Identifying Socio-Technical Challenges to Decentralized Wastewater Infrastructure Management in the Rural Alabama Black Belt

The Black Belt region of rural Alabama has struggled from a lack of access to managed wastewater infrastructure, resulting in the presence of raw wastewater on the ground and significant risks to public and environmental health. In addition to soil conditions that cause hydraulic failure in conventional septic systems, the wastewater crisis in the Black Belt is further exacerbated by several constraints, such as high poverty and low-population density. It is imperative to holistically understand the nature of challenges underlying the Black Belt’s wastewater crisis, bringing in-depth insights into the complexity of the operating environment. To do so, this study identifies wastewater challenges, spanning technical, financial, social, institutional, and environmental dimensions. We applied hybrid deductive-inductive qualitative content analysis on eight semi-structured interviews with 11 stakeholders involved in the wastewater sector in Alabama to better understand wastewater issues and barriers to improvements. Results show that inflexible funding processes—such as requirements for communities to match funds and have technical capacity to manage them—strain Black Belt communities’ competitiveness to secure wastewater infrastructure funding. Findings highlight the need to audit funding systems to consider rural, underserved communities’ financial constraints, thereby ensuring more equitable allocations and potentially improving wastewater access in these communities.