Flint accepts copper pipe deal, but PE under consideration for pilot area

Flint, Mich. — Members of the Copper Development Association Inc. helped the city of Flint acquire enough copper pipe to replace lead-tainted service lines to about 5,000 houses at a discount of about $1 million.

But plastic pipe is still under consideration as the city plans to replace some 20,000 service lines connecting homes to water mains over the next three years at an estimated cost of $106 million.

Flint is on a long road to recovery from the water crisis that caused lead to leach into the system in 2014 and still has residents drinking only filtered or bottled water.

Los Angeles-based JM Eagle, the largest plastics pipe producer in North America, was willing to provide free polyethylene pipe to replace lead service lines (LSLs) to all homes and businesses. However, the donation proposed by CEO Walter Wang to the Flint City Council in February 2016 seemed to languish without any public consideration or comment.

But behind the scenes, officials discussed the merits of PE vs. copper pipe, Flint officials said at the Water Infrastructure Conference, held March 7-9 at the University of Michigan-Flint.

JM Eagle's offer prompted Flint to conduct a secondary-research pipe study that resulted in copper being selected as the replacement material for the service lines. Flint accepted a pipe deal from the Franklin, Ind.-based copper association, which is the marketing and engineering arm of the copper industry.

“They helped the City of Flint acquire nearly 200,000 feet of copper piping for the 2017 phase of the Fast Start program, saving the city and the state approximately $1 million,” Flint Mayor Karen Weaver announced. “That's a big help for us to replace the lead-tainted service lines.”

Fast Start is the name of the mayor's initiative to remove LSLs and lead-tainted galvanized iron service lines, starting with houses where water tested highest for lead and where more vulnerable senior citizens and children live. Lead is a neurotoxin that causes premature births, developmental delays, learning difficulties, high blood pressure and joint pains among other problems.

The water crisis started when a state-appointed emergency manager switched the city's source of water from Lake Huron to the Flint River in April 2014 without adding the necessary corrosion controls. The caustic river water ate away at a protective coating inside the lead pipes, causing lead to leach into the system.

“We had a significant number of children ending up with higher blood-lead levels and water tests revealed at that time some homes had levels that equated to toxic waste,” Weaver said.

Flint changed back to water delivered from Lake Huron in October 2015, but residents still are told to drink only filtered water.

Flint has replaced about 800 LSLs to date, initially specifying copper based on an informal consensus as it studied other materials. While the city will continue to use copper, there's talk of creating a pilot area using PE pipe donated from a yet-to-be determined manufacturer to replace the service lines to houses on several city blocks.

Local contractors would be trained, possibly with federal funds, to install the lines using a trenchless method.

“With the pipe bursting technology, we can be in and out of there in two weeks,” said Peter Dyke, executive director of the Alliance for PE Pipe, which promotes its members' products as the “responsible infrastructure” choice and says they are leak-free, corrosion resistant, and durable and flexible enough to withstand earthquakes.

Dyke told Plastics News that state officials have directed him to talk to Michael McDaniel, a retired National Guard brigadier general put in charge of the Fast Start program, about a pilot area.

McDaniel told conference attendees that he began his work in February 2016, and one of the early issues was whether to use copper or plastic pipe.

“I didn't know how to make that decision. I don't pretend to be a scientist at all,” McDaniel said, adding that he asked a retired professor of environmental engineering, Mackenzie Davis of Michigan State University, to look at copper, PE, and cross-linked PE (PEX).

“He did a literature search,” McDaniel said. “We went through that and based upon his recommendation and in talking to city folks who had some other secondary issues, we felt copper pipes would be the best way to go. The bottom line of this report was it would cost more, but we believe the pipes have greater longevity and less permeability and they've got a residual value to them as well.”

After his presentation, McDaniel gave Plastics News an eight-page analysis of the pipe materials.

The analysis says longevity was the paramount consideration in selecting a pipe material and it assigns useful life spans of 60 to 80 years to copper and 25 years to both PE and PEX. The plastic pipe service years were based on their product warranties. The analysis also says no PE pipe has been in use for more than 30 years.

