The UK's Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) is calling on the UK government to overhaul its drinking water standards after a new study revealed that “more than a third of water courses tested in England and Wales contain medium or high-risk levels of the near-indestructible and toxic chemicals known as per- and polyfluorinated substances (PFAS) - often referred to as "forever chemicals".
The RSC said there was “growing evidence that some PFAS carry serious health risks including testicular cancer, fertility issues and developmental defects in unborn children.”
The RSC has cited recent analysis as having revealed that 35% of water courses tested in England and Wales contain “medium or high-risk levels” of a PFAS, Perfluorooctane Sulfonate (PFOS) and 37% carried another PFAS, Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA).
The RSC its calling on the government to take “five simple actions”:
reduce the current cap per individual type of PFAS tenfold to 10 ng/l of drinking water;
introduce a cap on the total level of PFAS combined of 100ng/l;
ensure the more than 4,700 of sources of PFAS are reported in a national inventory;
impose and enforce stricter regulatory limits on levels of PFAS in industrial discharges; and
set up a national chemicals regulator of all chemicals including PFAS.
According to the RSC “While PFAS can be filtered out of drinking water, UK water companies are not required by law to reduce them until they are deemed ‘high risk’”. It warned that current standards permit concentrations of each individual PFAS at up to ten times the level considered “low risk”, which is 10ng/l.
The RSC said practice in the UK fell short of that in the US and the European Union.
In the UK it said, while there are hundreds of different types of PFAS “there is currently no overarching limit on the total concentration when they are combined.” But the US, it said, was introducing a new limit of 4ng/l for each of PFOS and PFOA. And the EU’s Drinking Water Directive states that 20 widespread PFAS must collectively not exceed 100 ng/l.
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