Articles Tagged: PFAS

Cedar Rapids will use settlement funds from a class action lawsuit to pursue the design and potential construction of an aquifer storage and recovery (ASR) well to hold drinking water in deep storage.

Federal regulators said Wednesday they would maintain strict limits for two toxic "forever chemicals" in drinking water that were established last year under a different president but would delay a compliance deadline by two years.

The Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday that it plans to weaken limits on some so-called forever chemicals in drinking water that were finalized last year, while maintaining standards for two common ones.

A well that supplies drinking water to the east side of Waverly in northeast Iowa has elevated levels of two toxic chemicals that persist indefinitely and are newly regulated by the federal government.

Systems serving populations less than 10,000 people have until Oct. 18 to sign up for the voluntary monitoring program offered through the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.

The affected well is relatively shallow at about 139 feet, DNR records show. It was drilled in 1962, and it’s unclear how long the contamination has existed and what might have caused it.

New federal rules for toxic chemicals in drinking water could lead to costly upgrades for more than a dozen Iowa communities that have tested high for PFAS in the past.

Landfills in two Minnesota counties are experimenting with methods of containing “forever chemicals” in an effort to keep them out of groundwater and lakes.

The Eastern Iowa Airport’s governing board will consider buying a residential property valued at $770,000 because the home has a drinking water well with high levels of toxic chemicals found in firefighting foam used for decades at the airport.

The City of Cedar Rapids is teaming up with Iowa State University researchers to study how “forever chemicals” hold up during wastewater treatment at the Cedar Rapids Water Pollution Control Facility.

By testing 20 wells, as well as sampling groundwater and soil, airport leaders hope to understand the scope and direction of PFAS contamination and see if there is evidence of a link between tainted wells and firefighting foam used for decades at the airport.

Synthetic chemicals that persist indefinitely in the environment have been detected in the water of several deep wells in parts of Iowa with porous bedrock, according to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. Karst bedrock is most prevalent in northeast and east-central Iowa.

Camanche, which lies along the Mississippi River, is poised to be among the first cities in Iowa to tackle water contamination by “forever chemicals” by upgrading its water supply system.

The Iowa DNR released a summary of its statewide PFAS testing Thursday, detailing progress in its action plan and next steps.

The Minnesota-based company 3M has announced it will phase out its use of PFAS -- known as “forever chemicals” -- because they don’t break down in the environment, and they linger in people’s bodies for years. But the question of how to clean them up could persist for years to come.