The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released its Strategy to Reduce Lead Exposures and Disparities in U.S. Communities in conjunction with National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week.
The agency-wide Lead Strategy outlines how EPA plans to reduce lead exposure in communities overburdened by pollution and advance environmental justice and equity.
The Lead Strategy outlines the agency’s aims to: reduce community exposures to lead sources; identify communities with high lead exposures and improve their health outcomes; improve engagement with communities and stakeholders; and support critical research to inform efforts to reduce lead exposures and related health risks.
“The evidence is clear. Children exposed to lead are more likely to face adverse health impacts and other serious challenges throughout life —from slowed growth and development to learning and behavioral disabilities,” says EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan. “Combined with the historic investments from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, this strategy will accelerate our efforts to identify lead exposures early on and eliminate racial and socioeconomic disparities in blood-lead levels by connecting communities with resources that can reduce lead exposure.”
This work is supported by the resources flowing to EPA through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which includes $15 billion in dedicated funding to replace lead pipes and service lines and remove lead from soil and contaminated sites. These historic investments include:
- $1.16 billion to support lead service line projects in 21 states, District of Columbia, and three territories.
- $600 million to cleanup construction projects at more than 50 Superfund sites where lead is a contaminant of concern.
- $25 million over the next 5 years to support small and disadvantaged communities in the development of lead service line identification technologies, ensuring efficient, equitable distribution of resources through EPA State Revolving Funds.
Through this strategy, EPA is initiating several new actions, including:
- Lead Service Line Replacement Accelerators, which will provide targeted technical assistance and develop best practices to help address the barriers disadvantaged communities face in replacing lead service lines.
- New federal agency collaboration with the Food and Drug Administration and the Consumer Product Safety Commission to address lead in food, cosmetics, and other consumer goods.
- The development of new educational and engagement materials on children's health and maternal health regarding lead and heavy metals in cultural products and cookware.
In addition to these new actions, the strategy outlines, for the first time, a whole-of-agency approach for existing programs, regulations, and policies, ensuring coordination to protect the public from lead exposure. These existing programs include training courses for certified Renovation, Repair, and Painting contractors, community outreach and education programs on risks associated with lead-based paint, and resources for lead testing in schools and child care programs.
EPA will monitor implementation progress through a number of measures outlined in the strategy, including milestones for reevaluating regulations and program metrics such as completing 225 Superfund cleanups of lead contamination by fall of 2026.
The agency says that the final strategy reflects the feedback of a wide array of stakeholders from across the country. Following the releases of the draft Lead Strategy last year, EPA solicited feedback from the public, hosting 11 public listening sessions, one in each of EPA’s 10 regions and an engagement session for Tribes. The agency also received thousands of public comments which informed and improved the final strategy.
