Materials for water supply and drainage systems Water supply and drainage

In addition, growing construction of housing, buildings, and infrastructure has increased demand for drinking-water systems, particularly in developing countries. As a result, home builders and other construction-industry firms face a difficult challenge: to take maximal advantage—as appropriate for specific individual circumstances—of materials satisfying regulatory standards around the world, all while navigating the increasing complexities of today’s supply chains.

In this environment, product designers have increasingly sought to replace metals with plastics as constituent materials for components designed to make contact with drinking water—including components that may seem invisible in our daily lives, such as water-use meters, faucets, showers, pipes, junctions, and filters.
But the advantages of switching to resin materials are not limited to protection against toxic eluents and contaminants; the unique properties of resins—including their good mechanical properties, their chemical resistance, and the fact that they do not rust—serve to extend product lifetimes, while their lower weight reduces the cost and environmental impact of shipping products.

In addition to the above, a movement known as the 4MS-Initiative (4MSI) seeking to standardize European regulatory guidelines is active in four European nations—Germany, France, the Netherlands, and the U.K.—making the European regulatory environment something of a moving target requiring careful attention in the years to come.