[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:18] Speaker B: Welcome to Uptown Chats, a podcast where we share stories about environmental justice by and for everyday people. I'm your co host Jaron and and.
[00:00:26] Speaker C: I'm your other co host, Lonnie.
[00:00:28] Speaker B: And you may have noticed we did miss our episode earlier this month. We had some last, last minute schedule changes. So thanks for being patient with us. But we are back and we have an exciting topic today to share with you all. So Lonnie, you want to reveal what our topic is for today?
[00:00:44] Speaker C: Yeah, we're going to be talking about everyone's least favorite acronym right now, and that's pfas, also called pfas. It has been a hot topic over the last several years and got a lot of attention after the movie Dark Waters came out.
[00:00:58] Speaker B: That's right. Which some of us, myself included, only watched within the last year or two. So we're a little late to the game. But yes, we are talking about PFAS today. And more recently you may have heard about attempts to get PFAS removed from commoner products like waterproof apparel. And luckily for us, neither Lonnie or I are the experts here. So we have Kate Donovan from NRDC who will actually be joining us to talk more about PFAS and share a little bit more about why we consider it an environmental justice issue. But before we get too far down that road, Lonnie, can you share what we act's mission is?
[00:01:34] Speaker C: Yeah, we act's mission is to build healthy communities by ensuring that people of color and low income residents participate meaningfully in the creation of sound and fair environmental health and protection policies and practices.
[00:01:46] Speaker B: Thank you, Lonnie. So before we hear from Kate, as usual, we'll provide a little bit more context and background about pfas. We know it can be a little technical, so just a little bit of background to help kind of navigate the discussion a little bit. And we'll do our best. We'll do our best to keep it simple. So first of all, main question, what are PFAs? What are PFAs and what are they used for? And I say what are Pfizers? Because it's not just one thing, it's a whole class of chemicals. And they're synthetic, synthetic chemicals. In other words, they're man made chemicals that are widely used in consumer products for a couple different properties that they have. They're water, oil and stain resistant, which makes them kind of appealing. But they're found in a lot of different products like nonstick cookware, microwave popcorn bags, raincoats, cosmetics, firefighting foam, carpets, Food packaging, lots of stuff. Hear the words, you know, water resistant, stain resistant, chances are it has one of those chemicals in it. And one of the things that makes them really nasty as a chemical is that they, you know, we consider them forever chemicals. And what we mean by that is they don't break down easily just the, the way that they're structured, they just don't break down over time in the same way that other chemicals do, which makes them kind of build up in our drinking water and our soil and our food and means it's more likely that we'll be exposed to them in that way. So overall, not great. We do not like pfas.
[00:03:15] Speaker C: No. And like a lot of things that were created decades ago, you know, pfas, there's an emerging health crisis when it comes to these chemicals. And so toxic chemicals like PFAS are not only an environmental hazard by contaminating soil and water, but also public health crisis that support affects women of color and low income communities from increased breast cancer risk to lifelong exposure through food packaging and personal care products. Frontline communities are on the front lines of toxic harm. But this is a topic that WE ACT has engaged in and continues to lead the fight for legislative change, corporate accountability and community education to protect the health of vulnerable populations. Two sources of exposure that are major concerns are food packaging and apparel, which is why we ACT worked really hard to get PFAS banned in both food packaging and apparel in New York State. And those were both major wins. But the work still continues. And there are a lot of other products that we want to pursue that contain pfas, but also lots of other toxic chemicals that end up in our products we use every day.
[00:04:19] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. And we've talked about some of those other chemicals in some previous episodes, including our previous episode more recently with Liz Reyes, which you can go back and listen to if you haven't already. But one of the main takeaways from our conversation was that we need stronger policies in New York and in the US as a whole to ban harmful chemicals. And we also need more transparency and better labeling about what the risks are for a given product to know what you're getting, what you're exposing yourself to when you buy a certain product, and of course, you know, making sure that we hold corporations accountable for product safety. So all things that we are trying to emphasize in this conversation. So hopefully that provides a lot more context. I think that's a good segue to go ahead and jump into our interview with Kate to learn more about pfas. What's going on and what have what's happening in New York right now. What do you say?
[00:05:10] Speaker C: Let's get into it.
