Buy America & AIS Compliance for MBR Wastewater Systems: A Specifier’s Checklist

If your project draws on Clean Water or Drinking Water State Revolving Fund money, every iron and steel product installed in it must be produced in the United States. This is not a temporary condition of a particular funding round — it is a permanent requirement for CWSRF, DWSRF and WIFIA projects. For a membrane bioreactor, the component most likely to fail that test is the membrane itself.

Most compliance problems on MBR wastewater treatment plants are not discovered at bid. They are discovered at submittal review, when a manufacturer cannot produce a certification letter for a valve body, a membrane frame or a blower skid — and by then the schedule is already committed. This checklist is written for the engineer who has to specify the system, not for the attorney who has to defend it afterward.

AIS vs. BABA: what actually applies to your project

Two domestic preference regimes can apply to the same wastewater project, and they are not the same rule.

American Iron and Steel (AIS) is the older and narrower of the two. It requires that iron and steel products used in a CWSRF- or DWSRF-assisted project for a treatment works or public water system be produced in the United States. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act made AIS permanent across CWSRF, DWSRF and WIFIA.

Build America, Buy America (BABA) is broader. It reaches three categories of material rather than one: iron and steel products, manufactured products, and construction materials. It applies to federal financial assistance for infrastructure generally.

The two overlap, and EPA has been explicit about how: compliance with AIS satisfies the BABA iron and steel requirement. State programs generally treat it the same way — if you meet BABA, AIS is met as well, and there is no need to duplicate manufacturer certifications or de minimis lists for both.

Which one governs depends on how the state agency classified the funds. Projects funded with federal equivalency funds must meet BABA, which in turn satisfies AIS; projects funded with non-equivalency federal recycled funds need only meet AIS. Confirm this with your state program before writing the specification — on a municipal wastewater treatment project, it changes what you have to certify.

The three standards, stated plainly

1. Iron and steel products
   All manufacturing processes, from the initial melting stage through the application of any coating, must take place in the United States. A domestically fabricated part made from imported billet does not comply. Neither does a domestically produced part that was galvanized abroad.
2. Manufactured products
   The product must be manufactured in the United States, and the cost of the components mined, produced or manufactured in the United States must exceed 55 percent of the total cost of all components. The threshold is calculated on component cost, not on the selling price and not on weight.
3. Construction materials
   All manufacturing processes associated with the material must have occurred in the United States. Covered examples include non-ferrous metals, PVC, composite building materials and lumber. Cement, aggregates such as stone, sand and gravel, binding agents, and non-permanent items are excluded from this category.

Which parts of an MBR system fall into which bucket

This is where MBR projects get complicated. A packaged MBR train is not one product; it is dozens of products in three different regulatory categories, assembled on a skid.

The gray zone is the skid. A membrane module is a manufactured product, but its steel frame is an iron and steel product. Depending on how the state agency evaluates it, a packaged train may be treated as a single manufactured product subject to the 55 percent test, or broken apart so that each iron and steel component is certified individually. That determination changes the entire submittal package, so raise it with the agency during design — not after award. The same question applies to treatment plant equipment procured as standalone upgrades.

The specifier’s checklist

Ten items to resolve before the specification goes out for bid.

1. Confirm the funding classification. Equivalency or non-equivalency. This determines whether BABA or AIS alone governs.
2. Put the requirement in the technical sections, not only in the front end. Boilerplate in Division 00 does not stop a supplier from quoting an imported membrane in Division 46.
3. Require a signed certification letter for every covered product. On manufacturer letterhead, naming the project, describing the product, and stating that all manufacturing processes occurred in the United States.
4. Require step certifications for multi-stage products. Melting, forming, finishing and coating may occur at different facilities. Each step needs to be covered.
5. Ask where the membrane sheet is made — not where the module is assembled. Assembling an imported membrane sheet into a domestic frame does not make the module domestic. This is the single most common gap on MBR projects.
6. For manufactured products, request the component cost breakdown. You cannot verify a 55 percent threshold without the underlying component costs. Ask for it at submittal, not at closeout.
7. Scrutinize the small items. Valves, fittings, fasteners, couplings, flanges, restraints and saddles are where AIS findings usually originate — not on the tanks.
8. Build the de minimis list early. Miscellaneous incidental items may be covered under a de minimis waiver when they total no more than five percent of the total project cost. Track them from the start so the cap is not exceeded by accident.
9. Check lead times against the construction schedule. A waiver is not a procurement strategy. Confirm domestic availability and delivery before a non-availability waiver becomes your only option.
10. Retain every certification through audit. The documentation obligation does not end at substantial completion.

Documentation to demand from a supplier

• A certification letter per product, on manufacturer letterhead, identifying the project by name
• A statement that all manufacturing processes occurred in the United States, with the signer’s name, title and date
• Step certifications from each facility involved in a multi-stage process
• A component cost worksheet supporting the 55 percent calculation for each manufactured product
• A de minimis worksheet tracking incidental items against the five percent project cost cap
• Mill certifications or country-of-melt documentation where the agency requires them

A supplier who cannot produce these on request during bidding will not produce them during construction either.

Waivers, and what they cost you

Waivers exist, and they are legitimate. They are also slow, public, and visible to everyone reviewing the project.

One trap worth naming: the SRF Design Planning Adjustment Period Waiver, which exists to ease the transition into BABA, does not waive the iron and steel requirements. AIS still applies underneath it.

Why the membrane is the hardest component to source domestically

Tanks can be fabricated domestically. Pumps, blowers, screens and control panels have well-established domestic suppliers with certification letters already on file. The membrane is different. The global flat-sheet and hollow-fiber MBR membrane supply is concentrated in Asia and Europe, which means that on a federally funded project the membrane is frequently the component that forces a waiver conversation — or a change of technology.

A3-USA manufactures its MaxFlow™ ultrafiltration membrane modules in Jacksonville, North Carolina, and builds its skid-mounted and containerized MBR trains in the same facility. For projects where domestic sourcing is a condition of funding rather than a preference, that matters at the specification stage, not at the submittal stage. More on domestic manufacturing and documentation: American-made MBR membranes and systems.

If you are evaluating whether an existing plant can be upgraded within these constraints, a wastewater treatment plant evaluation is the right starting point — it establishes which components actually have to be replaced before the compliance analysis has anything to act on. And if you are still deciding between technologies, the MBR wastewater treatment process explains where a membrane bioreactor fits relative to SBR and conventional activated sludge.