Lead in Plumbing

      Lead gets into water after water leaves your local treatment plant or well. The source of lead in your home's water is most likely corrosion of the pipes or solder in your home's own plumbing. Corrosion results from a reaction between the water and the plumbing parts. Dissolved oxygen, low pH (acidity) and low mineral content in water are common causes of corrosion. One factor that increases corrosion is the practice of grounding electrical equipment (such as telephones) to water pipes. Any electric current traveling through the ground wire will accelerate the corrosion of lead in pipes. Eliminating the lead content in your home plumbing is an effective control of lead in drinking or cooking water.

Beginning January 1, 2010, the law requires pipes and pipe fittings, plumbing fittings, or fixtures, and any other end-use devices intended to convey or dispense water for human consumption through drinking or cooking to meet the new "lead-free" definition. Examples include kitchen faucets, bathroom faucets and drinking water fountains. Service saddles, back-flow preventers for non-potable services such as irrigation and industrial, and water distribution main gate valves that are two inches in diameter and above are not covered by the law.

A certification must be issued by an independent American National Standards Institute (ANSI) accredited third party, including but not limited to, NSF International (NSF). For the full list and more information of ANSI accredited third party, please click the link for ANSI’s website.

The January 2009 law establishes a testing program for the lead content in plumbing products. HSC section 25214.4.3 requires DTSC, based on available resources, to annually collect up to 75 drinking water faucets or other drinking water plumbing fittings and fixtures for testing and evaluation. The law requires the results be posted on DTSC’s Web site and to be transmitted annually to the California Department of Public Health.

While HSC section 25214.4.3 does not specifically exclude any product(s) from being subject to the testing and evaluation requirements, it does tie the testing program to those items subject to HSC section 116875. HSC section 116875 provides that the following items that are not subject to its requirements:

·         service saddles;

·         back-flow preventers which protect/separate potable water systems from non-  potable services such as irrigation, industrial and laboratory use;

·         water distribution main gate valves that are two inches in diameter and above; and

·         pipes, pipe or plumbing fittings, or fixtures that used in manufacturing, industrial processing, for irrigation purposes, and any other uses where the water is not intended for human consumption through drinking or cooking

No. Health and Safety Code section 25214.4.3 does not direct DTSC to establish such a list prior to sample collection. Based on the language of the statute, the legislative history, and the available resource, DTSC will exercise its own judgment on which product type will and will not be evaluated in the initial rounds of sampling and testing program.  Further, DTSC will continue to evaluate for inclusion in its monitoring sample population any device which would be reasonably described as intended to convey or dispense water for human consumption through drinking or cooking.

Yes. Health and Safety Code section 25214.4.3 requires DTSC to use test methods, protocols, and sample preparation procedures that are adequate to determine total lead concentration in a drinking water plumbing fitting or fixture to determine compliance with the lead content standards. In the August 2009 fact sheet “Testing and Evaluation of Lead Content in Plumbing Products, Materials, and Components”, DTSC outlined the testing protocols for lead content analysis in drinking water faucets and other drinking water plumbing fittings and fixtures that DTSC will use in its lead plumbing monitoring program. The analytical procedures for determining lead content percentage (as set forth in Section 2 of the August 2009 fact sheet) was used by DTSC during a round-robin study, in which nine laboratories, including DTSC’s Environmental Chemistry Laboratory, participated to evaluate laboratory procedures for lead content analysis.

California law requires certification for pipe, pipe or plumbing fittings or fixtures, solder, or flux by an independent American National Standards Institute (ANSI) accredited third party, which includes, at a minimum, testing of materials in accordance with DTSC protocols. (HSC, § 116875(g.).)  DTSC’s August 2009 fact sheet identifies certain analytical methods for lead content analysis DTSC will use during its monitor program, but recognizes equivalent analytical methods to be used. Third party testing organizations can use these analytical methods to test or monitor plumbing products, materials and components during certification process for lead content analysis.

The new lead content requirements apply broadly to all pipes, pipe fittings or plumbing fittings, or fixtures intended to convey or dispense water for human consumption.  (Health and Safety Code, § 116875, subdivisions (a) and (b).)  The statute does not contain an explicit exemption for replacement parts from the new lead content requirements.  Nor has the DTSC found any supporting information in the legislation or related materials for the notion that the California Legislature intended to exempt such a broad category of materials as “replacement parts.”  To do so would mean that for years or even decades after the law’s adoption, no meaningful reduction in lead exposure from drinking water would occur. Moreover, as plumbing fixtures sit on retail shelves available for purchase in California, there is no distinction between “new” and “replacement” parts. They are the same.

Health and Safety Code section 25214.4.3 requires DTSC to exercise its judgment regarding the specific drinking water plumbing fittings or fixtures to test. The law also does not require DTSC’s selection to be either random or representative of all available plumbing fittings or fixtures. We appreciate your input and will value your opinions in our decision-making process. We will continue our ongoing outreach efforts.  DTSC is developing general sample collection strategy which will be posted on this web site. If you have specific ideas for priorities in the selection of samples to test in the year of 2010, please send your comments to leadinplumbing@dtsc.ca.gov.

DTSC recognizes that there are issues of concern to manufacturers such as the authenticity of products tested, variability within and between material and product batches, and controls over distribution chains.  DTSC will contact each manufacturer whose product was collected for sampling prior to posting its annual testing results.  There will be a case-by-case determination by DTSC of the level of interaction with manufacturers, distributers, or retailers prior to posting results to ensure the authenticity of products tested.  Health and Safety Code section 25214.4.3 also requires DTSC to transmit the testing results in an annual report to the California Department of Public Health. Due to the very specific and limited role given to DTSC by the statute, DTSC does not have any enforcement authority.