Major progress with Potomac sewage cleanup, but who will pay?

DC Water crews are making good progress in repairing the underground sewer line that ruptured and spilled more than 240 million gallons of raw sewage and wastewater into the Potomac River, but who will pay for cleanup and repair remains unclear.

Despite President Donald Trump declaring an emergency, it’s not certain whether the federal government will help pay.

Crews are working around the clock at the site of the ruptured pipe, but after discovering huge boulders blocking the pipe, work to clear the debris is slow and dangerous.

In a conference call with reporters Wednesday, Sherri Lewis of DC Water explained the major progress made in the past two days.

“We’ve expanded this excavation area around that damaged section of pipe so that we could get to that rock dam,” she said. “We’ve removed sections of the pipe over the last couple of days and so far have removed about 45 feet of that rock and debris dam. We’re now down to maybe the last eight or 10 feet of that. And then once we get that removed, we’ll be able to begin our process that’s necessary to begin the geopolymer application inside the pipe, which is the key to the repair.”

DC Water expects preliminary repairs to be completed by mid-March.

While the declaration of an emergency by D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and the president opened the door for the federal government to pay as much as 75% of the estimated $20 million in costs, D.C. Homeland Security and Emergency Management Director Clint Osborn said, as of now, no federal funding has been approved, only federal assistance in the form of services such as lab testing. Further action by Trump is necessary for the feds to offset the costs.

“Need to be escalated from an emergency declaration to a major disaster declaration in order for the District to be reimbursed for the costs that we have and will continue to incur during this incident,” Osborn said.

The Bowser administration is working to convince the Federal Emergency Management Agency to make that upgrade determination, Osborn said.

DC Water reports there have been no significant sewage overflows into the Potomac River since Super Bowl Sunday.

District officials said they hope to lift the guidance restricting recreational use of the river next week if E. coli levels continue to drop.