Editor’s Note: Scott Faber is senior vice president of government affairs at the Environmental Working Group (EWG), which is a nonprofit environmental health research and advocacy group. He is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center. The views expressed here are his own. Read more opinion on CNN.
CNN
—
President Joe Biden pledged to make the toxic “forever chemicals,” also known as per- and polyfluorinated substances, or PFAS, a priority during his campaign. When the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a proposed drinking water standard for six PFAS compounds last week, he delivered on his promise.
As EPA Administrator Michael Reagan said while announcing the new standard, “[c]ommunities across this country have suffered far too long from the ever-present threat of PFAS pollution.”
For decades, millions of Americans have been drinking these toxic chemicals, which are used in everything from cookware to clothes to firefighting foam. PFAS are a family of more than 12,000 chemicals that repel water and oil and are used on waterproof and grease resistant coatings. Because of their strong carbon-fluorine bond, PFAS don’t break down in the environment, and build up and stay in the human body for many years causing long-term damage, hence the name “forever” chemicals.
Exactly how many Americans have been drinking unsafe levels of these chemicals is hard to know, because our drinking water utilities were only recently required to test for their presence. But, according to research estimates, it’s likely that more than 200 million Americans have been drinking a chemical linked to an increased risk of cancer, reproductive harm, immune system damage and other serious health problems, even at low levels.
Until last week, water utilities were not required to test PFAS, much less filter them out of our drinking water. Thanks to Biden, the US is about to take the first step toward change.
Water utilities will soon have to meet the toughest drinking water standards, of 4 parts per trillion, or ppt, for two of the most notorious and best-studied PFAS compounds: PFOA, formerly used to make DuPont’s Teflon, and PFOS, formerly an ingredient in 3M’s Scotchgard. The agency also set a separate standard for a witches brew of four other PFAS compounds: GenX, PFBS, PFNA…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CNN.com – RSS Channel – HP Hero…