Utilities Scrambling To Address New Federal PFC Guideline

A federal guideline for water utilities issued last month has some utilities scrambling to make sure they are properly addressing perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs).

The U.S. EPA issued a health advisory in May about PFC exposure as various cities wage high-profile battles against the chemicals, including Hoosick Falls, NY, and factory towns across the country. PFCs are industrial chemicals, and research has tied them to cancer, the Associated Press reported.

The EPA advisory covers perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) as well as perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS). Though not a regulation, the advisory requires utilities to alert customers about the presence of these chemicals.

“Within hours, public wells were shut down in Horsham, PA, and Maricopa County, AZ. West Virginia’s Bureau for Public Health ordered a ‘do not drink’ advisory for the water in three communities: Parkersburg, the site of a Teflon factory that until recently was operated by DuPont; the adjacent town of Vienna; and Martinsburg, four hours east, near the Maryland border. The West Virginia National Guard sent convoys of tankers containing drinking water to Vienna,” The New York Times Magazine reported.

Alabama utilities immediately felt the impact of the new advisory. “Thousands of Alabamians were shocked to find that the water coming from their taps may not be as safe as they thought,” Alabama Media Group reported.

“So were the managers of the eight named water systems, toxicologists at the Alabama Department of Public Health and state regulators at Alabama Department of Environmental Management, who said they did not know in advance that the advisory was coming,” the report continued.

John Guarisco, a toxicologist with the Alabama Department of Public Health, said the new advisory caught people “by surprise” and that water systems are working to address it, according to Alabama Media Group.

"They're going to be diligently working on this," Guarisco said, per the report. "They're trying desperately to do the best they can.”

"They don't want to put out a product that's going to cause harm. It's not in their makeup as human beings, so they're going to work and try to get this under control as fast as they can."

Water systems are devoting personnel to answering customer phone calls, according to the report. Some systems are considering switching wells and buying expensive reverse osmosis filtration systems to address PFCs.