Query EPA Envirofacts' RESTful Data Service API directly against SDWIS tables for public water system and violation data
domain: enviro.epa.gov · 5 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Steps
Review table and column documentation at epa.gov/enviro/envirofacts-data-service-api and the relevant table metadata pages
Construct a URL query against a specific SDWIS table (e.g., WATER_SYSTEM, VIOLATION) using the documented path/parameter syntax, requesting JSON output
Join up to three related tables in a single request when they share a common key column, per the API's documented join behavior
Apply row-count/row-range parameters to page through large table results, since the service enforces a completion-time limit (under 15 minutes)
Convert the returned JSON/CSV into the target schema, cross-checking field names against the table's metadata page
Known gotchas
The Envirofacts API exposes raw internal SDWIS table structures, so table/column names are database-oriented and require the metadata pages to interpret correctly
Joins are limited to tables sharing a common ID column and are capped at three tables per request
This is a different SDWIS access path than ECHO's SDW REST service; the two can return data at different refresh cadences, so don't assume identical timestamps between them
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