American Samoa Environmental Protection Agency

The Water Program consists of four branches: (1) Drinking Water, (2) Laboratory, (3) Water Quality and the (4) Piggery Compliance Program.

The Drinking Water Branch is committed to protecting the quality of groundwater in American Samoa by focusing on engineering, compliance and administrative priorities. These include maintaining the agency’s Safe Drinking Water Act component primacy status from USEPA, improving Public Water System (PWS) compliance and developing regulations, rules, guidance policies and special conditions for protecting drinking water resources in the Territory.

The Laboratory provides all programs of the agency with comprehensive analytical services that supplement ongoing environmental monitoring programs and help support agency decisions. Priorities of this branch include conducting monthly PWS monitoring, and implementing the AS-EPA Nearshore Marine Water and Stream Water Quality Monitoring Plans.

The Water Quality Branch is multi-faceted, incorporating water quality monitoring activities with site inspections, compliance determinations, regulatory enforcement, and education and outreach work. The top priority of this branch is to integrate watershed protection and management into all branch activities by implementing various programs including the AS-EPA Piggery Compliance Program and the American Samoa Coastal Nonpoint Source Monitoring Strategy.