EPA is encouraging water and wastewater utilities to prepare themselves for potential natural disasters, accidents, and intentional acts in the countdown to the America’s PrepareAthon! National Day of Action, which is on April 30.

For this week, EPA recommends utilities begin reviewing its Route to Resilience tool, which highlights resources available to help assess, plan, train, respond, and recover in the event of an emergency. EPA is focusing on steps 1 and 2 for this week, which involving assessing risks and planning for tomorrow’s emergency. The document posted below contains more details about these steps. While EPA will likely encourage utilities to review the other steps next week, it has also posted a webpage with actions to take on each day. These include joining your state’s Water/Wastewater Agency Response Network (WARN) on Monday, updating or creating an emergency call-down list on Tuesday, raising awareness in your community with the Public Awareness Kit on Wednesday, signing up for EPA’s Free Preparedness Tools webinar on Thursday, and managing cyber risks with AWWA’s Cybersecurity Guidance on Friday.