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North America's underground infrastructure is crumbling at an alarming rate, so smarter, more cost-effective and sustainable practices are needed.
Broader use of PVC pipe would solve this problem and enable municipalities to spend taxpayer dollars more wisely. To do this, local governments and utilities need to modernize outdated procurement practices that ignore corrosion-proof PVC pipe.
Explore our web site and visit my blog to learn about the exceptional performance and environmental attributes of PVC pipe, and why it should be included in every bid for water and wastewater infrastructure. To connect to my blog, bookmark this page or link our Pipe Issues Blog to your RSS feed program.
Industry expert and Uni-Bell PVC Pipe Association President & CEO Bruce Hollands shares the facts.
As you may know, several competitive materials are sponsoring articles and webinars alleging that PVC water pipe leaches vinyl chloride. However, the science is clear: independent testing and basic chemistry confirm that vinyl chloride does not leach from PVC pipe. The safety of PVC piping has been thoroughly evaluated for more than 70 years by federal regulatory agencies, independent certification organizations, and scientific studies. North American manufactured PVC pipe consistently meets or exceeds rigorous safety requirements established by the EPA and standards organizations such as the National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) and Underwriters Laboratories (UL). Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) is produced from vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) through a process known as polymerization. This process transforms VCM into PVC resin, a white powder which is the primary raw material for PVC pipe. In the pipe industry, “leaching” is the migration of a substance from inside a pipe wall into the conveyed liquid. For more than 60 years, PVC pipe has been tested per NSF Standards 14 and 61 to ensure that VCM does not leach into drinking water – testing requirement is 0.2 parts per billion (ppb), which is one tenth the EPA’s allowable of 2 ppb. The bar is high: using a time comparison, 0.2 ppb is equivalent to one second every 158 years. But PVC not only passes testing at this level it consistently tests “Non-Detect” for VCM per NSF and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Despite our competitors’ allegations, the bottom line is that leaching of VCM from PVC pipe into drinking water is not an issue for concern. Click here for our Tech Brief on VCM.
For additional information see The Health, Safety, and Environmental Performance of PVC Pipe.
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