Recent rollbacks of federal Clean Water Act protections have put at risk the small streams and wetlands that feed drinking water sources nationwide, including those serving almost 8 million Pennsylvanians, according to a national Sierra Club report.

According to the report released yesterday, Pennsylvania ranks eighth among states with the highest percentage of their populations supplied by water from sources that could be fouled by pollution or damaged by development due to Supreme Court rulings and Bush administration policy changes that have reduced the reach of the 1972 federal water law.

In addition, the report says 59 percent of the state's streams could be affected by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers policies that direct federal regulators to check with Washington, D.C., before issuing restrictions on pollution or development that would disrupt water flow from wetlands, bogs and periodic streams.

"Everyone deserves safe and healthy drinking water," said Barbara Benson, co-chairwoman of Pennsylvania Sierra Club's Water Issues Committee. "Unfortunately, current administration policies could open up our drinking water sources to unregulated pollution, jeopardizing our health and increasing the cost of treating our drinking water."

The EPA estimated in 2005 that more than 110 million people nationwide get their drinking water from public systems supplied wholly or in part by those smaller headwater sources.

Considered the cornerstone of national surface water protection, the Clean Water Act limits pollutant discharges into the nation's waterways, and places equal emphasis on protecting healthy waters and restoring lakes, streams and rivers.

The Sierra Club is calling on Congress to pass the Clean Water Restoration Act, introduced two weeks ago by U.S. Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., which reiterates the original intent of the 1972 legislation to protect all waters of the United States.

The legislation has 19 co-sponsors in the Senate, and 169 in the House, including U.S. Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forest Hills, and seven congressmen from eastern Pennsylvania.

"Our local congressmen need to step up," said Rachel Martin, regional representative for the Sierra Club in Pittsburgh, "and join Rep. Doyle in ensuring that Pennsylvanians, and all Americans, have clean, safe water to drink."

Pennsylvania has 83,261 miles of flowing water -- second only to Alaska -- but as many as one-third of those rivers, creeks and streams have been polluted by acid mine drainage, sewage, agricultural runoff or urban storm water runoff.

Ms. Benson said the Sierra Club is also participating in meetings about the state Department of Environmental Protection's ongoing modifications of state regulations governing erosion and sedimentation controls and stream encroachment.

"Right now, some smaller streams are waived from any encroachment protections, but those flows are important as drinking water sources, for ground water protection and flood control," Ms. Benson said. "We'd like to see changes to the rules to better protect those small headwater streams that make a big difference."

Modification of the state's erosion and sedimentation regulations, will focus on post-construction storm water management, including stream buffers, pollution limits and anti-degradation of high quality watersheds with special protections.

"We do cross reference with the Clean Water Act, but we felt in Pennsylvania that we were not being as protective in the erosion and sedimentation area as we could be," said Barb Beshore, section chief for DEP's erosion and sedimentation division.

Troy Conrad, chief environmental manager for DEP's stream encroachment program, said modifications of the state's rules covering stream impediments will try to make permitting more timely and improve development mitigation requirements, including making wetland replacement more effective.

The state code revisions were not prompted by any federal regulatory changes or court decisions, Mr. Conrad said, and are in the early stages of an 18-month public process.