arkansas River, Missouri River, and Red River drainages in parts of Oklahoma, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, and Colorado), and the Colorado Plateaus aquifers in the western U.S. (SE Wyoming, E Utah, W Colorado, NW New Mexico, NE Arizona).

Untreated groundwater from nearly 1,300 deep public-supply wells has been sampled from the 18 aquifers. Overall, inorganic constituents with a geologic source—related to the interaction of groundwater and aquifer rocks and sediments—most commonly exceeded human-health benchmarks. Among the aquifers, from 3-50% percent of samples contained at least one inorganic constituent that exceeded a benchmark. Those constituents were primarily the trace elements arsenic, fluoride, manganese, and strontium. The most frequent trace element exceedances occurred in the Stream Valley aquifers (37%), Rio Grande aquifer system (27%), and the Glacial aquifer system (24%).

One or more radioactive constituents, which also have geologic sources, exceeded a human-health benchmark in a small percentage of samples (0-12%) in most of the 18 aquifers studied. The exceptions were the Piedmont and Blue Ridge crystalline-rock aquifers and the Cambrian-Ordovician aquifer system, where exceedances were 30% and 45%, respectively. The nutrient nitrate was the only constituent with a manmade source that exceeded the human-health benchmark, typically in a low percentage of samples (0-7%).

About half of the nation’s population relies on groundwater for drinking water. The U.S. Geological Survey is intensively studying principal aquifers that provide most of the nation’s groundwater pumped for public supply. Water-quality information for three remaining principal aquifers is slated for publication in 2021.

Access related groundwater-quality data is available here.

EPA Offers State Training on New Overflow Sewer Grants

EPA is offering several identical training opportunities related to the New Overflow Sewer Grants. EPA’s Office of Water has released a Grant Implementation Document for the new Sewer Overflow and Stormwater Reuse Municipal Grants (OSG) Program. The OSG Program was authorized by the America’s Water Infrastructure Act of 2018 and will begin accepting applications and awarding grants to states in 2021.

EPA HQ is offering four virtual trainings for states and other stakeholders in 2021.  The content will be the same for each training date.  Please register at one of the links below:

• OSG Program State Training #1 – Thursday, April 15, 2021 – 11:00AM – 5:00PM Eastern Time
• OSG Program State Training #2 – Tuesday, April 20, 2021 – 11:00AM – 5:00PM Eastern Time
• OSG Program State Training #3 – Thursday, May 6, 2021 – 11:00AM – 5:00PM Eastern Time
• OSG Program State Training #4 – Tuesday, May 18, 2021 – 11:00AM – 5:00PM Eastern Time

For more information,  please contact Rachel Congdon at (202) 566-1564 or congdon.rachel@epa.gov.

Association Updates

2021 ACWA Mid-Year Meeting Recap

Thank you for joining us at this year’s Mid-Year Meeting! ACWA is deeply appreciative of all panelists and participants for making both days such great successes. If you are interested in learning more about any of our speakers, please click here for a list of bios. If you would like to revisit any presentations from the meeting, please click here for Day 1 and click here for Day 2.

To ensure that ACWA continues to provide high-quality services for our members, we are gathering feedback on the Mid-Year Meeting that will be essential to the planning of future meetings and workshops. Please take a moment to fill out our post-meeting survey and share your thoughts directly with our staff by clicking here!

Meetings and Webinars

EPA Webinar:  ICIS-NPDES – Introductory Q&A

Date: April 16, 2021 | 1:00-2:00 PM Eastern Time

Registration: Please see Monday March 29, 2021 email or contact Sean Rolland at srolland@acwa-us.org.

Please join EPA Headquarters for an ICIS NPDES Q&A Webinar on April 16th, 2021, from 1:00pm – 2:00pm EST. The webinar will be an hour-long session of questions and answers with our panel of experts.

EPA Webinar: Enhanced Aquifer Recharge: the Influence of Stormwater on Groundwater Quality and Aquifer Recharge

Date: April 28, 2021 | 2:00-3:00 PM Eastern Time

Registration: Click here

Registration is now open for EPA’s Water Research Webinar on Enhanced Aquifer Recharge: the Influence of Stormwater on Groundwater Quality and Aquifer Recharge. This webinar will be held on Wednesday, April 28 from 2:00-3:00pm ET, with an optional Q&A session from 3:00-3:15pm ET.

After registering for the webinar, you should receive an automatic reply with a link to test your computer’s compatibility with the webinar software. Please note that for this webinar, attendees can only listen with computer audio and will not be able to call into the webinar using a phone line. This change has been made to allow more people to attend the webinar.

Job Opportunities

Environmental Analyst – Water Quality Liaison | NEIWPCC