A Challenging Landscape
Our decades-long failure to achieve adequate water, wastewater, and stormwater investments, especially at the federal level, has resulted in growing and accelerating water stresses in the United States. Much of our nation’s water infrastructure is more than 100 years old. Many systems are outdated and aging, and failing infrastructure is visible in every community. In fact, a water main breaks every two minutes somewhere in this country.
What does our failure to adequately invest look like through the lens of communities?
In some urban areas like New Orleans, Louisiana, service disruptions can be so common that businesses keep a running tally of how many days have passed since the last boil water advisory. In less populated communities like Lynchburg, South Carolina, the water from the tap is perpetually brown, chasing away businesses and the town’s young people. Even more disheartening, many communities like Nanjemoy, Maryland, a mere hour from our nation’s capital, completely lack access to any water or wastewater services. Given the nation’s history of injustice, race and place are the strongest predictors of water stresses like these.
Moreover, the majority of water-related systems were not built to adapt to accelerating climate impacts. It’s often said that climate change is experienced through water, or the lack thereof. We only need to turn on the news to see towns like Sioux City, Iowa, severely flooded by unprecedented levels of stormwater, and municipalities like Tucson, Arizona, or Tribal communities in the Colorado River Basin struggling with drought and rapidly diminishing drinking water amid extreme heat.
The siloed nature of the water sector doesn’t help. Drinking water, stormwater, and wastewater are often governed, funded, and regulated separately, which hinders efficient collaboration across a region and coordination across sectors. That separation, among other factors, contributes to the water sector’s reputation as “the invisible sector.” Water is our lifeblood, but there’s an incredible lack of awareness about what it takes to keep it flowing. Among the repercussions are service and access inequities, workforce and affordability challenges, and an ever-growing infrastructure investment deficit.
Compounding Water Inequities
One of the pressing repercussions of underinvestment is the lack of universal water access. Recent research reveals there were over 2 million people without access to running water and basic indoor plumbing in the United States and many more living without sanitation in 2019. This humanitarian crisis has been swept under the rug and flies in the face of our posited identity as one of the most developed countries in the world. On top of the 2 million-plus Americans without water access, millions more are on the verge of losing water access due to aging infrastructure, climate change, and a lack of funding.
How did this happen? The structural inequity of how water, wastewater, and stormwater systems are funded—almost exclusively by local ratepayers regardless of community size, environmental conditions, or accrued negative externalities—has contributed greatly. Systemic racism has allowed for the very real water needs of many low-income communities and communities of color to be overlooked. For example, Native American households are 19 times more likely to lack water and sanitation than white households.
More than 90 percent of drinking water systems serve fewer than 10,000 people. These small communities frequently struggle to pay for their system needs and achieve compliance with water quality standards set by the Clean Water Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act. Many existing solutions are not “right-sized” or funded sufficiently for the challenge. For example, the way federal dollars are distributed through states can make it difficult for small communities that lack infrastructure to smoothly and easily access funding.
These challenges belie the lack of a clear national vision for water and the failure of sectors to align to advance the sustainable water management necessary for a healthy water future: one that ensures safe, reliable, and affordable water for all in the United States and that supports a healthy national economy and environment.
Significant Opportunities for the Invisible Sector: Cooperation, One Water, and Climate Action
Partnerships toward inclusive co-creation and cooperation are fundamental to durable and scalable solutions. With 200 cross-sector members and partners, the US Water Alliance facilitates water partnerships, co-creates solution frameworks, educates the nation about the value of water, provides technical assistance, and advances transformative practices.
The vision shared by US Water Alliance members and partners is a sustainable One Water future for all. One Water—a concept introduced by the alliance and adopted by many water utilities and organizations across the country—is a way of thinking and doing that breaks down traditional water silos and manages all water in an integrated, inclusive, and holistic manner that centers community from source to tap. The One Water movement is grounded in principles, practices, and people. It results in durable solutions, not silver bullets. It encourages opportunities to collaborate through regional partnerships and centers equity in all decision-making.
Currently, One Water leaders are pushing on crucial fronts like water affordability and climate action, in addition to community resilience around flooding and other climate impacts. One Water leaders also seek net-zero emissions in water management consistent with US Water Alliance’s Utility Greenhouse Gas Reduction Cohort goals. And the One Water network includes communities across the country who are working together to ensure no one in our nation is left out of water investments.
Partnerships and cooperation can make all the difference in accessing the investments necessary for change. In Lynchburg, over 100 residents of the 288-person community joined together to raise the alarm over their lack of access to clean drinking water. Residents worked with the alliance’s technical assistance team to assess their infrastructure, build relationships with state officials, and gather the information needed to submit the community’s first state funding application to restore Lynchburg’s water system. This collective approach to solving water challenges is a model for how to cooperatively value and work with each other and water.
Water Investment and Advocacy
Doing work in communities like Lynchburg has taught us firsthand about needs that can’t be funded or met through traditional funding pathways like local rates or state-revolving funds. The stark reality is that this work is limited by both the amount and the structure of federal funding streams.
Decades of underinvestment in water infrastructure generally have led to a funding gap of $91 billion this year, according to the 2024 economic impact report released by the Value of Water Campaign. If we do nothing, this gap will cumulatively grow to nearly $3 trillion over the next 20 years. To pay for everything our nation needs to do to bring drinking and wastewater systems up to date, we need to invest $109 billion a year for 20 years. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 appropriated $55 billion for water infrastructure projects over five years. For perspective, that’s half of the amount needed for one year to begin to close the funding gap. While it was indeed the biggest investment in history in our water systems and should be celebrated, it should be viewed as a down payment for the future level of investment necessary to improve our systems.
Lack of amount and diversity in funding has led to a water affordability crisis. Today, local residents almost exclusively bear the costs of operating systems, with a third of our country reporting their water bills are unaffordable (more than double the number compared to five years ago). Continued or increased funding at the current enhanced federal level would offer some relief, as it could cut the spending gap by $125 billion over two decades—enough to fully fund a permanent, national customer assistance program for 25 years.
And the federal funding that is available can be difficult for small and underserved communities to access. Most of it moves from the federal government to states to communities in ways that are administratively intensive with terms and structures that often don’t meet the needs of those seeking funding. How to close these structural gaps so funding can move directly to people who need it and serve the best interests of communities is a question that deserves significant attention.
A Bolder, Brighter Future for Water
Every person should have access to safe, clean, affordable, and reliable drinking water and wastewater services. Employed well, water can be a pathway to correct inequities, create economic opportunities, and enable thriving communities. It will take a bold effort to scale water access in every region of the country through durable solutions that fill systemic, structural gaps. This vision is achievable using holistic One Water approaches, centering those who bear the status quo’s greatest burdens and building inclusive and effective partnerships to deliver long-term investments to communities without reliable water access.
We need bold and unified leaders to get this done. We need all of us.
