WATER SAFETY

To protect citizens’ health, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) since 1974 has set national safety standards for drinking water.

As  the nation’s largest publicly traded water service providers, American Water takes that responsibility very seriously. In addition to working closely with the USEPA and state authorities to ensure that the water we provide customers meets federal and state safety standards, our researchers help the USEPA develop its standards and regulations.

We consistently score among the highest of all water companies when it comes to complying with strict federal regulations for delivering clean, quality drinking water with a current score of greater than 99% for drinking water compliance.

Additionally, over the past several years, and all over the country, we’ve received more than 150 awards for superior water quality from state regulators, industry organizations, individual communities, and government and environmental agencies.

Read the water quality report for your area.

System Updates

It’s no secret that much of the water infrastructure across the country is aging and in need of repair or replacement. Our engineering and operations teams work closely with our communities to identify problem areas and put plans into action to upgrade our systems and infrastructure.

Improving system resiliency is also a major focus to help protect plants, underground systems, and other crucial infrastructure from extreme weather events, natural hazards and malevolent threats.

Across the country, we manage approximately:

  • 80 surface water treatment plants
  • 540 groundwater treatment plants
  • 175 wastewater treatment plants
  • 53,700 miles of transmission, distribution and collection mains and pipes
  • 1,200 groundwater wells
  • 1,700 water and wastewater pumping stations
  • 1,100 treated water storage facilities
  • 74 dams

We invest more than $1 billion annually into our systems to ensure continued reliability for our customers, who count on us every day. In most of our service areas, high-quality water service still costs about or less than a penny per gallon.