WASHINGTON — A group of 11 senators on the Environment and Public Works Committee sent Senate leaders a letter Tuesday, 9 October, proposing $5 billion be allocated to boost US water system security and to help revive the ailing economy further weakened by the terrorist attacks in September.
The $5 billion would go to upgrade drinking water and wastewater facilities, officials said.
That funding would be in addition to about $160 billion sought by the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA) for improved security. AMWA, in a letter to congress last week, asked for the funds to go to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for security planning efforts.
The AMWA has recommended that Congress take the measures to boost security for the nation's water supplies. A formal request was also made today, 9 October, before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee, according to the Associated Press (AP).
John P. Sullivan Jr., AMWA president and chief engineer for the Boston Water and Sewer Commission, said in prepared testimony that the events of 11 September brought a sense of urgency to the water industry.
The hearing was called to explore the vulnerability of water supplies at dams and reservoirs, wastewater treatment plants, hazardous chemical operations and federally owned power plants.
Some major fears extending far beyond New York and Washington are that an explosion at a sewage plant along a river could contaminate the drinking water of millions downstream or that the catastrophic loss of major dams could wreak havoc on cities in the flow's path.
Rep. John Duncan, R-TN, told the committee that safety and security of the water infrastructure has not been a high priority in the past, but it should get looked at more seriously, AP reported. Even then, however, he conceded that pumping money into the effort couldn't make the country 100 percent safe from every danger.
In a 1998 presidential directive by then-President Clinton, the EPA gained responsibility for protecting the nation's water supply from terrorist attack, including biological contamination. The agency received $2.5 million to combat bioterrorism this year.
AP reported that before that, the EPA received as little as $10,000 to protect water supply infrastructure in 1998, no funding for that purpose in 1999 and $100,000 in 2000 — money that mostly went toward assessing vulnerability and conducting a water protection workshop, according to EPA figures.
AMWA said the EPA could use about $105 million more to assess the vulnerability of the nation's largest water supply systems and $55 million more to improve emergency response plans.
Patrick T. Karney, a spokesman for the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies (AMSA), said in prepared testimony that the terror attacks revealed how little the industry knows about the unique risks posed by terrorist threats.
After 11 September, an AMSA Water Infrastructure Task Force was formed, Karney said, and funds were allocated to immediately begin exploration of publicly owned treatment works' security needs and to identify tools and initiatives to support enhanced security. Additionally, AMSA established itself as a link between the FBI-affiliated National Infrastructure Protection Center and its member utilities to ensure the swift distribution of FBI advisories and other key information regarding terrorist threats or incidents.
Karney said cities will need help with vulnerability assessments and response plans, and told the subcommittee in a statement that "such essential undertakings to ensure the security of our nation's aging infrastructure project will require federal support."
AMSA's Executive Director Ken Kirk said his group "will in the short-term develop a critical wastewater utility checklist that will allow utilities to focus on their particular vulnerabilities and then focus our resources and efforts to the critical task of upgrading and enhancing wastewater infrastructure security at vulnerable sites. Given our members' strong responses, I am confident that wastewater utility security will be a model example for other critical infrastructures."
Among the critical links identified by the subcommittee were dams overseen by the Army Corps of Engineers and nuclear, coal-fired and hydroelectric power plants operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the nation's largest producer of public power, the news service said. . On 11 September, TVA's emergency response included dispatching 24-hour guards, helicopters fueled and put on standby, police boats next to cooling-water pumping stations and troops posted at the Army's Fort Campbell power substation, TVA Chairman Glenn L. McCullough Jr. said in prepared testimony, according to AP.
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