Jacksonville, FL – The Navy will be testing for potentially harmful chemicals in drinking water wells on and around Naval Air Station Jacksonville.
The Navy says the PFAS do not absorb well in to the ground, and can therefore make it into groundwater.
While the chemicals are not regulated, the Navy says the EPA is studying whether they should be.
They say surface water and shallow groundwater is not used for drinking, and the investigation of that groundwater contamination is ongoing.
Drinking water for the base is provided through two sources, according to NAS Jax- three deep wells from the Floridan Aquifer, and a connection from JEA.
NAS Jax says those sources are regularly tested, including for some unregulated contaminants like the ones in question here.
NAS Jax says the testing has shown “non-detect” amounts of these chemicals, or levels below the EPA advisory.
The Navy is now requesting permission from nearby private property owners, in order to sample their drinking water wells.
via NAS Jacksonville via NAS Jacksonville Sampling is not needed for homeowners in these areas served by JEA, because JEA testing has already come back as “non-detect”.
If this new well testing finds a potentially unsafe level of these chemicals, NAS Jax says the Navy will provide alternate drinking water to those affected, including bottled water, until a long term solution is implemented.

Michigan declared a state of emergency this week for communities whose drinking water is contaminated with perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA); these commercial chemicals were once widely used but are no longer manufactured in the US.
The state’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) discovered the contamination on July 26 in Parchment, a city in southwestern Michigan, according to Chemical & Engineering News.
Parchment is draining and flushing its water supply pipes with water from nearby Kalamazoo.
In the meantime, residents are being provided with bottled drinking water.
Contamination was also discovered in Cooper Township.
Tests on water from the two communities showed levels of PFOS more than 20 times higher than EPA recommendation, writes the Detroit Metro Times.
Kalamazoo County is one of 34 sites that have been identified as contaminated since a state-wide initiative to test all of the state’s public drinking water supplies was launched in March.
Other areas of contamination include Ann Arbor and the Battle Creek area, according to CNN.
The EPA says PFOS and PFOA have been linked to health issues like cancer, liver and kidney problems, and immune system disruptions.
Michigan is exploring a suit against 3M for compensation for past clean-ups of the chemicals.

In the wake of a federal report showing levels of PFOA and PFAS allowed in drinking water is too high, New Hampshire’s Department of Environmental Services announced Monday it is hiring toxicologist Stephen Roberts to look at the federal standards used in New Hampshire.
Merrimack and surrounding communities have been dealing with groundwater contaminated by perfluoroalkyls, PFOA and PFOS.
He is the director of the Center for Environmental and Human Toxicology at the University of Florida.
Roberts will review the June report from the Agency for Toxic Substance and Disease Registry.
He is tasked with reviewing the June report and providing an analysis of how the minimum risk levels within the report relate to drinking water and groundwater standards.
Merrimack resident and water advocate Laurene Allen worries that Roberts will not recommend that the limits go down, and that the standards will stay at the EPA’s recommendation.
While Roberts will start as a consultant, New Hampshire is still planning to hire a full-time toxicologist and a human health risk assessor to assist with developing drinking water standards.
Allen said the state government has still not done enough for people dealing with contaminated water.
She wants to see the state step up and do more, and especially inform people about the risks and ways to mitigate those risks.
Allen plans to watch Roberts and the ensuing work that is done to make sure the state lives up to its obligation to keep people safe.

PARCHMENT, Mich. – The City of Parchment is telling people to stop using the city’s water due to high amounts of the chemical PFAS.
Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), such as perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), are part of a group of chemicals used for in manufacturing, firefighting and other consumer products.
Bottled water will be provided starting Friday at Parchment High School from 7:00 a.m. until 8:00 p.m The city provided these short-term solutions: The City of Parchment’s water supply system is being drained.
Once it is drained, the City of Kalamazoo will connect residents on the City of Parchment’s water supply to the City of Kalamazoo’s water supply system.
Residents will be notified once this occurs.
The City of Kalamazoo will begin flushing the City of Parchment’s water supply system.
The City of Kalamazoo will continue flushing out the City of Parchment’s water supply system until test results come back that shows the PFAS levels are below the health advisory level.
Governor Rick Snyder is directing the state departments of Environmental Quality, Health and Human Services, and State Police, as well as the Michigan PFAS Action Response Team (MPART), to assist.
“Our next step is to work as a team to address the source of this contamination and restore the municipal water system.
People can also get PFAS information online at the website of Michigan PFAS Action Response Team.

