Clean Water Advocacy - Newsroom - NACWA in the News
EPA Touts New 'Green' Storm Water Control Project
Friday, April 20, 2007
By Don Hopey, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Grassy roofs, urban wetlands and rain barrels are now officially part of the federal toolbox for handling storm water runoff and minimizing unhealthy sewage overflows into the nation's streams, rivers and lakes.
U.S. Environmental Protection Administrator Stephen Johnson signed a national "statement of intent" in Pittsburgh yesterday, formalizing an ongoing collaborative effort with water treatment and environmental organizations to promote and use those "green infrastructure" initiatives. They are expected to reduce the need for expensive new and expanded storm sewer construction.
Mr. Johnson cited the Nine Mile Run Conservancy's rain barrel program in several East End communities and the "green" roofs of Phipps Conservatory and Botannical Gardens in Oakland as Pittsburgh examples working to reduce storm runoff.
Also signing the statement of intent were the National Association of Clean Water Agencies, the Association of States and Interstate Water Pollution Control Administrators, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Low Impact Development Center.
The green infrastructure -- including cisterns, roofs covered with vegetation, tree boxes, and rain gardens -- absorbs, filters and uses storm water and pollutants in natural systems. It treats the rain water as a resource instead of a waste product to be piped away and discharged into a river or lake, usually along with untreated sewage.
Pittsburgh was selected as the kickoff for the federal partnership because it has more sewer discharges or "outfalls" than anywhere else in the nation. There are 755 combined sewer outfalls into the rivers and creeks in the 11-county region -- more than in all but two states.