EPA water chief Radhika Fox says EPA is facing a “frontier issue” as it grapples with addressing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in biosolids but is pledging to work with key groups to preserve the three management methods -- land application, incineration and landfilling -- that wastewater treatment facilities currently use to dispose of biosolids while also protecting public health.
“I will certainly say the issue of biosolids and PFAS is an absolute frontier issue,” Fox said Oct. 11 during WEFTEC 2022, the annual conference of the Water Environment Federation (WEF). Her remarks were livestreamed from New Orleans, LA.
“I think we have to frankly acknowledge there is a lot that we don’t know, as an industry, about it,” she added.
But she made clear that EPA plans to uphold the three main methods wastewater treatment facilities currently use to manage biosolids.
The Water Office recognizes that biosolids and “making sure that utilities can preserve their three primary ways to address biosolids -- including land application -- are essential to this country,” she said. “They’re essential for effective utility management, so we need to figure out a path forward that allows and encourages the ongoing use of all three modes of addressing [biosolids] -- whether it’s incineration, land application, etc. -- for the water utility. And we have to do it in a way that’s also protective of public health.”
EPA’s proposal to list the two most-studied PFAS -- perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) -- as “hazardous substances” under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) has prompted significant concerns from water treatment officials who generate biosolids from the wastewater they process as trace amounts of PFAS have been found in those biosolids.
The biosolids are sold or given to farmers for use as fertilizers as a cheap and easy disposal option for water treatment facilities.
State officials in Maine have already banned the land application of biosolids because of PFAS exposure concerns, prompting groups like the National Association of Clean Water Agencies (NACWA), which represents treatment works, to step up their efforts to prevent the spread of such policies.
For example, the group is forming a coalition with agriculture groups to advocate on the issue and is also raising concerns with EPA.
But some industry officials have downplayed potential concerns. For example, a leading water sector lawyer said earlier this year the Superfund law provides multiple cleanup liability exemptions for the use of biosolids as a fertilizer on land.
Current law provides numerous “defenses” to allow for continued land application of biosolids even though additional “congressional relief” might be preferable, James Slaughter, a principal at Beveridge and Diamond, said during an Aug. 24 webinar hosted by WEF.
Risk Assessment
During her talk at WEFTEC, Fox noted the agency is in the process of conducting a risk assessment as part of the biosolids regulatory development process. She referenced the assessment EPA pledged in its October 2021 PFAS roadmap that is slated to be completed by winter 2024. Biosolids spread on agricultural lands can sometimes contain PFAS, contaminating crops and livestock, the roadmap says.
Under the Clean Water Act, EPA can set pollutant limits and monitoring and reporting requirements for contaminants in biosolids if there is sufficient scientific evidence to show a potential for harm to the environment or human health, the roadmap says. A risk assessment helps determine the potential for harm via human exposure, it says.
The risk assessment EPA is undertaking “will serve as the basis for determining whether regulation of PFOA and PFOS in biosolids is appropriate,” the roadmap says.
The assessment will inform future actions, Fox said.
She added that EPA recognizes states such as Maine and Michigan are moving ahead on the issue of biosolids and PFAS, and said the agency plans to work with state associations to weigh what EPA and state agencies can collaborate on even as EPA’s biosolids regulation is being developed.
She noted plans to work with WEF, the group that represents water sector professionals, NACWA, and the Environmental Council of the States, which represents states’ top environmental commissioners, as well as with state agricultural commissioners. She said EPA is working with this last group because it is seeing the agriculture community raising a number of questions on the matter.
Therefore, she said bringing water utilities and the agriculture sector together “on consensus solutions is going to be really important.”
She also reiterated concerns expressed by water utilities over the proposed CERCLA PFAS rule, and water office involvement in that rule’s development.
Fox said even though the rule is not promulgated by the Water Office, “we really heard the perspectives and the concerns that [water] utilities had around that.” As a result, her office has been working closely with EPA’s waste office, which developed the proposed CERCLA rule, to “protect the interests of water agencies in the context of that rulemaking.” -- Suzanne Yohannan (syohannan@iwpnews.com)