PETERSBURGH — Taconic plastics plant is beginning an in-depth investigation into the extent of PFOA contamination around its Route 22 plant — more than two years after the company first alerted the state to renewed concerns about contamination around its property.
In Jan. 2016, Taconic reached out to the state Department of Environmental Conservation and Health Department about previous PFOA contamination at its manufacturing facility in the wake of revelations about the nearby Village of Hoosick Falls public water supply being contaminated with PFOA since at least 2014.
Taconic responded by signing a consent order with the state in November 2016 that required a filtration system be placed on Petersburgh’s small municipal water plant, as well as testing and filtration systems installed for private wells in the area.
But as part of the consent order, Taconic was also required to investigate how much of the surrounding environs are contaminated, and if there is a way to clean it up beyond just providing water filtration systems to residents.
The state DEC announced last week that the investigation’s findings will be released in a report sometime in 2019, followed by a study suggesting ways to clean up the contamination.
But the state said at the time PFOA was not a regulated contaminant.
In 2005, the company installed a carbon-filter system on its plant wells along the Little Hoosic River after it said low levels of the chemical were discovered.
Alternative water treatment systems were also installed for nearby residents.
The site has made polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) coated fabrics there since about 1961.
PTFE previously contained PFOA.

The Village of Hoosick Falls could receive over $195,000 from two plastics companies, which residents said was an important step in becoming “whole” again.
“They’re here in the community,” resident Michael Hickey said.
They’re trying to work with us, and they want to make things right as well.” Hickey and other residents hope progress is on the horizon after the village board voted to accept money from plastic companies found responsible for PFOA contamination in the village water supply.
The village board also voted on a tolling agreement that would require both the companies and the village not to take legal action against one another without at least 30-days notice, which was the most contentious part of the meeting.
“It was, like, well, the village board voted to accept this money and there’s no strings attached.
But you gotta vote for both.” Still, the board voted to approve the agreement, and environmental attorney David Engel spoke to make it clear.
“Right now, my expectation frankly is that there will come a time when we have to bring a lawsuit,” he said.
“We know that the well field that they’re currently using is being properly filtered, and people are drinking clean water in the community,” Sean Mahar with DEC said.
“But long-term, we need to find that alternate source, and that’s been our commitment and that commitment isn’t changing.” The state department of health was also in attendance and presented results from a 2016 study that proved people who were on village drinking water generally had higher levels of PFOA in their blood than those who were not.
“Individuals who were tested towards the tail end of that program show lower levels,” DOH Spokesperson Gary Holmes said.

Bottom line: The man-made chemical compounds found in military fire-fighting foam, perfluorooctane sulfonate and perfluorooctanoic acid, known commonly as PFOS and PFOA, are hardy, toxic chemicals that do not degrade in soil or water, and can be absorbed by humans through drinking water, or through the soil or air.
In people, the study found that exposure could be associated with pregnancy complications, thyroid issues, liver damage, asthma, decreased responsiveness to vaccines, decreased fertility and kidney and testicular cancer.
The report’s findings on human exposure — and which looked at the whole population, not just military locations — were based on multiple studies of populations near contaminated water sources.
Based on 187 peer-reviewed studies where laboratory rats or other animals directly ingested the compounds, the results were more dire.
At significantly decreased exposure levels the subject rats survived but had increased prenatal loss in pregnant lab rats, and increased loss of the pups after birth.
To leave a public comment on the report, the study directed respondents to go to regulations.gov.
On military bases, the compounds seeped into the soil and water through the use of fire fighting foams.
After the foams were sprayed on aircraft, the remaining foam and chemicals would just be dumped onto the ground, or into a drain, multiple former airmen have told Military Times.
“It was just draining into whatever drains were around,” Paul Cyman, who served as an Air Force firefighter from 1969 to 1973.
The 2019 bill also supports creation of a national registry for service members, their families and the public to report exposure to the contaminants.

