originally posted on December 28, 2016

The state Department of Environmental Services is continuing to test water after a potentially cancer-causing chemical was found in wells and drinking water near the Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics facility in Merrimack earlier this year.

Well and groundwater tests conducted in Merrimack and Litchfield had revealed elevated levels of PFOA, or perfluorooctanoic acid, used in Teflon coatings, for more than one-and-a-half miles around the facility.

WMUR-TV reports the state is now testing farther out from the plant into parts of Bedford. There are 20 sites around the state that are under investigation.

Clark Freise, assistant commissioner at the DES, says officials are “absolutely concerned” that the PFOA contamination is a “long-term exposure.”

Work began this year to extend cleaner public water to neighborhoods with contaminated wells.