Intersection of Technology and Water: Using Technology to Speed Up Lead Pipe Replacement
At every step of the lead service line identification, planning, design, and replacement process, access to new data tools and technologies can make a difference - and ideally help a water utility replace their lead pipes faster, efficiently, and equitably. The US EPA’s Guidance for Developing and Maintaining a Service Line Inventory issued in August 2022 was a positive step forward in terms of embracing several areas where technology can play a critical role in lead service line replacement, in particular by:
Modernizing and streamlining recordkeeping and data collection.
Estimating and locating lead lines through predictive modeling.
Improving communications between the utility and its customers.
Ensuring greater attention to equity in replacement efforts.
With this in the backdrop, EPIC is working to build awareness of the use of appropriate technologies, communications techniques, and data management tools for speeding up and improving lead pipe replacement - depending on where a utility is in their program.
This fall, EPIC is unveiling several initiatives related to this intersection between technology and lead service line replacement that we are excited to share with you in this blog.
Technology service providers who can help boost lead service line replacement
We are pleased to share the Menu of Options: Data and Technology to Replace Lead Pipes Faster - a resource guide of some of the nation’s top technology providers offering products and services to communities working on lead service line replacement. Some of these providers are partnering with EPIC on our water and technology initiatives. We came across others during the 2021 Water Data Prize and our independent research. These providers offer tools and assistance to utilities and state regulators, at times at a cost and other times pro bono. We organized the providers by the area where they work for easier reference: Asset Management, Mapping and Public Dashboards, Field Tools, Predictive Modeling Tools, and Communications. We hope that this guide can serve as a resource to any community as they replace toxic lead pipes.
Over the past year, EPIC has worked on the Lead-Free Water Challenge with key partners to deliver free technical assistance to several communities across the country, including in areas that intersect with new and emerging technology. Below are some of the lessons learned from our Lead-Free Water Challenge partners:
What We Learned About Proactive Communications by Mike McGill of WaterPIO and LeadCopperRule.com
What We Learned About Data Management, by John Paul Miller of the Center for Geospatial Solutions
What We Learned About Inventory Development: How to Prepare Your Service Line Material Inventory without Knowing Everything Yet by Blue Conduit.
Supporting digitization and inventory development
In 2021, EPIC launched the Lead Free Water Challenge to support small and medium-sized municipalities with their lead service line replacement programs. Throughout this process and through communications with public water utilities across the country, we see varying degrees of data management and technology being employed; in some communities, we found records being stored in spreadsheets and paper records, making it difficult for anyone to easily access and update the information. In addition to inefficiencies of paper records, they are also susceptible to hazards such as fire and water damage, or loss of any kind.
The photo depicts a tap card - one of thousands of paper records in this particular municipality. This tap card indicates some basic information about the service line composition and location, with handwritten notes.
Paper records are vulnerable to environmental hazards, and spreadsheets do not inherently have spatial components. For this reason, modernizing data infrastructure is critical - from digitizing paper records and employing tools that enable automatic updates to a utility’s inventory database during field inspections to sharing information in public dashboards that are easily and automatically kept up-to-date.
To make it easier to extract the useful information from tap cards and convert it to a digital format, we have partnered with 120Water this fall to bolster innovative techniques to speed up paper record digitization and support utilities in creating online maps that center community accessibility. 120Water has developed a process to quickly digitize physical records and will be supporting Delmar, DE; Trusdale, MO; Reynolds, IN; Blowing Rock, NC; and one of EPIC’s Lead-Free Water Challenge partners, Chelsea, MA, in their process of digitizing paper records of lead pipe inventories. Building off of the Lead-Free Water Challenge and this new partnership, EPIC will work with 120Water and other partners to support these five communities and two other communities from the Lead-Free Water Challenge in updating and maintaining their inventory data and in the creation of accessible, public-facing dashboards that make lead service line replacements easier to track for the utility and provide transparency to the public. We will be sharing updates and lessons learned along the way.
A dashboard of lead pipe metrics is a great tool to show real-time progress on the removal of lead service lines. The City of Platteville, Wisconsin (population: 12,113) created a dashboard that is updated in real-time using a mobile application.
Partnerships in the technology-community-lead space
EPIC is pleased to partner with Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO) this fall to explore and support work at the intersection of technology, community, and lead service line replacement. Like many other environmental justice communities in the Midwest, Little Village has been negatively affected by outdated water infrastructure, including toxic lead pipes and other water quality, equity, and accessibility issues. LVEJO’s Water Justice program conducts research, advocacy, and outreach while also providing resources to community members in need. LVEJO’s work is guided by what they hear and learn from the community about the biggest challenges facing them in daily life--whether that’s trouble paying bills, fear of drinking the water in their homes, or dealing with sewer backups. To ensure lead-free water in Chicago and other municipalities across the country, EPIC and LVEJO believe that authentic collaboration among various stakeholders is necessary.
With an estimated ten million lead pipes in this country, many of which are not yet located and mapped, existing and emerging technologies can play an important role. Technology can help communities get the lead out, by increasing efficiency, making information and data more accessible to the public, and improving equity. It is our mission to ensure communities around the country, especially overburdened ones, have greater access to these tools and technologies if needed, so that we - as a country - can replace all lead pipes over the next decade.