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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 47 / Friday, March 12, 2021 / Rules and Regulations
short delay of the LCRR effective date, to June 17, 2021, and EPA is simultaneously publishing a proposed rule that, if finalized, would extend the effective date for an additional 6 months see the Proposed Rules section of this issue of the Federal Register.
II. Importance of EPAs Review of the LCCR for Protection of Public Health The impact of lead exposure, including through drinking water, is a public health issue of paramount importance and its adverse effects on children and the general population are serious and well known. For example, exposure to lead is known to present serious health risks to the brain and nervous system of children. Lead exposure causes damage to the brain and kidneys and can interfere with the production of red blood cells that carry oxygen to all parts of the body. Lead has acute and chronic impacts on the body.
The most robustly studied and most susceptible subpopulations are the developing fetus, infants, and young children. Even low level lead exposure is of particular concern to children because their growing bodies absorb more lead than adults do, and their brains and nervous systems are more sensitive to the damaging effects of lead.
EPA estimates that drinking water can make up 20 percent or more of a persons total exposure to lead. Infants who consume mostly formula mixed with tap water can, depending on the level of lead in the system and other sources of lead in the home, receive 40
percent to 60 percent of their exposure to lead from drinking water used in the formula. Scientists have linked leads effects on the brain with lowered intelligence quotient IQ and attention disorders in children. Young children and infants are particularly vulnerable to lead because the physical and behavioral effects of lead occur at lower exposure levels in children than in adults. During pregnancy, lead exposure may affect prenatal brain development.
Lead is stored in the bones and it can be released later in life. Even at low levels of lead in blood, there is an increased risk of health effects in children e.g., less than 5 micrograms per deciliter and adults e.g., less than 10 micrograms per deciliter.
The 2013 Integrated Science Assessment for Lead and the HHS
National Toxicology Program Monograph on Health Effects of LowLevel Lead have both documented the association between lead and adverse cardiovascular effects, renal effects, reproductive effects, immunological effects, neurological effects, and cancer.
EPAs Integrated Risk Information
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System IRIS Chemical Assessment Summary provides additional health effects information on lead.
Because of disparities in the quality of housing, community economic status, and access to medical care, lead in drinking water and other media disproportionately affects lower-income people. Minority and low-income children are more likely to live in proximity to lead-emitting industries and to live in urban areas, which are more likely to have contaminated soils, contributing to their overall exposure.
Additionally, non-Hispanic black individuals are more than twice as likely as non-Hispanic whites to live in moderately or severely substandard housing which is more likely to present risks from deteriorating lead based paint. The disparate impacts for lowincome and minority populations may be exacerbated because of their more limited resources for remediating the sources of lead such as lead service lines. For example, stakeholders have raised concerns that to the extent water systems rely on homeowners to pay for replacement of privately owned portions of lines, lower-income homeowners will be unable to replace lines, resulting in disparate levels of protection. Moreover, the crisis in Flint, Michigan, has brought increased attention to the challenge of lead in drinking water systems across the country.
Given the paramount significance to the publics health for ensuring that lead in drinking water is adequately addressed under the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the concerns raised by litigants and other stakeholders about the LCRR, it is critically important that EPAs review of the LCRR be deliberate and have the benefit of meaningful engagement with the affected public, including underserved communities disproportionately affected by exposure to lead.
In conducting its review, EPA will carefully consider the concerns raised by stakeholders, including disadvantaged communities that have been disproportionately impacted, states that administer national primary drinking water regulations, consumer and environmental organizations, water systems and other organizations.
Stakeholders have a range of concerns about the LCRR. For example, a primary source of lead exposure in drinking water is lead service lines. Stakeholders have raised concerns that despite the significance of this source of lead, the LCRR fails to require, or create adequate incentives, for public water systems to replace all of their service lines. In addition, stakeholders have raised
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concerns that portions of many lead service lines are privately owned and disadvantaged homeowners may not be able to afford the cost of replacing their portion of the lead service line and may not have this significant source of lead exposure removed if their water system does not provide financial assistance.
Other stakeholders have raised concerns regarding the significant costs public water systems and communities would face to replace all lead service lines.
Based upon information from the Economic Analysis for the Final Lead and Copper Rule, EPA estimates that there are between 6.3 and 9.3 million lead service lines nationally and the cost of replacing all of these lines is between $25 and $56 billion.
Another key element of the LCRR
relates to requiring public water systems to conduct an inventory of lead service lines so that systems know the scope of the problem, can identify potential sampling locations and can communicate with households that are or may be served by lead service lines to inform them of the actions they may take to reduce their risks. Some stakeholders have raised concerns that the rules inventory requirements are not sufficiently rigorous to ensure that consumers have access to useful information about the locations of lead service lines in their community. Other stakeholders have raised concerns that water systems do not have accurate records about the composition of privately owned portions of service lines and that have concerns about public water systems publicly releasing information regarding privately owned property.
A core component of the LCRR is maintaining an action level of 15
parts per billion ppb, which serves as a trigger for certain actions by public water systems such as lead service line replacement and public education. The LCRR did not modify the existing lead action level but established a 10 ppb trigger level to require public water systems to initiate actions to decrease their lead levels and take proactive steps to remove lead from the distribution system. Some stakeholders support this new trigger level while others argue that EPA has unnecessarily complicated the regulation. Some stakeholders suggest that the Agency should eliminate the new trigger level and instead lower the 15 ppb action level.
Some stakeholders have indicated that the Agency has provided too much flexibility for small water systems and that it is feasible for many of the systems serving 10,000 or fewer customers to take more actions to reduce drinking water lead levels than
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