Actionable Criteria for Achieving Equitable, Climate-Resilient Water and Sanitation Laws and Policies

This fourth report in the Water, Sanitation, and Climate Change in the United States series examines the essential legal and policy attributes needed to protect frontline communities from climate-driven disruptions to water and sanitation infrastructure and services. Climate change is intensifying droughts, floods, wildfires, extreme storms, and sea level rise, which threaten infrastructure, degrade water quality, and create lasting service gaps — impacts that fall disproportionately on frontline communities. While laws at federal, Tribal, state, and local levels could enable equitable, climate-resilient access to water and sanitation services, they often fail to account for these risks, leaving water and wastewater systems and the people they serve underprepared.