If any silver linings exist for the economic crisis that has gripped the United States since last summer, one is the heightened public and governmental awareness about the nation's need for infrastructure improvements-a situation that American industry had watched grow without proper attention in recent years.
President Barack Obama's $787-billion February stimulus package outlined a range of fixes, from repairing dilapidated roads and bridges to expanding broadband cable-TV reception. Government officials seem focused on how these stimulus proposals are only a beginning; preparing for future growth will need to be a priority after the nation emerges from its financial tailspin.
The welcome spotlight on infrastructure, however, has a glaring weakness in one critical area: water.
Current planning concentrates a total of only $12 billion in stimulus-based resources on the nation's need for system improvements geared to delivering safe drinking water and managing wastewater, a tiny fraction of what is truly needed to keep water systems running efficiently to provide safe water to 300 million citizens.
Six billion dollars of what has been allotted for clean water and wastewater projects are being channeled through the Environmental Protection Agency, with the Agriculture Department's Rural Utilities Service accounting for the rest.
Outside of the stimulus, recent congressional actions call for more than $30 billion in water and wastewater assistance through the State Revolving Fund during the next five years. While this is a significant increase over the current assistance, it still does not close the spending shortfall.
In one sense, these shortfalls in spending, compared to the need, are nothing new. Those of us who deal with providing solutions have long watched infrastructure challenges sharply outpace the relative trickle of money directed at them. For years, public and private stakeholders, including the U.S. EPA, have tallied the annual U.S. spending gap between current investments and what is really needed at around $23 billion. That enormous amount is split equally between fresh and wastewater systems. It does not reflect any growth-related needs, since the spending is limited to the replacement of aging and failing equipment, pipes and treatment and storage facilities in accordance with mandates of the federal Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act.
The problems associated with the water-related projects in the president's plan need to be called to the attention of the governmentand the public before any additional aid packages are proposed. Early stimulus dollars, to fund "shovel-ready" projects, have often been targeted without much attention to the watershed-based policies that experts in the field consider vital if the nation is to stay ahead of future clean water and wastewater treatment needs. A continuation of such disjointed approvals could be costly.
While the current federal plans emphasize the use of greener, more energy-efficient technology where possible, such strategies are more effective when they are part of the more holistic view of the water cycle that thought leaders in the water industry promote.
The government needs to recognize that the right approach to deal with water infrastructure problems is energy efficient systems, not pumps, pipes or treatment facilities alone. The technology and production capacity are there, but ensuring that equipment is used in the right combinations and environment can do much more.
Who should bring these critical messages to the government and citizenry about the needs of energy efficient water-related infrastructure, and the most effective ways in which to invest money?
The onus is on the industry players-including manufacturers, utilities and metropolitan agencies-who have independently developed knowledge and technology geared to intelligently repairing and growing the nation's water infrastructure.
For a business that has been traditionally fragmented when spreading its messages, this poses a serious challenge-before the actual challenges of building effective 21st century systems can be met.
Yet in some regards, the water industry is suited to this informational task. Just as water-related businesses know about the historic shortfalls in spending to keep infrastructure up-to-date, it is well prepared to explain the dangers of falling behind to a populace that may resist the message.
For decades, in fulfilling individual missions, the water industry has learned to understand that because water systems are out of the public's sight, they are often out of its mind. Unlike a bridge collapse or a massive power blackout, which immediately lead to calls for infrastructure reviews, a water main break is considered a local news event only. It is rarely explained that 240,000 such breaks occur around the United States each year, according to the EPA. The national collective cost of those breaks is never calculated and disseminated. By one U.S. Geological Survey estimate, the value of the lost water alone from such breaks is $2.6 billion annually. That value excludes the expense of repairs, the cost in traffic delays and lost business for the companies that depend on reliable water flow.
Who better to make that point and deliver other lessons based on familiarity with a wide variety of problems than the water industry? What a value it would be if the industry succeeded in teaching something about water's true cost and the energy-water linkage, in a world that seems increasingly ready to learn about the interconnectivity of national resources and the value of confronting our problems holistically.
Even with water infrastructure issues often overlooked, water has a strong public image: starting with the relative unanimity that exists about how vital good water delivery and wastewater removal is for the environment, public health and the economy. Certain obvious needs, like preventing pollutants from entering treasured bays, lakes and rivers, already receive increased attention from the public and government. The broader manufacturing community is eager to explain how many hundreds of billions being spent in basic manufacturing each year depend on clean water.
Manufacturers of water systems have made great strides in reducing the historic fragmentation and formulating a consistent message, with the help of such groups as the Water Infrastructure Network. That is no small achievement in a country with more than 52,000 community water systems.
Beyond our water-related companies, a diverse collection of water experts brought together by The Aspen Institute recently made a series of recommendations in a report titled "Sustainable Water Systems," beginning with the need to define water infrastructure broadly-and include in any definition the protection of natural watersheds and a reliance on small-scale technologies to reflect the way water systems are currently managed. The recommendations emphasized the role of federal funding in supporting efficient, "green infrastructure" for water, and helping ensure that the price of water services to ratepayers is fair.
The industry should spur frank public discussion of technological progress, particularly around energy and operational efficiency, and how technology can help answer these societal needs, as they become clearer in the new economic environment.
New water and wastewater technology is gaining wider acceptance with time and offering proof that the industry is headed in the right direction technologically as water needs continue to multiply. A recent challenge to the Orange County Water District and Orange County Sanitation District in southern California-to name just one case-involved finding alternatives to the purchase of water from outside, in recognition that such large scale movement of water is not sustainable in the long term. The American Society of Civil Engineers recognized the district's new Groundwater Replenishment System as a "safe, reliable option for meeting the increasing water demands of north and central Orange County"-areas that project by 2020 will be supplying 1.3 million families, compared to the current one million. The drought-proof purification system, using solar power, is expected to be 35 to 75 percent cheaper that the alternative of seawater desalination, while consuming about half the energy.
Any industry push for more intelligent approaches to water infrastructure will come in a superheated global environment, with Third World countries and developed nations facing greater water infrastructure needs during the next two decades than the United States has recently. China is now estimated to have 300 million rural residents drinking substandard water. That condition is driving programs like a pilot project by the China Ministry of Water Resources for rural water treatment plants to supply more than 10,000 people with purified water.
The same sense of immediacy needs to be felt in the United States, in the need to rebuild and modernize water cycle infrastructure as part of broader rebuilding and job-creation initiatives-missions that increasingly seem like they will be with us for years. Paying too little heed to the technological upgrading and expansion of clean water and wastewater treatment systems-when the case for increased attention is pressing-would leave a major hole in national recovery. The water industry needs to let the federal government know just what we have to lose.
October 2009, Pumps & Systems