PFAS drinking water limits were praised, but more regulations were sought

EPA restrictions on PFAS in drinking water will reduce the amount of disease-linked chemicals that many people drink, but regulations are still needed on how these substances are released into water and how they are handled.

Individuals, parents, firefighters and farmers discussed the final drinking water standards and waste regulations issued by the Environmental Protection Agency in April at a recent conference on the emerging science of chemicals. Participants called for eliminating nonessential uses of PFAS while pushing for new water permit limits and hazardous waste management requirements.

Data from the first federal study comparing concentrations of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in drinking water exposed to the chemicals in the blood of local residents “tells us that efforts like EPA’s are effective,” said Rachel Rogers, who oversees the study. on chemicals by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

People whose water had lower levels of PFAS or reduced them by using home water filters generally had lower amounts in their bodies, she said, summarizing the findings of a CDC report on a survey of 10 communities in nine states.

“No administration has done as much to protect us from toxic chemicals,” said Scott Faber, senior vice president of government affairs for the Environmental Working Group, referring to the agency’s issued or proposed regulations on drinking water, waste and other PFAS regulations .

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) safe drinking water regulations covered six PFASs with numerical limits for some and a limitation on mixtures. Industry groups have challenged this rule.

The agency selected PFAS based on scientific information showing they have similar harmful effects on the liver, kidneys, immune system and other body functions, said Brittany Jacobs, a health scientist in the EPA’s Office of Water, who led the effort to set the limits. These effects can be stronger when certain chemicals are combined, she said, describing the agency’s rationale for the mixture limit.

More controls were sought

Emily Donovan, co-founder of Clean Cape Fear, a community organization in North Carolina, said the EPA’s drinking water regulations were historic.

However, communities living in PFAS-contaminated regions continue to struggle with “poisoned tap water, toxic air and soil, contaminated fish” and are forced to debate the pros and cons of feeding infants contaminated breast milk, she added.

In one example, Joanne Stanton, co-founder of the Buxmont Coalition for Safer Water in Pennsylvania, found that drinking water in her community was contaminated with high concentrations of PFAS from local military bases. She recalled how her son was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor at the age of 6, which doctors attributed to an incident that occurred while he was in her womb. “It was heartbreaking to be told that my exposure could have caused cancer in my child.”

“Much more needs to be done to address the harm caused by PFAS polluters,” Faber said.

EPA drinking water regulations don’t stop companies that produce or use chemicals from getting them into the water, he said. Provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act also do not apply to private wells, which are used by millions of U.S. residents.

He added that limits on PFAS emissions into water should be required under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits that states and the EPA provide to producers under the Clean Water Act.

Semiconductor and lithium-ion battery manufacturers are two types of industrial sectors discussed at the conference, although many more industries use chemicals. They do this because of PFAS’s stability, ability to smoothly transport electricity, reduce friction, and resist heat, water, and other damage to many types of products.

EPA’s recent rule designating two types of PFAS – perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) – as hazardous substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, or the Superfund Act, makes it easier for agencies and state regulators to require cleanup. However, it does not designate chemicals as hazardous waste.

The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) states that nine hazardous PFAS components proposed by the EPA this year will be created but will not become hazardous waste. The agency would have to issue another regulation designating one or more of these nine chemicals as hazardous waste.

Waste disposal

The agency must prevent chemicals from entering the environment further through uncontained industrial discharges and unregulated disposal, Faber said, calling for quicker regulations on hazardous waste.

Data on PFAS waste disposal is limited due to a lack of regulations, but some facilities have reported it voluntarily, he added.

Information collected by EPA includes shipments of non-RCRA-regulated materials containing chemicals to hazardous waste incinerators in East Liverpool, Ohio, and El Dorado, Arctic; a deep well injection facility in Texas; landfills; and other licensed facilities across the country, he said.

The database shows that companies, laboratories, universities, hospitals and military bases shipped millions of pounds of firefighting foams containing PFAS, contaminated soil and other materials between July 2018 and March 2024, according to a Bloomberg Law analysis of the law.

Alaska Airlines, BASF company., Cargill Inc., Disney Cruise Lines, GlaxoSmithKline PLCAccording to the database, Harvard University, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and numerous military bases are among the facilities that sent waste to incinerators on specific dates between July 2018 and February 2024. PFAS-infused aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF) was one of the most frequently mentioned materials sent by these plants to hazardous waste incineration plants.

American airlines, Exxon Mobil.and Perimeter Solutions, which provides firefighting equipment and services, supplied water with AFFF to licensed deep well and ground injection companies between January 2020 and March 2024.

The EPA database reports one incident of open burning of PFAS waste. Shore Terminals LLC, which stores, handles and distributes petroleum products, shipped oily water containing PFOS to US Ecology Inc., a waste management company, in 2019 for open burning or detonation in Beatty, Nevada.

In the waste transfers portion of its database, EPA states that some shipment manifest records may not contain PFAS and that the data does not reflect all PFAS waste transfers.

According to Faber, ultimately, companies, federal agencies and states must end the unnecessary use of PFAS, stop releasing them into the environment and properly manage them as hazardous waste.

Even as progress is being made in removing PFAS, it is slow and remediation is difficult, said Hope Grosse, the other co-founder of the Buxmont Coalition for Safer Water, who grew up across the street from the Naval Air Warfare Center in Warminster, Pennsylvania. “Our community will be engaged in this cleanup for decades.”