Small System Safe Drinking Water Act of 2011 - Amends the Safe Drinking Water Act to require the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA): (1) to convene a working group to study barriers to using specified treatments; (2) to develop model guidance to assist states in regulating and promoting such treatment options; and (3) when establishing affordability criteria for variance technology, to consider specified cost factors, to give extra weight to households below the poverty level and to communities that meet state affordability criteria, and to ensure that the criteria are not more costly, on a per-capita basis, to a small public water system than the per capita cost to a large water system of acquiring feasible technology.
Requires the Administrator or a state, before initiating any enforcement action, to ensure that sufficient funds have been made available to assist each public water system that serves fewer than 10,000 individuals in meeting regulation requirements.
Revises provisions allowing an exemption of a system from maximum containment level and treatment technique requirements to: (1) increase the population threshold; and (2) allow state determinations of a renewal period.
Revises technical assistance provisions to require water systems serving fewer than 10,000 individuals to receive adequate technical assistance and training to meet requirements of final rules. Gives priority to systems not in compliance with specified rules concerning disinfectants and disinfection byproducts, arsenic and compliance and new source monitoring, or groundwater or any other final rule promulgated by the Administrator after this Act's enactment.
Establishes pilot programs to: (1) explore new technologies or approaches to comply with a drinking water standard; and (2) research technology transfer issues and disinfection strategies relating to drinking water.