Policymakers, Issue Panels Highlight 2015 Water Policy Conference

At AMWA’s 2015 Water Policy Conference in March, water executives from across the country convened in Washington, D.C., to interact with national policymakers and to discuss several high profile water issues with peers and with experts from government and academia.

In the keynote address, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy spoke of innovation in the water industry and the need to think creatively to address the need for new investment in water infrastructure.  She cited the new Water Infrastructure and Resiliency Finance Center, which she said will look at how creative communities are financing water needs and “bring new players to the table” for water system investment.

Featured speaker Bob Woodward, associate editor of The Washington Post, centered his remarks on an analysis of recent U.S. presidents. The real job of the commander-in-chief, he said, is to “define the next stage of good for the country” and plan to get there.  While the power of the presidency has grown since President Nixon’s administration, today’s reality is that everything in Washington is a shared power, a situation that isn’t working.  He noted that with the Congressional connections and negotiating skills of past presidents, issues like infrastructure funding would be worked out “in a flash,” but with the current administration “it isn’t happening.”

Speakers from Capitol Hill expressed support for the new Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) pilot loan program and said discussions are underway to amend a section of the WIFIA statute that bars utilities from pairing WIFIA loans with tax-exempt debt to fund capital projects.  Rep. Bob Gibbs (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee, noted his efforts over the past several years to develop the WIFIA proposal and said he is aware of the need to allow communities to combine WIFIA loans with municipal debt.  Susan Bodine, chief counsel to the Republican majority of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, said the tax-exempt debt restriction is “on [the] radar screen” on Capitol Hill, but any fix will ultimately depend on Congress identifying an acceptable offset to the fix’s $135 million price tag. 

Peter Shanaghan and Jordan Dorfman of EPA updated attendees on the status of the agency’s efforts to establish WIFIA’s operational framework.  They said EPA will likely issue guidance, rather than regulations, to spell out the program’s rules, but the pace at which this is accomplished will depend on the level of WIFIA funding Congress includes in the agency’s FY16 budget.

Republicans in the House and Senate are planning legislation that would require EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to rewrite their “Waters of the U.S.” (WOTUS) rule, which critics say would expand the scope of federal Clean Water Act jurisdiction.  Rep. Gibbs said he and Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Penn.) plan to introduce legislation that would direct the agencies to correct what some stakeholders see as shortcomings in the proposal.  Susan Bodine said many senators want to move a bill instructing EPA to issue a new proposal, following extensive consultation with businesses, that “actually looks at the costs” that would accompany the new rules. 

An interactive panel on water reuse covered questions that need to be answered before the real potential of direct potable reuse (DPR) and indirect potable reuse (IPR) can be tapped. Dr. Peter Grevatt, director of EPA’s Drinking Water Office, described the agency’s efforts to help states address key issues and concerns surrounding DPR and IPR projects, observing that while the water reuse discussion is primarily on the wastewater side, going forward EPA will also include drinking water. Dr. George Tchobanoglous, professor emeritus at the University of California, Davis Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, reviewed various promising treatment trains for advanced water treatment and observed that potable reuse provides an opportunity for a renaissance in designing wastewater treatment. Valerie Rourke, the water reclamation and reuse coordinator for the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, said that when pursuing reuse projects, assessing public sentiment and coordinating with regulators should be at the top of the agenda.  Design, maintenance and operation of IPR and DPR projects, as well as the costs and energy implications of water reuse and alternative sources, were discussed, along with examples of public outreach for effectively communicating the case for potable reuse to often dubious consumers.

The future of Lead and Copper Rule negotiations was the topic of a second panel discussion. Lisa Christ, chief of the Targeting and Analysis Branch in EPA’s Standards and Risk Management Division, joined two members of EPA’s National Drinking Water Advisory Council Lead and Copper Rule Working Group: Stephen Estes-Smargiassi, director of planning for the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority, and Lynn Thorp, national campaigns director of Clean Water Action.  Issues included lead service line replacement, lead monitoring and sampling, copper requirements, cost-benefit considerations and others. Christ said the group must look at cost benefit analysis and any recommended revision to the rule must maintain or improve public health protection.  Estes-Smargiassi said the foundation of the working group’s discussion was recognition that no level of lead is safe.  On lead service lines, he said they may suggest long-term, utility-designed programs that lay out a series of steps with a horizon of 20 to 25 years.  Thorp noted the rule revisions must leave room for emerging knowledge, but said it is a generational challenge to get the lead problem off the table.

Christy Goldfuss, managing director of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, shared the President’s “fourth quarter” environmental goals: protecting clean air and water, conserving for future generations and connecting people to their environment.  She acknowledged the challenge of aging water infrastructure and stressed the Administration’s commitment to the State Revolving Funds and WIFIA.  Mark Kim, chief financial officer at DC Water, described the utility’s innovative financing that “cuts the pie better” with customer class-based water rates and a lifeline rate structure for residential customers, and “grows the pie” with a water system replacement fee and development impact fee.  He also discussed DC Water’s use of 100-year bonds that are certified green.  American Water’s Director of Innovation and Environmental Stewardship Mark LeChevallier heads a team of 40 whose work includes evaluating and recommending new technology to enhance operations.  The company’s innovation development process applies solutions, processes or technologies to better meet existing needs or new requirements in areas such as smart grid, metering systems, distribution systems, data management, reservoir management and energy efficiency.  Attorney Steven Bonafonte of Pullman and Comley, LLC, spoke on cybersecurity and legal issues: differences between privacy law and cybersecurity law; federal efforts in the Bush and Obama Administrations; the NIST framework; state regulations; and data breaches, response and legal liability.