EPA tightens recommendations on 'forever chemicals' in drinking water

Federal regulators stunned scientists and local officials nationwide Wednesday by releasing new health advisories for toxic "forever chemicals" known to be in thousands of U.S. drinking water systems, impacting potentially millions of people.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cut the safe level of a chemical called PFOA by more than 17,000 times what the agency had previously said was protective of health, to now just four "parts per quadrillion." The safe level of a sister chemical, PFOS, was reduced by a factor of 3,500.

“This will set off alarm bells for consumers, for regulators, and for manufacturers, who thought the previous (advisories) were safe,” said Scott Faber, senior vice president with the nonprofit Environmental Working Group. “I can't find the words to explain what kind of a moment this is. ... The number of people drinking what are, according to these new numbers, unsafe levels of PFAS, is going to grow astronomically.”

But unlike a maximum contaminant level, the new so-called health advisory levels for the chemicals only provide information on what levels can cause negative human health effects. They have no teeth and are "non-enforceable and non-regulatory."

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EPA has set no maximum contaminant levels for PFAS.

But the new health advisories will increase public pressure on local utilities to reduce the chemicals in their water supplies. The compounds, called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) get into drinking water and the Indian River Lagoon from contaminated soil, sewage, reclaimed water, biosolids, and countless consumer products. Experts say there’s no cheap or easy way of getting them out of drinking water or the environment, or of even measuring them.

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Based on the new data and EPA’s draft analyses, the levels at which negative health effects may happen are much lower than previously understood when EPA issued a 70 parts per trillion (ppt) health advisory for PFOA and and PFOS in 2016, individually or combined.

Now it says the health advisories should be just 0.004 ppt for PFOA and 0.02 ppt for PFOS. It also says other forever chemicals called GenX can be at 10 ppt, and PFBS at 2,000 ppt.

PFAS also are known as "forever chemicals" due to their stable chemical bonds — some of the strongest in nature — which make them extremely resistant to breaking down into less harmful compounds in the environment or the human body. They have been linked to different types of cancer, low birthweights, thyroid disease, high cholesterol and other health ailments.

PFAS can even blunt the effectiveness of vaccines, including those against COVID-19.

Scientists are just beginning to unravel and understand their effects in nature and on humans. And they are being found everywhere scientists look for them in the environment.

PFAS are known to contaminate the drinking water of an estimated 200-plus million people, according to the nonprofit Environmental Working Group, which published an analysis in late 2020 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters.

While no one’s drinking lagoon water, PFAS compounds keep popping up in fish, alligators, manatees, seagrass and more along the waterway from Kennedy Space Center to Patrick Space Force Base.

Similar to lead and mercury, EPA in effect now say any detectable PFAS is unhealthy to consume over the long term.

But for many of the health outcomes, a direct cause and effect is unknown or unclear. The chemicals can remain in the body for decades with indeterminate consequences. Thousands of PFAS compounds aren’t even yet measured, so the combined long-term toxic effects also remain uncertain.

Most uses of PFAS were voluntarily phased out by U.S. manufacturers in the mid-2000s. But there are limited ongoing uses.

Wednesday's announcement has potentially astronomical cost expensive implications for water utilities, towns, and Americans across the country with water supplies most affected by the compounds.

Because the chemicals are not yet officially regulated, water utilities are not required to test for them. But their use for decades in products such as Teflon and other nonstick cookware, clothing, food packaging, furniture, and numerous industrial processes, means they are widespread in both the environment and drinking water.

Local testing in the summer of 2018 found trace levels of one less-harmful breakdown product of PFAS, called perfluorobutanoic acid (PFBA), in several Brevard County schools along the beach side.

The University of Florida has been finding PFAS basically everywhere they've looked in recent years: alligators at Kennedy Space Center, manatees and seagrass in the Indian River Lagoon, in the ground water and soils in Brevard County.

The extensive historical use of firefighting foams at Patrick Space Force Base and KSC, as well as the discharge of wastewater, coupled with the stagnant nature of the waterway contribute to the higher levels in Banana River, the UF researchers said in one recently published paper.

Patrick Space Force Base has found PFAS at levels of up to 4.3 million parts per trillion in their groundwater, which is not used for drinking water.

PFAS work in the background, with risks building up over a lifetime of consumption, said Philippe Grandjean, a PFAS researcher at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, who's called for extremely protective limits on PFAS. His work shows PFAS can decrease the immune response in children. They may come down with more infections than they would otherwise.

“People on the front lines of PFAS contamination have suffered for far too long," EPA Administrator Michael Regan said in a release. "That’s why EPA is taking aggressive action as part of a whole-of-government approach to prevent these chemicals from entering the environment and to help protect concerned families from this pervasive challenge.”

The American Chemistry Council, an industry group representing many of the companies that use PFAS, said it believes the agency's new advisories are "fundamentally flawed."

"ACC supports the development of drinking water standards for PFAS based on the best available science. However, today’s announcement ... reflects a failure of the agency to follow its accepted practice for ensuring the scientific integrity of its process," the council said in a release.

EPA announced it will make available the first $1 billion of $5 billion in grant funding from the federal infrastructure bill passed last year to help communities contaminated with PFAS. Another $6.6 billion is potentially available through existing loan programs for water and sewer utilities.

But the costs to remove and dispose of PFAS are huge, says Emily Remmel, director of regulatory affairs for the National Association of Clean Water Agencies. A filter on a single water well can cost $500,000. Remmel said while the new funding is helpful, it’s also just a “drop in the bucket" for what's needed across the country.

Jim Waymer is an environment reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Waymer at 321-261-5903 or [email protected]. Or find him on Twitter: @JWayEnviro or on Facebook: www.facebook.com/jim.waymer

Kyle Bagenstose covers climate change, chemicals, water and other environmental topics for USA TODAY. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @kylebagenstose.

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This article originally appeared on Florida Today: EPA tightens recommendations on 'forever chemicals' in drinking water