A decade after the Flint, Michigan, water crisis raised alarms about the dangers of lead in tap water, President Joe Biden is setting a 10-year deadline for U.S. cities to replace lead pipes and make drinking water safe for all Americans.

A decade after the Flint, Michigan, water crisis raised alarms about the continuing dangers of lead in tap water, President Joe Biden is setting a 10-year deadline for cities across the nation to replace their lead pipes, finalizing an aggressive approach aimed at ensuring that drinking water is safe for all Americans.

Biden is expected to announce the final Environmental Protection Agency rule Tuesday in the swing state of Wisconsin during the final month of a tight presidential campaign. The announcement highlights an issue — safe drinking water — that Kamala Harris has prioritized as vice president and during her presidential campaign. The new rule supplants a looser standard set by former President Donald Trump’s administration that did not include a universal requirement to replace lead pipes.

Biden and Harris believe it’s “a moral imperative” to ensure that everyone has access to clean drinking water, EPA Administrator Michael Regan told reporters Monday. “We know that over 9 million legacy lead pipes continue to deliver water to homes across our country. But the science has been clear for decades: There is no safe level of lead in our drinking water.’’

  • VubDapple@lemmy.world
    771·
    1 month ago

    Didn’t the corrupt supreme court just take away Chevron Deference? This needed rule will be disqualified by the captured courts.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
      552·
      1 month ago

      Trump will mandate more lead pipes. “They took the sweetness out of the water! Water used to be sweet! It isn’t sweet anymore! We like sweet water, don’t we, folks?”

      • SeaJ@lemm.ee
        311·
        1 month ago

        That honestly would not surprise me if he did allow lead. He thinks asbestos is 100% safe and is only being removed because the mob lobbied for it to get the construction contracts.

        And let’s not forget that Reagan wanted to reverse banning the use of lead and had a study commissioned to show how much money it would save the economy. The person writing the report decided to add in the massive negative health and societal consequences of removing the ban which showed a huge cost to the economy by removing the ban.