DeKALB – Over 50 years after the federal government mandated that the EPA create regulations to limit potential contaminants, lead contamination of water systems is still common.
The Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974 empowered the EPA to ensure citizens have safe drinking water.
The city of DeKalb maintains over 10,000 water service pipes and is in the process of creating a materials inventory of pipes. To do this, a hole must be made in the ground to each pipe which is then tested to identify the material, a process called potholing.
The city is legally required to positively identify the material of all water service lines and replace any lead contaminated lines. This inventory must be reported to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and is publicly available.
The city replaced at least 392 lead pipes with copper pipes between 2020 and 2022. In the city’s 2022 report, there were 125 lead pipes, 9,895 copper pipes (all with non-lead solder), 152 cast iron pipes and 407 pipes of unknown material(s).
The city council approved $50,000 for the potholing of an additional 171 galvanized (zinc coated) and unknown pipes to identify if lead piping is or has been in that location.
The city has identified at least 157 lead pipes still in service and are working on replacing them.
“We’re ahead of most cities in Illinois and it’ll probably take a couple years, but hopefully we get that EPA money to finish,” City Manager Bill Nicklas said during a City Council meeting on Dec. 10.
As of 2022, Sycamore had about 71% more lead pipes and nearly double the number of unidentified pipes in service than DeKalb with 3,000 fewer water service pipes in total.
The city of Galesburg with a similar population, land area and number of water service pipes had more than double the number of lead pipes of DeKalb in 2022, but as of 2023, it had finished replacing all its lead pipes.
This process will allow for safer drinking water in DeKalb as well as $3.1 million in loan forgiveness from the state for the cost of replacing the contaminated water pipes.
