It’s been four years since the last infrastructure report card from The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), but low grades in the “C-” to “D” range for the water sector have returned in 2025.
The 2025 ASCE Report Card, released in March, gives drinking water infrastructure a “C-”; wastewater infrastructure received a “D+” grade; and stormwater came in as the lowest rated segment of any infrastructure category in the U.S. with a grade of “D-”.
The common theme in the report card is a critique of “persistent underinvestment”, particularly as so much critical infrastructure reaches its useful end of life.
“Every American household or business immediately feels the impact of just one inefficiency or failure in our built environment,” announced Darren Olson, 2025 ASCE Report Card Chair, in a statement accompanying the report’s release.
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For the wastewater sector’s “D+”, the report card cites a drop in the renewal and replacement rate for large capital projects, which decreased from 3% to 2%. The average number of collection system failures for combined water utilities, meanwhile, increased from 2 to 3.3 per 100 miles of pipe, indicating the impacts of aging infrastructure, the report card states.
Wastewater systems, encompassing nearly 17,500 treatment plants, continue to age without sufficient reinvestment, the report card states. While sanitary sewer overflows have decreased in frequency and the number of combined sewer systems has slightly declined, the authors say that overall renewal rates are lagging
The stormwater sector’s “D” is a reflection of the degradation of rivers and streams across the U.S., according to the report card, which states that the length of impaired U.S. waterways jumped from 424,000 to more than 703,000 miles in just over a decade. While the report’s authors concede that this is partly due to better monitoring, they say it also highlights the pressure that stormwater systems face from aging pipes and increasing rainfall intensities linked to climate change. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the 20-year need for large stormwater systems increased nearly five-fold in a decade — from $23.8 billion in 2012 to $115.3 billion in 2022.
Assuming the combined wastewater and stormwater sector continues along the same path, the report suggests that the gap will continue to grow to more than $690 billion by 2044.
The drinking water sector’s “C-” grade explores the fact that while many drinking water utilities are actively improving infrastructure through innovations such as asset failure prediction technologies, only about 30% of utilities have fully implemented an asset management plan, and just under half are in the process of implementing one. In 2023, the EPA estimated that $625 billion in drinking water investment is needed over the next two decades — up more than $150 billion from its 2018 estimate.
Susan Hardwick, CEO of American Water, issued a statement in response to the report card that described the state of U.S. drinking water and wastewater infrastructure as “stagnant.” She also called it a “stark reminder” when it comes to the need for sufficient funding.
“With over a trillion dollars in infrastructure investments needed in water and wastewater over the next two decades, American Water continues to work with local and federal leaders to provide expertise and investment in communities that need to strengthen their water systems — and we will not slow down,” announced Hardwick, who is set to retire in May.
Despite the low grades for the water sector, U.S. infrastructure overall received a “C”, its highest grade of the eight ASCE report cards ever published.
