Here is a new worry for a lot of people. A chemical the EPA has not set a standard for, used in the manufacture of Teflon pans, Gore-Tex jackets, ski wax, carpets and the linings of pizza boxes and microwave popcorn bags so keep them slick, called PFOA, or perfluorooctanoic acid, also called C8, is showing up in drinking water around the country where this chemical is being used, also it’s cousin perfluorooctane sulfonate, or PFOS, which is used in firefighting foam.
Of 4,764 water supplies, 103 systems in 29 states had trace amounts of PFOA, but none exceeded 400 parts per trillion, EPA's advisory level for short-term exposure — water you drink for only a few weeks. Seven had levels slightly over 100 ppt (parts per trillion), the new advisory level for long-term exposure — for the water you drink for years — that the EPA is expected to set this spring. More recently, testing turned up PFOA at about 100 ppt in drinking water in nearby Petersburg, New York, and North Bennington, Vermont, which also had plastics plants. On Tuesday, Vermont officials said a second round of water testing in North Bennington yielded readings of up to 2,730 ppt. "I would consider it an urgent priority to decrease exposures," said Philippe Grandjean, a researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health who believes the 100 ppt safe-exposure level EPA is proposing is still 100 times too high.
In reading the article we find that kidney cancer is the prevalent disease caused by drinking the water with this chemical exposure. Nothing is said about the streams that carry it, i.e., effects on fish, wildlife, etc. Or, effects on humans that swim in the water or eat the fish and other aquatic life or wildlife that depend on the aquatic life, such as ducks, geese, etc.
Makes me wonder, with CAFOS (hormones, antibiotics, arsenic, etc), situations like Flint, MI, and now this, What the Hell Else is in Our Drinking Water???
A new study shows the US drinking water infrastructure dates back to the 1930’s. It will 6.3 billion to fix Oklahoma’s drinking water infrastructure!
Maybe it’s time to cut more taxes, and to give more subsidies and breaks to the Oil and Gas industry!!
http://www.phillyvoice.com/activists-demand-action-against-industrial-chemica/
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