PFAS chemicals have contaminated 17 sites in Pennsylvania, data shows

Mapping of public data shows PFAS-contaminated sites exist across the country

Jon Hurdle reports for StateImpact

Seventeen sites in Pennsylvania have been contaminated by PFAS chemicals in recent years, and are still likely to contain at least some of the toxic material even if water supplies there have been treated by local authorities, according to data released by a national advocacy group on Monday.

Environmental Working Group compiled PFAS reports from local utilities, the Department of Defense, and researchers at Northeastern University, and presented the information in a national map showing public water systems, military bases, civilian airports, industrial plants and dumps where contamination has been found at various times since 2013.

The utilities include one in the eastern Pennsylvania town of Horsham where five PFAS chemicals, including PFOA and PFOS, were detected at more than 44 million parts per trillion (ppt) in 2014, thousands of times higher than a level recommended — but not required — by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as being protective of human health.


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Horsham officials say they have since cut PFAS levels to below the recommended health limit by installing carbon filters. Public and private water wells in the Horsham area have been contaminated with high PFAS levels because the chemicals were a component of firefighting foam used by the military on two nearby bases.

Aqua, an investor-owned utility that also serves Horsham Township, said on May 3 that the combined PFOA/PFOS level there was 10.8 ppt, well within the EPA limit of 70 ppt for those two chemicals. Aqua spokeswoman Donna Alston said all the company’s water systems in Bucks, Montgomery and Chester counties showed PFAS levels below the EPA’s threshold in the latest tests in March.

Although many utilities use the EPA’s PFOA and PFOS level as a benchmark, advocates say it’s too high to protect public health. For that reason, state scientists in New Jersey have recommended – and environmental officials are in the process of adopting – levels that are some five times lower than the federal standard.

In the EWG data, one of the bases, the former Willow Grove Naval Air Station at Horsham, had combined PFOA and PFAS contamination as high as 86,000 ppt, affecting 108 out of 161 wells on-base in testing during 2017, DoD data show. Public wells near the base had contamination of up to 1,000 ppt.

Other utility data show contamination well above the EPA’s health limit at Warminster and Warrington, two communities that have also been affected by PFAS chemicals from the military bases.

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It’s my party, and I’ll fight climate change if I want to

Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho)

Nathanael Johnson reports for Grist – May 1, 2019

In deep red Idaho, out of sight of the national news media and out of reach of the Twitterati, a real-live Republican member of Congress acknowledged the existence of climate change and even proposed taking action.

“Climate change is a reality,” said Mike Simpson, a Republican Congressman from Idaho, at a conference in Boise last week. “It’s not hard to figure out. Go look at your thermometer.”

Simpson knew he might hear a record scratch when he broke out of the well-worn Republican grooves. After stepping to the lectern, he joked that anyone carrying matches or lighters should pass them to the authorities as a security measure to prevent heads from bursting into flames.

Simpson was there to say he wanted to see Idaho’s mountain lakes full of salmon again, even if it meant tearing down the dams that the state’s politicians have defended for decades. Dams, climate change, and predators all threaten the fish, and Simpson said he was ready to consider all options. It was clear to anyone watching his speech he feels a spiritual obligation to save salmon.

Recounting a trip to a spawning creek in the Sawtooth Mountains in central Idaho, Simpson paused to swallow hard a couple of times. Only one salmon made it to those shallows, he said, to “create its bed, lay its eggs and die. It was the end of a cycle and the beginning of a new one. These are the most,” he paused for a deep breath, “most incredible creatures I think that God’s created. It’s a cycle God has created. We shouldn’t mess with it.”

This break with standard Republican talking points has people asking if he had “gone over to the dark side,” Simpson said. “I’ve had people say to my chief of staff, we don’t even like someone of Simpson’s seniority asking these questions.” And in the run up to this speech, he said his office was fielding calls from nervous people asking, “What’s Simpson going to say at this?”

Of course, Simpson isn’t the first Republican advocating for action on climate change, but most of those politicians differ from Simpson in one important way: They come from swing districts. In fact, the bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus in the House of Representatives (Simpson isn’t a member) has a hard time keeping Republicans because voters keep kicking them out in favor of Democrats. Former representatives Carlos Curbelo, Mia Love, and Peter Roskam are exhibits A, B, and C.

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UN Chemical Regulators Approve PFOA Ban, With Exemptions

A firefighter is seen dousing the facade of the Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral April 15, 2019, in Paris.Photographer: Stephane de Sakutin/AFP/Getty Images

Bryce Baschuk for Bloomberg Environment

International chemical regulators unanimously approved a global ban on the use of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), a toxic chemical used to manufacture nonstick and stain-resistant coatings in clothing, fast-food wrappers, carpets, and other consumer and industrial products.

Participating governments in the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants agreed to list the chemical in Annex A of the treaty during this week’s United Nations Conference of the Parties meeting in Geneva.

“It’s probably the biggest Stockholm listing for ages,” said Charlie Avis, spokesman for the Basel, Rotterdam, and Stockholm Conventions in Geneva.

Under Annex A of the Stockholm Convention, governments must take measures to “eliminate the production and use” of PFOA, which is linked to diseases, including kidney cancer, testicular cancer, thyroid disease, ulcerative colitis, and pregnancy-induced hypertension.

The majority of the countries that approved the May 3 decision have 12 months to fully implement the ban. Some members of the Stockholm Convention are permitted to have a longer implementation time frame to complete their domestic ratification process. 

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Law firm says it will name 300 N.J. priests accused of sex abuse, including those not named by the church

By Kelly Heyboer | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

A New Jersey attorney says he has a list of more than 300 priests accused of sexual misconduct in New Jersey — far more than the 188 priests the Catholic Church has said were “credibly accused” in the state’s dioceses.

Attorney Greg Gianforcaro said he will release the list Monday at an afternoon press conference where he will announce that an unnamed victim of sexual abuse is filing a lawsuit against New Jersey’s five Catholic dioceses alleging they created a “public hazard” by not naming all accused priests.

Gianforcaro, who has represented multiple alleged priest abuse victims, said he will release a report with the 300 priests and their histories at a 1 p.m. press conference in Elizabeth.

“I think the public was shocked by the prior list of 188 priests and I think they should have been shocked,” Gianforcaro said. “That list was woefully inadequate.”

Last month, Gianforcaro and the Minnesota-based law firm Jeff Anderson & Associates, teamed up to release the names of 52 former Boy Scout leaders from New Jersey who allegedly sexually abused boys and were included in the organization’s so-called “Perversion Files.”

In February, the Archdiocese of Newark and the state’s four other dioceses — Camden, Metuchen, Trenton and Paterson — released the names of 188 priests and deacons “credibly accused” of sexual abuse of children.

More than 100 of the named priests were dead and most of the others had been removed from ministry years ago.

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Advance planning saves many lives in India from deadly Cyclone Fani

Dibyangshu Sarkar/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
From the New York Times

The worst is over in India as Cyclone Fani, one of the biggest storms in years, passed over the subcontinent.
The storm washed out countless homes and farms, but by Saturday evening local time, fewer than 20 deaths had been reported in India. Above, destruction in Puri, India. That’s because India and neighboring Bangladesh embarked on a massive evacuation, whisking more than a million people to safety in each country. It was a meticulous plan that they had been perfecting for 20 years.

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