By Oskar Rask Hjorth 15 November 2022

Disturbing studies and alarming incidents push the ‘forever chemical’ PFAS to the spotlight in the EU’s environmental stage. Now, member countries have banded together to put an end to the toxic chemicals.

A field in Dordrecht, Netherlands, where citizens are advised against eating local produce.
Photo by Damian Kamp on Unsplash.

Is your make-up, raincoat or cookware causing you more harm than good?

When you’re cooking eggs in the morning, wrapping food for lunch or flossing your teeth, there is a harmful group of chemicals that is sure to appear in all of those daily morning routines.

In recent months, a compound of toxic chemicals, with a full spectrum of dangerous side effects, has had large amounts of media attention. The group of chemicals in question are known as PFAS, which is short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. This group of chemicals is used in a wide array of common consumer products.

PFAS are not only present in household products, but also in drinking water, contaminated soil and in turn, in humans, where they pose a risk of decreased immune response, increase in cholesterol, cancer, hormone deficiency and fetal damage.

“PFAS is an increasingly worrisome group of chemicals, because it has polluted the entire planet. Every living being has PFAS in their bodies.”
Tatiana Santos, Policy Manager of Chemicals and Nanotechnology, European Environmental Bureau

PFAS have been dubbed “forever chemicals” because of their inability to break down biologically. Once they’re in the environment, particularly in the ocean, they will drift away and, somewhere down the line, will most likely be ingested, perhaps even by an arctic polar bear, which have been found to contain large amounts of PFAS.

PFAS are so widespread that an international group of scientists and policy makers, backed by EU’s REACH (an EU regulation in charge of chemicals), are calling for a ban on the production and use of all PFAS in the EU, not deemed essential for society. But a recent rumor has it, that a reform of REACH  necessary to implement the ban, has been postponed, which has the future regulation of PFAS in the EU coming to a standstill.

The EU has already voted to ban tattoo ink, certain brands of fire retardant and PVC, on a restrictions roadmap known internally as “The Great Detox,” as a promise to phase out the most hazardous chemicals. Now, a qualified majority in the EU wants to ban all PFAS not ‘essential’ to society, headed by Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands.

THE EUROPEAN ENVIRONMENTAL BUREAU

One of the key figures working to make PFAS a thing of the past, is the European Environmental Bureau, located in Brussels, just a few blocks away from the European Parliament. Here, Tatiana Santos, the policy manager of chemicals and nanotechnology, is working to put an end to “unessential PFAS.”

“The devil is in the details,” Tatiana says, “companies will not publicly say ‘we want to keep introducing this horrible chemical into consumer products,’ but instead claim that the chemical is essential to their products and to society, to try to attain an exemption from a ban of the future.”

Examples of products containing unessential PFAS could be G.U.M’s dental floss, which contains PFAS despite the fact that it is harmful, and that other dental floss works just fine without it.

“There was a study of almost 30,000 umbilical cords, which were all found to contain PFAS, which means that newborns are pre-polluted before they are born.”
Tatiana Santos, Policy Manager of Chemicals and Nanotechnology, European Environmental Bureau

Comparing a product to alternatives on the market has proven very useful to gauge whether or not PFAS is essential for a product.

“There was a request by one company to use one of the most famous PFAS, called PFOA, in asthma inhalers, so of course the authorities said ‘yes, we will grant you permission,’ but it was only after the product had reached the market, that it realized it was a mistake, because there are plenty of asthma inhalers without PFAS on the market.”

And even if a product must contain PFAS to function, the product category will have to be deemed essential to society, to not be taken off the market, for example in non-stick frying pans, where manufacturers have already begun making claims that their product’s function is essential to society

“They claim that it is essential for society that food does not stick to pans, and what we say in return is ‘no, it’s not essential to add carcinogenic reproductive toxicants in pans to make them nonstick, you can do it in other ways.”

“And even if there was no other possibility, it’s not worth getting cancer over food not sticking to pans,” Tatiana adds.

PFAS IS HERE TO STAY

Early last month, Denmark’s biggest sewage treatment facility was found to “treat” sewage to a higher concentration of PFAS. The water exiting the facility was found to have PFAS levels 107 times above the limit set by the EU.

DANVA, a Danish NGO concerned with drinking water and sewage, confirms that the level of PFAS increases when water is treated in a water treatment facility. 

Anders Hansen, consultant of DANVA, points to a study from 2021 by Western Michigan University, which concludes that there is an increase in PFAS, when contaminated sewage is treated at a water treatment facility.

He explained that “short-chain PFAS chemicals break down into biologically unbreakable PFAS” when treated at a water treatment facility, “and therefore the concentration of PFAS increases as an effect of the water treatment.”

Susan Rosendal Bennetzen, consultant of the Danish Environmental Agency, explains that the available technology for treating water contaminated with PFAS is not yet applicable to large scale water treatment, and that the technology is better used, when it’s applied by the source.

“It can primarily be applied at the source, where sewage is more concentrated and in smaller amounts. A way forward could therefore be finding sources of contamination and limiting it, to in turn limit what is being led to the water treatment facilities.”

While the national environmental agency is busy locating sources of contamination, where PFAS has to be treated to rid contamination, the sewage treatment facility is constantly washing chemicals into the coast of Copenhagen.

NATIONS WORKING TOGETHER

Denmark is one of five countries working to propose a ban on PFAS. As the national authorities implement more guidelines by the help of scientists and experts, industry and citizens realize just how widespread the chemical is.

In the nearby European country of the Netherlands, the realization of PFAS in the environment was turned on its head, compared to Denmark.

“One of the member states to propose the ban is the Netherlands, and it’s quite interesting because the proposal came from a citizens request, where a large number of Dutch citizens asked their government to ban PFAS, and this has now become an obligation to the Dutch leaders,” explains Tatiana Santos of the EEB.

The Netherlands have had several incidents with PFAS contamination, including in the Dutch city of Dordrecht, whose citizens were told not to eat local produce as the city’s ground had been heavily contaminated, presumably by the local Chemours chemical company, who lies in the center of the radius of contamination.

The Dutch news media RTLnieuws examined the case of Sandy, who lives in the city of Dordrecht, has 750 times the permitted amount of PFAS in her blood, and lost her husband to liver cancer, which is a documented consequence of high levels of PFAS in the body.

In other parts of the country, the Dutch are advised not to eat fish and shell food from the fruitful Western Scheldt, home to seabass and flounders, oysters and mussels, some of which are local delicacies of towns along the shoreline.

THE FUTURE OF PFAS

A global study of 30,000 umbilical cords, polar bears in the arctic and public water treatment facilities, are examples of vulgar cases that have all been found to involve alarming levels of PFAS.

As more and more information is made public proving PFAS to be both a highly disturbing issue, and a problem of global concern, the chances of a ban within the EU is made more likely, according to Tatiana Santos of the EEB.

The delay of a REACH reform, key to banning PFAS before the end of next year, is now the biggest roadblock.