City of Detroit to partner with tech startup to help identify lead water service lines

Detroit Free Press
Nushrat Rahman

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The city of Detroit is partnering with an Ann Arbor-based technology startup to predict the location of lead water service lines that are due for replacement in the next two decades, city officials announced Thursday. 

The Detroit Water and Sewerage Department will use data from BlueConduit, an analytics company that maps out potential lead service lines, creating models to help identify where lead lines may be based on the known locations of lead pipes and other factors.  

"One of the things that is difficult with service line replacement is really knowing where the lead service lines are in advance," said Palencia Mobley, DWSD deputy director and chief engineer, during a Thursday news briefing.