With more people living in the country each day and local, state and national budgets strained to their breaking point, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced that they are developing new “strategies to strengthen public health protection from contaminants in drinking water,” according to a press release from the group.
Part of the strategy includes utilizing new technologies and using the law more effectively in order to attain their goals.
Part of this new strategy includes: tackling contaminants as a group rather than individually; assisting development of water treatment technologies; utilizing authority of statutes to address drinking water issues; and working with states in sharing more data.
Lisa P. Jackson, EPA administrator, said via the press statement: “To confront emerging health threats, strained budgets and increased needs—today’s and tomorrow’s drinking water challenges—we must use the law more effectively and promote new technologies. That means fostering innovation that can increase cost-effective protection. It means finding win-win-win solutions for our health our environment and our economy. And it means broad collaboration. To make our drinking water systems work harder, we have to work smarter.”
In this new era of tight budgets, the EPA’s decision to pursue new strategies for ensuring drinking water safety is commendable—albeit challenging. However, new and more cost-effective technologies can help improve the process and make enforcing water quality standards more amenable to communities and states.
In addition, the EPA plans to revise standards for four contaminants that they say cause cancer.
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