[00:05:23] Speaker B: All right. Well, thank you so much for joining us, Kate. Before we get too far into our questions with you, I want to give you a chance to just quickly introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your role.
[00:05:34] Speaker A: Yeah, thanks so much for having me. My name is Kate Donovan. I'm a senior attorney and also the Northeast Regional Director for Environmental Health, which is quite a mouthful at the Natural Resources Defense Council. And it's a real pleasure to be here with you both. I work with WEAC a lot on the issues that, that we're advocating for. So it's, it's great to be here. I spend most of my time these days focused on pfas, chemicals and plastics, and other environmental health issues that affect the Northeast.
[00:06:05] Speaker B: Awesome. Thanks for that intro. So, again, topic of the day, pfas. And I think that for a lot of people, for some people, it's just four letters. Like, I don't even know what that is. I just hear those letters in combination a lot. But for some people, you know, you've seen it in the news, seen it as a recurring, recurring thing and becoming more, more, there's more awareness around it. But I think that a piece that some people are still less familiar with is how people actually get exposed to pfas. I think that's maybe a good place for us to start. Like, for the average person out there in the world, how are they even coming into contact with pfas? How are people getting exposed to PFAS in the first place?
[00:06:46] Speaker A: Yeah. And I might even back us up further to tell you that. So PFAS is a, an acronym that stands for PER and polyfluoro alkyl substances, which you don't need to remember that or know that. But what it is important to know about that acronym is it actually stands for a class of chemicals, about 16,000 chemicals. So it's not one particular chemical. When we say paf, PFAS or pfas, it actually is kind of talking about a whole class of chemicals. And we know information, we have a lot of scientific information about several of those chemicals in that class. And we know less about a lot of chemicals in this class, but we do know that there are characteristics of all of the chemicals in the class that make them dangerous and toxic and concerning for our health. But your question where you wanted to how to start was like, how are we exposed to things? Like why are we even talking about these things. So these chemicals, they've been around for a long time. They were invented in the 1930s by scientists at DuPont in the kind of chemistry lab. They're a synthetic bond, meaning they're a main man made bond of carbon and fluorine. And that's this kind of unique chemical structure that makes these chemicals unbreakable, like indestructible. And that's often why we talk about them as forever chemicals. And that's important later on because it kind of talks about why they don't degrade in the environment or break down in our bodies and hence why it's so concerning to be exposed to these over periods of time. But we find them in drinking water. That's kind of where we started to first get clued into how people were exposed to these chemicals were in drinking water. And so this happened over many, over many years where people had contaminated water sources and actually communities just started to be suspect of the cancers and the sickness that were happening around their properties. So one great movie to kind of tell that tells a lot of the stories, the Dark Waters movie, right, where Mark Garoppolo plays a lawyer who is asked by a farmer to take, you know, look at his cattle that have been dying off. Right. Some of these stories that have happened in the, you know, like the 70s and 80s were kind of like the, you know, how it brought a lot of this emerging contaminants to light. We have our own story in New York, in Hoosick Falls, New York. You know, many, many years ago, residents there thought there was an odd incidences of cancers happening. And they residents got their own water tested and they were finding these chemicals that were not even regulated by the federal government or the state government.
So as this kind of has unfolded and we found these chemicals in water supplies, more and more we're tracing it back to where does it emanate from. And it's, it's being used in a lot of consumer products and industrial sources. So you know, one, one area in New York state where we've seen a lot of drinking water contamination crisis come from is firefighting foam. So firefighting foam that is used either in military citizens scenarios for training purposes or at airports. That foam contains PFAS chemicals and when it's used on an airport, it, you know, washes directly off into say, the watershed that's been a number, number of firefight. Airports and fire departments are locations, you know, locations where PFAS contamination has been found. So, you know, water exposure, exposure through water has certainly been one of kind of the primary places we focused in terms of exposure. But we do know as we learn more and more that these chemicals, because I think I failed to mention that why are they used? Because they repel water, they repel oil, they have like a temperature resistance and a friction reduction quality. So they, they make things slide and not stick. So they've been used in all sorts of consumer applications. So Teflon pans, right. Or food pack, you know, fast food, food packaging, the inside of popcorn bags or microwave popcorn bags, dental floss, different types of cleaning waxes, floor waxes, textiles, things like stain resistant fabrics or water repellent, you know, upholstery. All of those types of consumer products have used some type of kind of PFAS chemical to create that quality in the product.
