The District of Columbia will use a large loan from the federal government to replace some of the century-old water mains carrying drinking water throughout the city, Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan announced Thursday.

The $156 million loan comes at a lower interest rate than D.C. Water’s ordinary cost of borrowing to finance water main repairs, and will save the utility about $30 million in interest, D.C. Water chief executive David Gadis said.

The utility can pass on some savings to customers and use some to complete further repairs on a faster schedule than originally planned.

Gadis said D.C. Water will rip out aging water mains in every ward of the city, many of which were installed in 1914, and replace them with new pipes that should be less likely to break and will provide clean drinking water for at least 50 years.

Some of the pipes slated to be removed are lead pipes, which can cause long-term cognitive damage to young children.

Regan announced the loan from EPA’s Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) program at a park in Northeast Washington, joined by Bowser, Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) and others.

In his first public appearance since his confirmation last month to head the federal agency, Regan said the federally financed projects would create jobs for 1,000 people.

The EPA could create hundreds of thousands of jobs — and remove all the lead pipes in America — Regan said, if Congress passes President Biden’s proposed infrastructure and jobs plan, which commits a far greater sum to loans for similar drinking water projects.

Congressional Republicans have criticized Biden’s plan as too large, saying that only the money devoted to improving roads and transportation can truly be considered funding for “infrastructure.”

Norton disagreed Thursday. “Despite what some of my friends on the other side of the aisle say, clean water is infrastructure,” she said.

Bowser spoke about additional goals for water projects in the District, including eventually completing massive new tunnels that can absorb rainfall during major storms — which prevents both flooding and untreated water from running directly into the Anacostia River.

Norton said she looks forward to the day that she can say about the city’s rivers: “Jump in, people.”

But the EPA loan won’t directly finance those projects. Kishia Powell, the chief operating officer of D.C. Water, said the low-cost loan will help the utility save the money to attend to those projects sooner.