Water damage and mold entities

These pages explain the people, standards, places and systems that come up on almost every water damage or mold job in Greater St. Louis: who writes the industry standards, which agencies run the sewers and flood insurance, which rivers flood, and what the fungi and equipment involved actually are. Each page links to its entry in public knowledge bases (Wikipedia, Wikidata and others) and to the matching terms in our glossary.

• IICRC (Institute of Inspection, Cleaning and Restoration Certification): The nonprofit certification and standards body behind the S500 water damage and S520 mold remediation standards.
• Stachybotrys chartarum (black mold): The greenish-black mold usually meant by "black mold": what it needs to grow, what is and isn't known about health effects, and how it is removed.
• Indoor mold: Why mold grows inside homes, the moisture levels that prevent it, what testing can and cannot tell you, and when cleanup needs a professional.
• Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (MSD): The public utility that runs wastewater and stormwater sewers for St. Louis City and most of St. Louis County, and why it matters after a sewer backup.
• National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP): The federal program that sells most U.S. flood insurance: what it covers, the waiting period, and the basement limits that surprise St. Louis homeowners.
• Flood Insurance Rate Map (FEMA flood zones): FEMA's official flood map: what Zone AE and Zone X mean, when lenders require flood insurance, and how to look up a St. Louis-area address.
• Meramec River: The river that runs through south St. Louis County to the Mississippi, its record floods in 2015 and 2017, and what Meramec floodwater means for cleanup and insurance.
• Sump pump: How a sump pump keeps a basement dry, the ways it fails during St. Louis storms, backup options, and why sump failure is an insurance endorsement question.

For short definitions of the technical terms used on these pages, see the water damage and mold glossary.

Download our white paper: Basement water in Greater St. Louis: flood, sewer backup or sump failure (PDF white paper).