Rates & billing
Why your water bill keeps going up
Most of the increase is not water. It is the cost of the tunnels, the lead pipe replacement, and a stormwater charge based on your roof.
What is on the bill
A DC Water bill is not one charge but five or six, and only two of them are about how much water you used.
| Charge | What it pays for | Based on |
|---|---|---|
| Water service | Buying and distributing treated water | Volume used |
| Sewer service | Collecting and treating wastewater | Volume used |
| CRIAC | Clean Rivers tunnels | Impervious area on your property |
| Right-of-way fee | Use of public space by the utility | Flat |
| Customer metering | Meter reading and billing | Flat / meter size |
The CRIAC charge, and why it is controversial
The Clean Rivers Impervious Area Charge first appeared in May 2009. It exists to pay for the tunnel programme this site documents elsewhere — and it is deliberately separated from ordinary sewer rates so that the cost of fixing combined sewer overflows is visible rather than buried.
It is charged on impervious area — roof, driveway, patio, anything that sheds rain rather than absorbing it. The logic is direct: hard surfaces send stormwater into the combined sewer, and stormwater is what causes overflows. The more runoff a property contributes, the more it pays toward the fix.
That logic is sound and the implementation has been contentious. Because the charge is not based on water use, a household that uses very little water can still face a large bill — and churches, schools and non-profits with big roofs and car parks have been hit hard.
The current dispute. Over the 2025–26 holidays DC Water sent letters announcing significant CRIAC increases based on re-measured property data. Some customers saw monthly charges move from around $24 to $57. After complaints about both the size and the timing, DC Water paused implementation. There is no published timeline for resolution.
Where the money goes
It is worth being clear that the spending is real and the results are measurable. The tunnels CRIAC funds have cut Anacostia sewage overflow by around 99% — from 3,387 million gallons in 2005 to 5.4 million in 2025.
The open question is not whether the work is happening, but how its cost is distributed among ratepayers — which is precisely what the plaintiffs in the consent decree case argued when DC Water sought a deadline extension on affordability grounds.
See what the money bought → · Why DC has to spend it →
Sources: DC Water rate schedules and CRIAC documentation; overflow figures from DC Water quarterly reports to the EPA. All sources →