However, the pipe alliance says PE pipe has been used to convey water since 1959, particularly in western United States, in places with seismic activity or droughts, because it is strong yet flexible and doesn't leak. The alliance was among the conference sponsors and Dyke gave a presentation about fusing PE pipes for leak-free systems.

Flint's analysis also says copper has a high salvage value, giving it a life-cycle benefit as opposed to a life-cycle cost. And it raises a long list of concerns about plastic pipes, including the release of volatile organic compounds, the taste and smell of the water, the possibility of material degradation from chlorine disinfectants and the lack of data about the potential for soil contaminants to permeate through the pipe wall.

Dyke said he would review the analysis and respond later to the findings, which also includes a “practical concern” that Flint houses are traditionally grounded for electric lines by using metallic piping whenever available. If a non-conductive pipe is used, the cost of permit and re-ground work would be $300 to $500 per residence, plus the cost to the city of the electrical inspections.

However, a representative of one PE pipe manufacturer said in those cases, the metal pipe can just be left in the ground and the new pipe installed near it.

The analysis also warned Flint officials against entering any kind of partnership with JM Eagle because it has been embroiled in a federal whistleblower lawsuit that alleged the company wasn't manufacturing PVC pipe products in a consistent manner from 1996-2006 that assured compliance with industry standards for strength and durability.

In November 2013, a jury found JM liable for violating the False Claims Act by falsely representing “uniform compliance” with the standards in five water systems that had been selected as exemplar plaintiffs out of the three states and 42 cities that joined the lawsuit. Damages for those five plaintiffs are to be determined in a second phase of the ongoing trial that could start in October.

JM Eagle's defense lawyers have said in legal briefs that the first jury finding says little more about the company and its products than could be said of any manufacturer: JM isn't perfect and that's why warranties are offered.

The drawn-out litigation raised several issues for Flint, according to the analysis. It says: “…it would not seem to be in the city's best interests to align itself with the company when the city is seeking to assure state and federal legislative bodies and executive agencies of its stewardship and remediation capabilities and to restore the trust of its citizenry in the city's water treatment and distribution systems.”

JM Eagle officials declined to comment, citing the pending lawsuit. They have said in the past that the offer of free pipe was intended as a philanthropic gesture to a cash-strapped city, and that the company has donated pipe to other communities around the world.

Flint's analysis also claims that “there appears to be movement from plastics back to copper” for water service lines. The report attributed the trend to uncertainty about longevity and susceptibility to leaching of plastics.

In the 1980s and 1990s plastics pipe was used in nearly 50 percent of the underground water service market, replacing cast iron, galvanized steel and then copper, the analysis says.

In his presentation, Dyke said PE pipe is made with a fourth-generation resin and has about a 10 percent market share overall and about 5 percent in Michigan. The city of Livonia is considered one of the “early adopters” even though PE pipe has been around more than five decades. It also is used almost exclusively in the United States to distribute natural gas. In Europe, it is used widely for potable water systems.

About 15,000 miles of PE water pipe was installed in the United States last year, Dyke said.

PVC isn't used for service lines to houses and business, but it is used widely in other parts of the water distribution system, and has been installed in other Michigan cities near Flint including Burton and Mount Morris, according to Veso Sobot, an engineer and director of corporate affairs for Oakville, Ontario-based Ipex Inc., which is a piping systems manufacturer.

“Change sometimes has to happen in increments,” said Sobot, who attended the conference. “Michigan is using a lot of PVC pipe now and we're very excited about the $1 trillion in infrastructure spending that may happen in the next 10 years under the federal program.”

Flint could benefit from potable PVC pipe, Sobot added.

“Flint's sister city is Hamilton, Ontario,” he said. “Hamilton has been using PVC for many years. We've given Flint a copy of Hamilton's specification and we're hopeful they will come to use larger diameter pipe sometime in the near future. The beauty of plastics, and PVC specifically, is that hydraulically it's superior. If you want to save electricity pumping water, this is the way to go. Want to save money by reducing the amount of water main breaks? This is the way to go.”