Boston-area communities have access to $200 million for removing lead service lines—but the strongest financial support depends on replacing the entire pipe. Steve Estes-Smargiassi, director of planning and sustainability at the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority, says the regional wholesaler does not own the lead pipes connecting customers to local water…
Failure is the way forward. At Blue-White Industries, CEO Rob Gledhill says teams developing new water-treatment products fail multiple times a day—and log every failure. Inside Studio 53, each test rules out an unsuccessful design, records what was learned and informs the next iteration. That record helps engineers measure progress…
Innovation works best when everyone has a role—from engineers and production workers to customer-service staff, software developers, returns specialists and customers. At Blue-White Industries, CEO Rob Gledhill says water technology is never designed in a vacuum. Quality assurance, tech support, sales, marketing and other teams contribute what they learn from…
The world must mobilize up to $7 trillion for water infrastructure by 2030 while more than 80% of global wastewater still enters water bodies untreated, according to the World Bank and UNESCO. Shirley Zhong, co-founder and COO of Toronto-based Xatoms, grew up near industrial complexes in Guangdong, China, and watched…
Colorado entered this summer after its worst snowpack on record—making outdoor water conservation an immediate supply strategy, not a distant concern. In Summit County, High Country Conservation Center has brought together local governments, water providers, landscape contractors, nonprofits, and residents to reduce demand across a region where no single jurisdiction…
Bringing research, prototyping, production, and shipping under one roof can turn American manufacturing into a faster engine for water innovation. Rob Gledhill, CEO of Blue-White Industries, offers an inside look at how the Huntington Beach company develops and manufactures equipment used in water and wastewater treatment. Blue-White produces chemical metering…
💧 H2O INTRO 🤝 Meet Corwin Washington, Utility Senior Service Manager for the Stormwater Division at the Sewerage & Water Board of New Orleans. After Hurricane Katrina, it took four days for floodwaters across New Orleans to reach the level of Lake Pontchartrain. Two decades later, the utility that helped…
Milwaukee’s modern water technology hub began with beer. Karen Frost, executive director of The Water Council, traces the region’s distinctive concentration of water businesses back roughly 150 years, when breweries and other water-intensive industries drove demand for pumps, valves, meters, and pipes. That demand helped create a dense local supply…
Beer production leaves behind millions of tons of waterlogged spent grain—and Bakal is working to recover more value from every load. David Maciel, CEO and co-founder of Bakal, says the company’s patented process transforms wet brewing biomass into nutrient-rich ingredients for livestock. The system can recover up to 50% of…
In Aspen, where roughly 60% of treated water is used outdoors, landscaping rules go well beyond restricting turf. The city’s Water Efficient Landscaping Standards require qualifying new construction and renovation projects to design landscapes around a maximum outdoor water budget. Developers and property owners must account for irrigation design, plant…
💧 H2O INTRO 🤝 Meet Melody Bailey, Director of Water Resources at Mojave Water Agency. Managing water in a desert that receives about four inches of precipitation a year leaves little room for defaulting to “this is how we’ve always done it.” Mojave Water Agency is a California State Water…
Milwaukee’s water technology economy traces back roughly 150 years to breweries, tanneries, and meatpacking plants that created sustained demand for pumps, valves, meters, and pipes. In this episode, Karen Frost, executive director of The Water Council, explains how that industrial history continues to shape the city’s leading role in developing…
A lead-pipe program cannot jump from hundreds of replacements to thousands without first expanding the workforce and contracting system behind every excavation. William Elledge, director of Capital Water and Lead Free DC at DC Water, says the utility is working through an estimated 41,157 lead service lines. Its annual replacement…
A two-hour yard evaluation is becoming a blueprint for water savings, wildfire protection, and healthier habitat. Through Eagle County’s Beyond Lawn program, homeowners receive an on-site assessment that examines far more than thirsty turf. Evaluators walk the property with each participant, identify their goals, and develop tailored recommendations for water-wise…
Water managers can have more data than ever—and still wait weeks for a usable answer. Anna Paola Lonardi, a meteorologist with WaterJade, says satellite observations, ground sensors, weather forecasts, and hydrological models often arrive through 20 different systems in 20 different formats. Combining them into a clear picture of future…
Fifty years of federal regulation have made American drinking water safer—but not equally safe. Manny Teodoro, a professor of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and member of the Water & Health Advisory Council, says decades of data reveal persistent disparities. Small and rural systems, lower-income communities, and communities…
A 3.5 acre lawn at the University of Northern Colorado now offers students more places to gather while using far less drinking water. The Greeley campus replaced much of the lightly used Kentucky bluegrass with water-wise landscaping, efficient irrigation, shaded seating, a hammock garden, and a sidewalk connecting the university…
💧 H2O INTRO 🤝 Meet Yan Zhang, Senior Director of Water Quality and Process at Long Beach Utilities A shortage of treatment plant operators can quickly become a drinking water reliability problem. At one point, Long Beach Utilities had vacancies in more than 30% of its operator positions as retirements,…
Westminster has turned City Hall’s lawn into a highly visible piece of water policy. Outdoor irrigation consumes approximately half of the Colorado city’s water supply annually—and about two-thirds of demand on the highest-use summer days. To reduce that pressure, Westminster removed nonfunctional turf at its City Hall complex and replaced…
Minnesota’s East Metro is removing lead pipes by starting where the risks—and the barriers to replacement—are greatest. Saint Paul Regional Water Services launched Lead Free SPR in 2022 with 26,000 lead service lines across the 14 communities it serves. General Manager Racquel Vaske says the utility expects to have replaced…
Colorado communities adapting to the long-term strain on water supplies in the arid West are turning one of their largest demands—the irrigated landscape—into a source of new supply, with this year’s historically low snowpack adding urgency to the work. The first episode of Resilience in the Rockies travels from the…
Millions of lead pipes can’t be replaced without the cooperation of the people living above them. As water utilities work toward the federal goal of replacing lead service lines by 2037, Roya Alkafaji of the Environmental Defense Fund says community trust is a prerequisite for getting the work done. “Without…
Finding the right customer for a wastewater technology can be harder than developing the technology itself. Martin Strøh, CTO and co-founder of Klarifi, calls his company's approach "Tinder for wastewater"—matching specialized treatment technologies with facilities that have the specific problems they are designed to solve. A company targeting nutrient removal,…
There is no single playbook for replacing America’s estimated four million lead service lines. Mason Hines of RESOLVE says communities face vastly different political, economic, and demographic conditions, which is why the Lead Service Line Replacement Collaborative has avoided prescribing exactly how every replacement program should operate. Instead, its approach…