[00:11:19] Speaker C: I definitely appreciate that background because it seems like, I guess my next question or follow up question is you've mentioned so many different ways that people are exposed or potentially exposed to that. I know that the most popular way I think a lot of people will see when something is free of PFAs. Right. Sometimes there's been more and more marketing around that. So there's a lot of consumer products. You mentioned military foam, you mentioned these things that are nonstick in these pans and things that we use all the time. And often on this podcast we always talk about disproportionate impacts of certain things. Would you say that there's any populations that have a disproportionate impact with exposure and the complications and issues that can come with exposure?
[00:12:01] Speaker A: Yeah, 100%. So as just a general premise, which we know that marginalized environmental justice communities have their disproportionate risks and exposure to environmental pollution. Right. Pollution burdens. And that's not any different for necessarily PFAS chemicals. And I, and I do believe a study at Harvard really tried to confirm that link between PFAS and black and Latino communities and did find, I mean, because there tend to be sited near more industrial facilities that may be discharging PFAS chemicals either through the wastewater or the air emissions or cited near landfills. We know landfills are also a source of PFAS contamination as well as being made perhaps being more closely cited to airports. Right. And military sites and military installations. So all of these kind of siting decisions impact, you know, where these pollution and toxic chemicals are being admitted into the environment. Oh, and I guess just another additional point about communities because I mean certainly black and Latino communities are important for the disproportionate impacts, but we also know like rural communities, which may not be necessarily a race disproportionate impact, but based on the location of where they're lived, it could be socioeconomic impacts. Rural communities may not have the infrastructure for better wastewater and water infrastructure to filter out contaminants. And rural communities tend to be more reliant on private well sources. So that's another concern is that private wells are not being tested and treated in the same way that municipal water that's coming through your tap is say like in New York City and industry happens in rural places across New York as well. So there are, there are impacts in that way.
[00:13:54] Speaker B: I think that's a great segue thinking about. Yeah. The impact, the different impacts on a private well out in rural areas, or thinking about a public, more robust water treatment system, thinking about what are those protections in place, Given that the awareness of PFAS contamination in water has become more prominent, more people are aware of it, including folks that are looking at our drinking water and things. What protections have kind of built up over the years. What have been put in place to, to try to reduce the exposure for people to PFAS chemicals?
[00:14:31] Speaker A: Yeah. So I mean, New York was one of the first states to really put in some of these water protections in terms of identifying like a maximum contaminant level of this particular of a couple PFAS chemicals. Right. We established in the beginning it's a class of 16,000. But some of the more well studied chemicals, which you will probably have heard of POFA and pofs. This is a side note, but when you see products, you'll often see them say POFA and POFS free. And that doesn't necessarily mean that they're PFOS free because I know, Lonnie, you mentioned that before, but New York State has implemented these maximum contaminant levels a couple years ago. So that does mean that water utilities that are supplying water to the public have to be testing and filtering out a couple, you know, PFAS chemicals places like New York City actually have, from the most recent testing I've seen, don't have impacts from PFAS chemicals. And this is also. People talk about how great New York's water, New York City's water actually is. And it is because it comes from upstate and it comes from a very. We do a lot of work to protect the reservoirs and the water that feeds the city. Right. But there are places upstate like Newburgh is another good example of also kind of like a disproportionate impacted community In Newburgh, New York, their drinking water supply was contaminated by Stuart Air Force National Guard base there. And so there are pockets all throughout the state where water has been contaminated. And we're in the process of, you know, filtering it, cleaning up, and the state is going through that process.
Now, I mentioned private wells. Private wells don't fall into the same category of public water supply. So if you are on a private well, you don't have the same protections as, say, someone who is drinking a municipal water supply, drinking from a municipal water source, you know, in the governor's budget. So this year, so we're in legislate legislative session right now, New York State is in the process of figuring out a budget. And there are some kind of exciting protections that are incorporated into this budget, which is hopefully will get passed and be part of a new kind of approach to help with private well owners. There is some money in there to help private well owners test and treat and maintain water, you know, filtrations in their systems if they found it. So, you know, I know this is an issue advocates are really talking about to help fill that data gap, to fill that gap of people that, that are not being notified of what's in their water because they're on private wells. So I think that's an important and exciting development, hopefully. But it's definitely a real disparity in terms of who knows what's in their water.
