34. Firefighters PPE leading to PFAS in Our Waterways

We’re back with Jason Burns who is Executive Director at Last Call Foundation and he's been a Firefighter since 2006. He has spent much of his career advocating for better and safer working conditions for his firefighters. I talked with Jason at the end of last year in episode 24, about how there is PFAS in firefighters PPE. We ended the conversation on how when they wash their PPE, the PFAS ends up in their waterways. Now we’re picking the conversation back there.

In 2022, there was a test of 114 waterways from across the country, in which 83% were found to contain at least one type of PFAS—dangerous per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances that are widely linked to serious public health and environmental impacts. 

These findings are an important step toward filling in a major data gap and validate the call to EPA for increased and widespread monitoring to gain a complete picture of PFAS contamination in all watersheds across the country.

In spite of the serious health risks, there are currently no universal, science-based limits on the various PFAS chemicals in the United States. For many PFAS chemicals, the EPA has not even set a health advisory limit that would give the public a baseline to determine what amount of PFAS is unhealthy in drinking water. In most cases, the EPA is not doing adequate monitoring for these chemicals, which is why these findings are so unique and important.

Contact and connect with Jason: jasonjburns@comcast.net

Study/survery mentioned: https://waterkeeper.org/news/unprecedented-analysis-reveals-pfas-contamination-in-u-s-waterways-shows-shocking-levels-of-contamination/