A resident discovered high levels of PFAS, a toxin linked to cancers and other health effects, in their tap water, setting off a state investigation in Newberry Township.
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, were common in clothing, cookware and firefighting foam for decades. Despite mounting research showing significant health risks, the chemicals are not routinely tested by drinking water systems or formally regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
“No water system is required to test for it because there’s no [statutorily set limit], which we are in the process of developing,” said Neil Shader, a spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Protection.
- Read the ‘TAPPED OUT’ special investigation of drinking water.
Suez, the water utility for the York County community, has already installed new equipment that should be operating by next Monday in order to reduce PFAS levels. A utility spokesman said it also plans to begin testing other systems for signs of contamination.
“This is certainly something we’re very concerned with,” he said. “It’s a nationwide problem and we want to be right on top of it.”
Last year, Gov. Tom Wolf established an action team to develop a plan to sample drinking water systems, limit public exposure and potentially introduce state-level regulation. Shader said the first steps of that plan — assembling a list of at-risk systems that will be tested for contamination — will be unveiled next week.
UPDATE: Pennsylvania plans to begin testing for PFAS in drinking water
The DEP was already monitoring 19 other contaminated sites, including the Harrisburg International Airport. Many of those sites, including HIA, were places where firefighting foam was manufactured or regularly used.
Shader declined to comment on whether the latest contamination site in Newberry Township, which is across the Susquehanna River and downstream from HIA, could be linked to the HIA contamination.
“We’re just starting to investigate what the possible source would be,” he said.
Currently, Shader said the DEP has no guidance for what residents of Newberry Township should one, other than to consult their physicians.
They should not, however, boil their tap water. While boiling water can neutralize biological contaminants like E.coli and giardia, it would actually increase the concentration of PFAS and other chemical contaminants — and thus increase the potential risk from consuming them.
For now, Shader said, the DEP has authorized the local water utility Suez Newberry to install a new granulated activated carbon treatment for the water system. That method has been effective in other places with high levels of PFAS.
After a Newberry Township resident discovered a toxic chemical not currently tested or regulated in their drinking water, Suez installed a new granulated activated carbon treatment system. It will be up and running by Monday, a spokesman said.
The customer, who has not been publicly identified, sent a sample of their water to a lab that returned combined PFAS/PFOA levels of 186 parts per trillion. That’s far beyond the 70 parts per trillion limit established in an EPA health advisory. Recent research, however, indicates that even much smaller concentrations than 70 parts per trillion can be dangerous.
Shader said the DEP has not independently confirmed the resident’s sample but chose to act out of an abundance of caution.
Suez spokesman Richard Henning said the utility plans to conduct additional testing in Newberry Township, which has some 2,100 customers of the utility. However, it moved to bolster treatment before waiting for that testing to be completed.
“Our focus was first to treat it if we thought there was a potential [for contamination] because there’s potential across the country,” he said. “We wanted to be sure we could treat it and remove it first.”
Henning said Suez plans to test its other systems for PFAS chemicals. The company’s water utilities include Middletown, which is adjacent to HIA.
The new treatment system in Newberry Township should be operating by Monday, Henning said.
Shader said the company will have to notify customers.
As of Tuesday, it wasn’t clear what other Pennsylvanians concerned about PFAS contamination in their communities should do.
The state’s own water testing laboratory will become accredited to test for the contaminant this year, Shader said, and the resident whose discovery led to the investigation actually used an unaccredited lab to test the sample.
In fact, he said, very few labs anywhere are set up to perform such tests. The DEP recently purchased equipment that will allow it to do more PFAS testing over the course of the next year.
First developed by 3M in the 1930s and mass-marketed in the ‘40s and ‘50s, these synthetic chemicals—also known as perflourinated chemicals or PFCs—enabled the development of nonstick cookware, water-repellent clothing and firefighting foam. Today, there are thousands of these chemicals known by acronyms like PFOS, PFOA, PFNA and PFHxS.
But the chemical bonds that give PFAS their heat, oil and water-resistant qualities are so resilient they don’t break down in the environment — or in the human body. It didn’t take long for PFAS to make their way into drinking water and, finally, the human bloodstream. They’ve been linked to various health effects, including pregnancy complications and problems related to the liver, lungs and thyroid.
You can learn more about PFAS in this explainer video:
For more information about water contamination, read PennLive’s Tapped Out, an investigation of drinking water oversight in Pennsylvania.
This article was updated with comment from a Suez spokesman and a photo of the treatment system.
Wallace McKelvey may be reached at wmckelvey@pennlive.com. Follow him on Twitter @wjmckelvey. Find PennLive on Facebook.