[00:17:23] Speaker C: Yeah. And it seems like there's a lot that individual states can do when it comes to, you know, protecting folks or passing legislation or, or just the testing in general, but kind of like on the national level, what. What has the epa, the Environmental Protection Agency, done to protect people from pfas? And what would be the state of that, given the current administration? Some of the rollbacks with the epa.
[00:17:51] Speaker A: Right. It's a great question. So EPA this last April did something pretty historic where they set a maximum contaminant level for six PFAS chemicals, POFA, POFs, and four other ones. And they set them at a level of 4 parts per trillion. I didn't mention that. New York standard is at 10 parts per trillion. So actually more protective than New York's current mcls. And there's been some advocacy trying to get New York to match the federal standards, in part because we're worried the federal standards are going to go away. That is a real concern that, you know, this administration is going to weaken or totally get rid of those national standards for those chemicals. States were the first places that started regulating PFAs in drinking water. It's taken EPA many, many years to catch up to where states have been. So yeah, I think in terms of what other stuff EPA has done to help protect against PFAS chemicals, I would say not a whole lot.
It's really where the states have been showing the initiative in the movement to regulating it in water. And then also where states are taking the lead now is starting to ban it in products, in consumer products. We're starting to say that and also see that it's not necessary in so many consumer products. Like why is it necessary to have a toxic chemical in your dental floss when you're putting it between your teeth every day? Or why is it necessary to have, you know, this kind of coating on carpets or upholstery where you have small children like rolling around and putting their faces on things? Right. So states have started to take the lead in phasing it out of particular consumer products.
And that's really important. And that's part of where we're trying to push the state to move further with this session as well.
[00:19:50] Speaker B: That does lead us to the next question of thinking about, you know, these are the things we've already talked about, what, what's happening now, what, what's kind of been built up over the last couple of decades in terms of evaluating and trying to control fasten on our waterways. But just like anything else, there's more that needs to be done. And you kind of alluded to that like things that are happening here in New York State to help. Help help move things forward. So maybe this is a good time to talk a little bit more about what that looks like, what still needs to happen. What's, what's kind of some of those things that you mentioned are kind of on the radar for New York.
And yeah, some of the things that I imagine y'all are advocating for and you know, we were advocating for that you think are need to happen still?
[00:20:27] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, just to kind of set the stage of where New York is. So New York has banned PFAS in some things already. So firefighting foam was the first thing. I mean, obviously we mentioned that was a big source of water contamination. That was one of the first steps that the State did in 2019, I believe, to say firefighting foam can't contain this toxic chemical. They also addressed it in food based packaging. So popcorn bags, fast food wrappers. So that, that, that's good. And they've also last a couple years ago did ban PFAS in carpets and apparel. So coats and Uniforms. So these are all great steps of kind of. But you can kind of see what's like whack a mole. We're just choosing one product as the next to say we can't, we shouldn't be having it in that consumer product. And the policy basis and rationale is that there are other safer alternatives on the market for all of these products to exist and work well and function in a desired way without PFAs. So where we're going this session is we're still kind of playing that whack a mole in some ways, like we're just adding more products to the list list. With that we know where we don't need the pfas, where we know it's not necessary. And that includes legislation that would ban pfas. Intentionally added PFAS in cookware, dental floss, paint, textiles that are other than clothing. So that would be upholstery, cleaning products. If I did. I think I mentioned that, as well as consumer personal care and cosmetic products and menstrual products. So this is kind of a big bucket. And actually all of those products are addressed in three separate bills. And really important that we start to just like look at what's necessary, what's unnecessary, and say if it's not necessary for the product or if there's a safer alternative, manufacturers need to move to safer solutions.
