Approximating Community Water System Service Areas to Explore the Demographics of SDWA Compliance in Virginia

Abstract

Although the United States Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) theoretically ensures drinking water quality, recent studies have questioned the reliability and equity associated with community water system (CWS) service. This study aimed to identify SDWA violation differences (i.e., monitoring and reporting (MR) and health-based (HB)) between Virginia CWSs given associated service demographics, rurality, and system characteristics. A novel geospatial methodology delineated CWS service areas at the zip code scale to connect 2000 US Census demographics with 2006–2016 SDWA violations, with significant associations determined via negative binomial regression. The proportion of Black Americans within a service area was positively associated with the likelihood of HB violations. This effort supports the need for further investigation of racial and socioeconomic disparities in access to safe drinking water within the United States in particular and offers a geospatial strategy to explore demographics in other settings where data on infrastructure extents are limited. Further interdisciplinary efforts at multiple scales are necessary to identify the entwined causes for differential risks in adverse drinking water quality exposures and would be substantially strengthened by the mapping of official CWS service boundaries.

Sociodemographic Factors Are Associated with the Abundance of PFAS Sources and Detection in U.S. Community Water Systems

“…Results of this study are consistent with prior findings that communities with greater proportions of Hispanic/Latino , and non-Hispanic Black residents have elevated concentrations of other drinking water contaminants (arsenic; ,, nitrate; , and uranium, chromium, barium, and selenium) and more frequent violations of the National Primary Drinking Water Regulations. , Similar results were reported in analyses of arsenic MCL exceedances in Arizona (1–2% higher odds for each percentage-point greater proportion in Hispanic/Latino residents), health-based violations in Virginia (3% higher odds for each percentage-point greater proportion in Black residents), and an analysis of nitrate levels above 5 mg/L (2% higher odds for each one percentage-point greater proportion in Hispanic/Latino residents) . However, no environmental justice studies on PFAS in drinking water are available for a more direct comparison.…”

Unregulated drinking water contaminants and adverse birth outcomes in Virginia

“…Downloaded data included: PWS ID and name, PWS type, counties and cities served, contaminant name, and sample collection date. As water system service area boundaries for Virginia are not publicly available [46], estimated service areas (n = 662) used in previous work by Marcillo et al (2021) [47] and Young et al (2023) [5] were applied. In brief, the approach developed by Marcillo et al (2021) [47] assigned populations to community water systems (CWSs) based on population served and proximity to the system (Fig 2).…”

“…As water system service area boundaries for Virginia are not publicly available [46], estimated service areas (n = 662) used in previous work by Marcillo et al (2021) [47] and Young et al (2023) [5] were applied. In brief, the approach developed by Marcillo et al (2021) [47] assigned populations to community water systems (CWSs) based on population served and proximity to the system (Fig 2). To determine proximity to CWS, the closest zip codes to a CWS were assigned to a corresponding water system until the population served by that system was fully assigned.…”

“…Assumptions were necessary to conduct this cross-sectional study. As mentioned previously, service areas were approximated [47] in order to refine exposure classification at a finer than county scale. The absence of publicly available service area data is recognized as a limitation in examinations of potential trends in community water exposures [46].…”

A Governance Framework for Implementation of Scientific and Engineering Innovation in Buried Infrastructure Systems

“…Recognition (or respect), as part of procedural justice, addresses the factors behind maldistribution such as social status and embedded institutional structures (Schlosberg, 2012). That hidden issues of maldistribution may arise is highlighted most clearly by studies raising concerns of socioeconomic and racial inequalities in access to safe drinking water in the US (Marcillo et al, 2021). This emerges despite the US being a high income country with a safe drinking water governance regime in place.…”