EPA Awards Research Grant to ASDWA Arlington, Virginia, Administrators for Very Small Drinking Water Systems
The U.S. EPA announced an award of $965,395 in research funding to the Association of State Drinking Water Administrators (ASDWA) in Arlington, Virginia.
This award will help develop and test approaches that states can use to obtain approval for new or alternative technologies for very small drinking water systems, according to EPA.
Very small drinking water systems are classified by EPA as systems serving 500 or less people. According to EPA, these systems can often lack the financial and technical resources to identify and implement technologies and approaches to address their challenges.
“It is important that our towns and rural communities have the tools they need to maintain their water systems and provide people with clean drinking water,” said Wayne Cascio, Acting Principal Deputy Assistant Administrator for Science in EPA’s Office of Research and Development in the EPA news release. “ASDWA’s research will help address challenges in maintaining water quality and availability.”
Furthermore, very small systems lack technical background, which applies not only to drinking water systems themselves but also to the local technology providers or consultants that these systems rely on.
ASDWA will conduct research to identify approaches to improve how states consider sources of performance data and other information that determine how innovative water technologies to be used to improve water quality. EPA adds that ASDWA will also establish ways for multiple states to work together to minimize state-by-state testing protocols.
The goal is to evaluate water technologies that address drinking water supply, quality, treatment, and security challenges of these very small public water systems.
More information about the grant to ASDWA is available here.
Learn more about EPA’s research grants program here.