“I think we’re just scratching the surface on water contamination on the East End.” Mr. McAllister, who has spoken out to the East Hampton and Southampton town boards about the contamination, said in a recent interview that he wouldn’t be surprised if the region continues to see more cases of PFOS and PFOA contamination as more testing and research is conducted.
So far on the South Fork, plumes of water contaminated by the pair of chemicals have been detected in Westhampton, Hampton Bays, East Quogue, and Wainscott.
In Wainscott about 140 private wells near the East Hampton Airport were found last summer to have PFOS and PFOA contamination—although an exact source of the contamination has yet to be officially identified.
Of the contaminated wells, nine homes reported levels of the chemicals above the health advisory level, and another 131 wells have been found to have traces of the chemicals below the health advisory level.
Since the detection, East Hampton Town declared a state of emergency in the hamlet of Wainscott and allotted $400,000 in funding to provide grants to homeowners with tainted wells to help pay for in-home water filters.
The town supervisor also pointed to a flaw in the process for testing for unregulated chemicals: Chemicals are often not tested for health safety risks before entering the marketplace.
“I think it has a lot of similarities,” Mr. McAllister said.
Henry Bokuniewicz, a groundwater expert and a professor at Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, warned that it’s not easy to stop contamination once it hits the groundwater.
Generally speaking, to stop such contamination from flowing through the groundwater, one must take two steps: detect the source of the plume, then find a treatment.
Since the Hoosick Falls contamination, DEC officials have reportedly been testing more frequently near fire training centers and airports—where the firefighting foam was commonly used—as well as near other common sources of contamination, such as landfills.

Water district officials note that the wells in question were not regularly being used to provide water for HBWD customers during the first quarter.
It was not tested during the first quarter of 2017, as the Health Department had requested, but it also provided no water to the district’s system.
But Well 1-2 was used little after the October 2016 test; it was not used from early October through early June 2017, with the exception of one day in January.
The next time the well was tested, was between June 28 and July 14, the reading had jumped above the EPA threshold, at 85.89 ppt.
Well 1-3 was tested three times in 2016, with the results falling below the 70 ppt threshold each time.
D&B Principal Engineer Anthony Conetta, who has decades of experience monitoring water districts, and Warren Booth, a maintenance crew leader for the water district, explained during a Town Board work session earlier this month that the failure to test the wells in the first quarter of 2017 was an oversight.
Mr. Conetta and Mr. Booth also explained during the May 10 work session that because the chemicals are unregulated, the district was not obligated to turn off the wells.
No fines can be issued for serving customers water with unregulated chemical contamination, because the threshold is only advisory.
After the contamination was detected and the wells were shut off last year, the town purchased and installed carbon filtration systems for the wells—costing about $1 million—to keep the unregulated chemicals out of the water.
Mr. Conetta stressed that the district had “mostly complied” and pointed out that it had acknowledged mistakes that would not be repeated in the future.

(Photo by Jon Olender) CLARENDON — The state suspects firefighting foam used during a 1986 plane crash near the then-Rutland State Airport could be the source of chemical contamination that has showed up in wells that serve the Rutland Airport Business Park.
On Monday, state officials told the Clarendon Select Board that only two wells near the Rutland-Southern Vermont Regional Airport tested positive for PFOS and PFOA, or polyfluoroalkyl substances, that were higher than state standards.
Other wells tested in the area, particularly along Airport Road and at the state-owned airport, have revealed no detectable levels of the chemicals.
Nahmias said a carbon-based filter system would be installed in the water system serving the eight businesses that get their water from the two wells, which are located on airport property but serve the business park.
Residents peppered Schwer and Nahmias with questions about how far afield the state would test for contamination and how sure they were that the source of the PFOS and PFOA was the firefighting foam from 32 years ago.
The Rutland Business Park’s wells were tested on March 13, and the state got the results about two weeks later.
Schwer said that wasn’t necessary.
People can sign up for a state newsletter that will have the latest information about the problem, he said.
He said the state also found PFOA contamination from the foam at the Vermont Air National Guard site in Burlington and the Vermont firefighters training site in Pittsford.
At the National Guard site, the area was served by a municipal water system, he said.