Highlighting Our Successful 2022 Community Lead Response

We launched a variety of targeted lead removal programs in 2022.
2022 Lead By-the-Numbers

As stewards of a vital natural and public resource, PWSA is committed to providing safe and reliable drinking water to the communities we serve. We’re pleased to announce that our most recent round of testing – conducted between July and December of 2022 – shows lead levels at 5 parts per billion (ppb), well below the state and federal action level of 15 ppb.

PWSA’s water has remained in compliance with federal lead regulations since 2020 and, since the 2016 establishment of our Community Lead Response program, PWSA has replaced 10,000 public lead service lines and more than 6,800 private lead service lines at no direct cost to customers.

2022 Accomplishments
We launched a variety of targeted lead removal programs in 2022. In addition to water main replacement programs, which focused on areas with a high concentration of lead service lines, we also launched the Priority Lead Line Replacement Program, a unique effort to replace lead lines at all daycare facilities and any homes that submitted a lead test kit with elevated results. Made possible by a $4.7 million funding package from PENNVEST, the program included the following:

  • Service line material investigations at 180 daycare facilities within PWSA’s water service area.
  • 19 lead lines found and replaced at daycare facilities. All daycare facilities within PWSA’s service area are now free of lead lines.
  • 306 replacements at homes with elevated lead test kit results.

We also continued replacing lead lines through the $17 million Neighborhood Lead Line Replacement Program, an effort funded by the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, granted to PWSA through the City of Pittsburgh. Thus far, the project has completed work in Elliott, Crafton Heights, North and South Oakland, East Allegheny, the North Shore, Bloomfield, and East Liberty replacing any lead lines found within a given work area. Hundreds of lead lines have been replaced by this program already, and work will continue into 2023, providing replacements free of charge to our customers. Since its inception in 2016, PWSA has invested approximately $270 million in PENNVEST funding alone to replace lead lines and upgrade water infrastructure for thousands of our customers.

For more information, please read our full press release.