Final week, Representative John Duarte (R – Modesto) introduced the bipartisan Water Infrastructure Modernization Act to build federal grant applications aimed at growing the use of intelligent water technologies.
Duarte teamed up with Arizona Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego to draft the bill.
Complete: The Water Infrastructure Modernization Act would deliver $50 million in new EPA funding for grants that water utilities can use to acquire and implement new technologies.
- Such technologies incorporates identifying water loss, testing pipe integrity, detecting leaks, preparing for serious climate circumstances, and innovating water storage systems, amongst other people.
- The grants would be divided into two applications more than a 5-year period.
By the numbers: According to the Environmental Protection Agency, aging and outdated infrastructure leads to the loss of two.1 trillion gallons of treated drinking water and 900 billion gallons of untreated sewage nationwide.
- These infrastructure problems served as the driving force behind Duarte and Gallego establishing the legislation.
Deeper: The grant applications would allocate 20 % of the funds to communities with a maximum of ten,000 individuals. A different ten % would be set aside for tribal communities.
What they say: “I feel relatively low-effect improvements could add an extra million acre-feet of water for California, which is a massive deal,” Duarte mentioned. “Nowadays, with the exact same infrastructure we had 20 years ago, we’re essentially delivering two.five million acre-feet much less water than prior to.” So hopefully with the new technologies we can get back at least closer to exactly where we had been.”
- Duarte mentioned he’s delighted to cross the aisle and companion with Gallego on a bill to operate on “affordable options to improve water availability.”
- “It is $50 million,” Duarte mentioned. “There will not be brand new dams constructed, but in each his district and mine we have a lot of infrastructure that just wants to be upgraded.” We have to have to implement some technologies. There is a lot of flow technologies, automated dams that can enhance efficiency.”