EPA Seeks to Roll Back PFAS Drinking Water Rules, Keeping Millions Exposed to Toxic Forever Chemicals in Tap Water

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, the EPA asked the court to axe its determinations to regulate and enforceable standards for four PFAS chemicals: GenX, PFHxS, PFNA, and PFBS. Separately, the EPA previously announced that it will seek to extend the compliance deadline for PFOA and PFOS standards by two years from 2029 to 2031. More than 73 million people are served by water systems that have detected PFAS levels above the limits the EPA now seeks to rescind or delay.

Environmental lawyers said the 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, the EPA is asking the court to do what agency itself is not allowed to do.

“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 commonsense, lawfully enacted standards in court,” said Jared Thompson, a senior attorney with NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council).

“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.”

NRDC and community groups represented by Earthjustice 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.

Background

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a class of thousands of synthetic chemicals that are widely used in an array of consumer, commercial, and industrial products due to their ability to withstand heat and repel water and stains. Also known as “forever chemicals,” PFAS are extremely persistent in the environment and can accumulate in humans or animals. PFAS exposure is linked to many negative health effects at extremely low levels of exposure, including but not limited to kidney and testicular cancer, liver and kidney damage, changes in hormone and lipid levels, and harm to the nervous and reproductive systems.

After decades of advocacy on the part of environmental and public health advocates, the EPA proposed in March 2023 to regulate six PFAS chemicals in drinking water. PFAS can be removed from drinking water with existing technologies. In April 2024, the agency concluded there is no safe level of PFOA or PFOS exposure, and the final rule covered six PFAS chemicals in total and set individual limits for five PFAS chemicals and a limit on mixtures of four PFAS chemicals. The rule also requires water systems to monitor for the six regulated PFAS chemicals and publicly communicate their compliance with the new limits, while giving them the law’s maximum compliance time of five years to comply by April 2029. The rule was a long overdue step to address a public health crisis that threatens millions of people nationwide.