EPA Tightens Water Rules to Combat Carcinogens

(March 22) -- Our drinking water can cause cancer, and the government agency charged with safeguarding Americans against environmental hazards has announced tighter regulations in an effort to better control what comes out of the tap.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is targeting four chemical compounds that are known carcinogens, agency administrator Lisa Jackson announced today. They are tetrachloroethylene, trichloroethylene, acrylamide and epichlorohydrin.

Tetrachloroethylene and trichloroethylene (TCE) are both industrial byproducts that can seep into waterways during textile processing. Acrylamide and epichlorohydrin can get into drinking water during the actual water treatment process. Acrylamide is also found in cigarettes and some foods, such as french fries.

Of all four, TCE has received the most attention from concerned health experts. Once used to clean missiles, it's prevalent in nine U.S. states. Ongoing exposure can cause nervous system damage, abnormal heartbeat, increased cancer risk, coma and death.

The EPA has launched a "Drinking Water Strategy" to better control the four compounds. Among the key strategies are new technologies to filter and monitor water quality, better cooperation between the EPA and state-level organizations, and better enforcement of federal legislation designed to keep water clean.

A New York Times analysis, published last December, found that 20 percent of U.S. water treatment centers were in violation of the Safe Water Drinking Act, but fewer than 6 percent had been reprimanded by the EPA since 2004. At the time, experts and officials blamed skewed priorities at the EPA for the lack of oversight into water regulation.

"There is significant reluctance within the EPA and Justice Department to bring actions against municipalities, because there's a view that they are often cash-strapped, and fines would ultimately be paid by local taxpayers," David Uhlmann, former head of environmental crimes at the Justice Department, told the Times.

"But some systems won't come into compliance unless they are forced to," he added.

The EPA's new plan won't actually add new regulations. Instead, the agency will tighten up existing rules, Jackson said at a press conference. "It's an approach that works within existing law and capitalizes on the idea of new innovations," she said.

But what the EPA hasn't said is how it will actually keep those four targeted carcinogens out of drinking water. Jackson would only say that the agency will be revising standards for all four within two years.

Right now, the EPA regulates contaminants using Maximum Contaminant Level Goals, based on the relative safety of a given substance. From there, it determines the maximum level of contaminant that drinking water can safely contain. TCE, for one, has a MCLG rating of zero, meaning that the EPA considers only water that is entirely TCE-free to be completely safe. But the agency's cap on TCE content is 5 parts per billion, based on what it reasonably expects purification to accomplish.

The EPA will also re-evaluate standards for 14 other contaminants, including arsenic, lead and copper.

Still, there are many more than 14 chemicals, bacteria, viruses and other contaminants in our drinking water. The EPA regulates 90 but estimates that more than 60,000 potential contaminants exist in the U.S., of which hundreds have been tied to cancer, according to a New York Times report.

And perhaps most problematic are the current EPA regulations, which Jackson said won't change. Despite acknowledging a host of potentially hazardous water contaminants, the EPA hasn't added new substances to its watch list since 2000. So even if it monitors those 90 contaminants more closely, thousands of others are going unwatched.

"People don't understand that just because water is technically legal, it can still present health risks," Dr. Pankaj Parekh, director of water quality for the city of Los Angeles, told the Times.

Globally, contaminated drinking water is responsible for 3.7 percent of all deaths, according to a U.N. report released today -- more than all forms of violence, war included, combined.