EPA Seeks to Eliminate Critical PFAS Drinking Water Protections

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it will no longer defend rules that protect people from unsafe levels of PFAS “forever chemicals” in drinking water, seeking to reverse legal protections put into place last year.

In its motion filed in federal court yesterday, EPA asked the court to axe its determinations to regulate and enforceable standards for four PFAS chemicals – GenX, PFHxS, PFNA, and PFBS. Separately, EPA previously announced that it will seek to extend the compliance deadline for PFOA and PFOS standards by two years from 2029 to 2031. PFAS have contaminated the drinking water for approximately 200 million people nationwide.

Environmental lawyers said EPA’s course of action is an attempt to evade limits that Congress imposed on the agency. The Safe Drinking Water Act has a strong anti-backsliding provision that prohibits the EPA from weakening any drinking water standard once it is set. In essence, EPA is asking the court to do what EPA itself is not allowed to do.

“Administrator Zeldin promised to protect the American people from PFAS-contaminated drinking water, but he’s doing the opposite,” said Katherine O’Brien, Earthjustice attorney. “Zeldin’s plan to delay and roll back the first national limits on these forever chemicals prioritizes chemical industry profits and utility companies’ bottom-line over the health of children and families across the country.”

“The EPA’s request to jettison rules intended to keep drinking water safe from toxic PFAS forever chemicals is an attempted end-run around the protections that Congress placed in the Safe Drinking Water Act. It is also alarming, given what we know about the health harms caused by exposure to these chemicals. No one wants to drink PFAS. We will continue to defend these common-sense, lawfully enacted standards in court,” said Jared Thompson, a senior attorney with NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council).

Earthjustice is representing the following community groups: Buxmont Coalition for Safe Water, Clean Cape Fear, Clean Haw River, Concerned Citizens of WMEL Water Authority Grassroots, Environmental Justice Task Force, Fight for Zero, Merrimack Citizens for Clean Water, and Newburgh Clean Water Project. Working alongside NRDC, the organizations have intervened to defend the nation’s first-ever drinking water standards for PFAS in ongoing litigation brought by chemical companies and water utility associations, who are asking the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., to overturn the standards.