Schools in Montana have been required to test their drinking water for lead since 2020 and are finding alarming results.
Greg Montgomery with the Department of Environmental Quality Lead in School Drinking Water Reduction Project explains the findings.
“About 75 percent of the schools had at least one fixture that exceeded our action level for lead.“-Greg Montgomery
He continues to explain the Department of Environmental Quality’s action level for school drinking water.
“Well, some of these schools take 20,30, 40 samples or 50 samples, some take 100 depending on the size of the school, and the concentrations vary. So that’s just our action level. So, if it’s above five parts per billion that fixture needs to be addressed.” “-Greg Montgomery
According to Greg schools have a few options when lead is found in the drinking water.
“If they find elevated lead then there’s a number of things they can do to address that. They could put in new lead-free fixtures, like new faucets or drinking water fountains. They can simply shut old fixtures down if they don’t need them. They can add water filters that take the lead out of the water.”-Greg Montgomery
