Community Members Condemn EPA’s Lack of Drinking Water Protections

Washington, D.C. —

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) discussed their plan to roll back the first-ever drinking water protections from PFAS at a National Drinking Water Advisory Council meeting earlier today. Last year, the EPA established necessary and overdue safeguards for six PFAS in drinking water. However, Trump’s EPA announced in May its intent to gut these life-saving standards. EPA’s discussion questions posed during the advisory council meeting focused on how the proposed rollbacks would affect water systems instead of the tens of millions of people exposed to PFAS.

“Simply put, EPA’s plans are illegal. The Safe Drinking Water Act has an anti-backsliding provision that prohibits EPA from weakening drinking water regulations, as it intends to do here. EPA should be taking steps to further protect the public from drinking water contamination. Instead, they plan to reverse course and put the communities they should be protecting at increased risk,” said Suzanne Novak, senior attorney at Earthjustice.

PFAS, also known as forever chemicals, is a class of chemicals that are predicted to be in the drinking water of approximately 200 million Americans. Scientific studies link PFAS to cancer, infertility, and thyroid disease. Even in very small amounts, PFAS can cause harm, especially to children.

Quotes from impacted community members and environmental groups who condemn the steps EPA is taking to roll back PFAS drinking water regulations

“Too many people have been harmed by years of lax policies related to regulating PFAS chemicals,” said Sandy Wynn-Stelt, co-chair of Great Lakes PFAS Action Network. “The science is and has been clear that PFAS is harmful to human health and the environment, the very mission of the EPA. To roll back these standards and delay the implementation of clean water rules is not Making America Healthy Again. Instead, it puts people’s health at risk so others can increase their profits. No one should be purchasing water that is unfit to drink.”

“Since the PFAS drinking water standards were finalized, the science on PFAS has not changed only EPA’s leadership. It appears the Trump EPA is caving to the chemical industry. Chemours is actively trying to increase production of GenX in North Carolina and West Virginia,” said Emily Donovan, co-founder of Clean Cape Fear. “EPA’s decision to rescind will make it easier to make more GenX which will end up in our nation’s air and water through products and disposal, just like PFOA did 20 years ago.”

“The most recent protections were met with national applause, a testament to the countless years of hard work by advocates, the science community, and impacted families. Rollbacks and delays to these crucial protections feels like a profound betrayal — a slap in the face to every person who believed their government was committed to safeguarding their health and ensuring safe drinking water,” said Jennifer Rawlison, member of Newburgh Clean Water Project. “Any intentions to reverse course signals a disregard for human health, the suffering communities have endured, and abandons pathways to achieving meaningful prevention, remediation, and recovery for communities like the city of Newburgh. These protections should remain, preserved as established last year in their entirety.”

“The Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments (ANHE), representing nearly 10,000 nurses in all 50 states, strongly opposes the current EPA proposal to repeal four PFAS from the 2024 finalized standards as these four PFAS have similar chemical structures and cause similar health effects to the two that are being retained,” said Sarah Bucic, policy analyst with the Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments. “By EPA repealing four of the six PFAS from national public drinking water standards, millions of those living in the United States will be at increased risk for serious health effects including increased risk of kidney and testicular cancer, breast cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease and dysfunction, and increased cholesterol levels. ANHE opposes removing the hazard index and delaying the compliance time for PFOA and PFOS as these are already set at the maximum. Our patients and communities deserve better health protections and with nearly half of the U.S. population drinking PFAS-contaminated water we can’t afford to push off these much-needed public drinking water standards any longer.”

“In June of 2018, at the EPA’s first PFAS regional listening session in New Hampshire, EPA Administrator Pruitt, under the first Trump administration, assured our New England states that rule-making would commence for four PFAS and acknowledged awareness of the presence of multiple PFAS in drinking water. In the 2019 PFAS action plan, it was stated that toxicity values would be finalized for several additional PFAS by 2020. Thousands of residents in my state, upon learning of the health impacts and bioaccumulative qualities of PFAS, have been clear that they don’t want any amount of this chemical class in drinking water. Unfortunately, current plans to repeal progress in drinking water protections show an immense disconnect between exposure and outcome, as well as a disregard for the health and well-being of our families,” said Laurene Allen, co-founder of Merrimack Citizens for Clean Water. “As demonstrated by countless stories of the observations of disturbing health patterns in all known PFAS exposed communities, this class of chemicals collectively are highly disruptive to human health. The EPA must follow their mission, end the pandering to those who profit at our expense and above all, build on the sound science that has laid the foundation from which to responsibly and swiftly stop the harm.”

“More than 73 million people are likely being exposed to concerning levels of PFAS from their drinking water. We all expect our water to be safe when we turn on the tap, but PFAS chemicals can be found in water systems nationwide. Just last year EPA set limits on PFAS in order to ensure safety, but now EPA has signaled that it intends to abandon those protections. Removing protections against PFAS in drinking water will place a heavy financial and health burden on communities all across the nation,” said Katie Pelch, PhD, senior scientist with NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council).

“EPA should focus on helping water systems comply with the health-based limits and on keeping PFAS chemicals out of water, the environment, and our bodies — not kicking the ball down the road two more years for some chemicals and tossing out any limits at all for others,” said Lynn Thorp, campaigns director, Clean Water Action National Campaigns.