Congress has approved funding to develop new drinking water standards that would check for contamination from the chemicals known as PFAS.
PFAS is short for per-and-polyfluorinated alkyl substances, a group of man-made chemicals that have been used since the 1940s across the world, including right here in the United States. There is evidence that the most-studied PFAS chemicals, PFOA and PFOS, can lead to adverse reproductive, developmental, liver and kidney effects.
The chemicals were found in firefighting foam that spilled from Bradley International Airport into the Farmington River earlier this year. Millions of dollars will now go to the EPA to create new standards within 60 days.
“This is a huge step forward for the work we need to be doing in Connecticut and the country, to remediate and clean up PFAS contamination, to search for more sites, to monitor drinking and groundwater sources,” said Anne Hulick of Clean Water Action.
There is currently no federal standard in place for a safe level of PFAS in drinking water.
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The funding will also help communities affected by the contamination.
