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Updated 3 hours ago

The Allegheny County Sanitary Authority will offer $9 million in matching grants to help municipalities reduce the amount of water flowing into the authority's sewer system.

The authority announced Tuesday that its board of directors awarded the grants to 32 municipalities as part of a new program dubbed Green Revitalization of Our Waterways or GROW.

Alcosan is under a federal mandate to cut in the half by 2026 the 9 billion gallons of sewage that overflow the area's sewer system each year and end up in rivers and streams.

Alcosan's initial plan, which included expanding its North Side treatment plant and building massive storage tunnels under the rivers, could cost $2 billion to $3 billion.

The authority and city, council and municipal officials are working on a plan that involves building or installing more “green” environmentally friendly infrastructure such as rain barrels, porous pavement and vegetation-covered roofs to reduce costs.

The announcement Tuesday did not name the municipalities that will receive the matching grants or what types of projects the grants will fund. The announcement did not state where the money would come from.

A call to the authority was not immediately returned.

Alcosan Executive Director Arletta Scott Williams and Brenda Smith, chair of the board's green committee, plan to hold a news conference Wednesday to discuss more details.

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