Scientists at the EPA have spent a decade urging the government to require more rigorous testing methods. But in its first major revision of lead-in-water regulations, made public in October, the EPA ignored years of research by its scientists.
The agency instead sided with water utilities in choosing to preserve its misleading test standards, an APM Reports investigation has found. And now the Trump administration, amid a global pandemic, is pushing to finalize the revised regulations this summer.
‘This rule does absolutely nothing to address all the deficiencies we've known about for the last 10 years,’ said one EPA researcher, who requested anonymity. ‘It's an amazing house of cards that's not supported by the data. ... From a scientific perspective, we're writing a rule that is ass-backwards.’
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Utilities also were protected by the rule's lenient testing requirements. Even in the nation's largest cities, the EPA requires utilities to only sample a minimum of 50 homes with lead pipes as little as once every three years, unless certain lead levels are exceeded. Then, tests have to be run more frequently, as often as every six months.