[00:22:32] Speaker C: Yeah, and I think that kind of, I think we can kind of get into like that last bit of question, because the last question that we kind of have is it seems like it's everywhere. And so it can be scary to a lot of people knowing that. And there's lots of different ways of exposure. It seems like the main way that people are impacted is through water. And you talked about all of these different consumer products that New York State is working on banning kind of PFAS being a part of it. But is there any suggestions on how consumers can avoid PFAPs in like their everyday products?
[00:23:00] Speaker A: Yeah. And so the first thing I want to say, it's not their fault. Right. It is not our fault that these toxic chemicals. And so that, that is what kind of really gets me upset is that a lot of these things, this isn't our choice and it shouldn't be a choice. Right. That being said, we need to, that's why we need to push for these kind of laws and regulations so that the playing field is, is level. Right. Everyone should have access to the same toxic free dental floss or, you know, upholstery or whatever it be.
But in the Meantime, while we're still trying to do this, I think that there are good keywords for consumers to be aware of. Things like non stick wrinkle free, stain resistant, water repellent. Those are all to me just in my own personal life in the home that I, I'm a little bit more wary of and will kind of pause if I was going to make a. I mean, to be honest, I don't make a purchase that says any of those things any right now. But I think it's been a pure, it's been a process over time. Right. I didn't all of a sudden just stop buying everything. The more I've learned, the more I've become more of a conscious consumer in a lot of ways, I've been able to shift some of those habits.
Again, we have to be kind to ourselves because it can be very overwhelming to think about all of the different toxic things that we are putting into our, into our homes and exposing ourselves to unknowingly. I think the best advice is certainly being wary of things like that. Plastics. We know we haven't talked a lot about plastics, but PFAs are also in plastics. Right. So moving away from plastic things in different parts of your home is always a good idea. It's a really hard thing to do considering that most of the materials in our homes are made out of some type of plastic material or fiber or whatnot. Not suggesting you should throw out everything in your home. Right. But just kind of start if, if this is important to you and this is something that you're thinking about kind of just looking around your home and seeing where, what are the things you use the most. But that being said, you know, a lot of these products are more expensive. Right? So that's where a lot of the inequity comes into play, is that even if you do care about this, you know, affording the cookware that is, that is non, you know, that is toxic free can be a challenge. Right. So that's why, you know, these bills are so important to us because we do need to make sure that this is available to everyone and that manufacturers are responsible for everyone's health and not just those who can afford it.
[00:25:41] Speaker B: Thank you for that and thanks for. I appreciate you emphasizing the fact that this shouldn't be an individual responsibility. We have so many things that we're already trying to as individuals navigate and avoid, especially communities that are already disproportionately impacted by other things. So like you said, why having protections in place so that people shouldn't have to think about this in the first place. They should just be able to go and grab a product off the shelf and have confidence that it's not going to contain really hazardous chemicals. So before we wrap up, I just wanted to give you a chance. We have all of our questions about me. There's always things that we miss. So just thinking about other things that you think are important for people to be thinking about related to PFAS chemicals and, or things that you think people might want to hear in terms of how to keep supporting this work. If folks are like really passionate and want to support making sure that these protections are put in place. What you would say to folks about just getting involved.
[00:26:38] Speaker A: I mean, it's, it's so important, you know, if you're inclined to be part of, you know, making your voices heard as part of, you know, these inequities. These like, I mean, they're more than inequities.
[00:26:49] Speaker B: It's.
[00:26:49] Speaker A: It's criminal that we were exposing ourselves to toxic chemicals. Right. You know, we ACT is a great organizer and uses, you know, all sorts of voices in Albany and, and I love working with the folks that we ACT brings up to Albany. I think there are opportunities in the PFAS space for people to get involved. We do have a kind of an Instagram account if your listeners want to check out. It's PFAS Free ny. And that is an Instagram kind of account dedicated to talking about the advocacy we're doing in New York and spreading information and education about PFAS and how it's impacting New Yorkers, but also how it's being in consumer products. I'll, you know, post our. Whenever we. We. You guys release this. That you put that up there. We also do have a website which is pfas free ny.org which is kind of similarly linked where you can learn a little bit more about PFAS and its lifecycle as well as the bills that we're advocating for and encourage people to get in touch through those channels if they're interested in being part of this.
[00:27:59] Speaker C: Yeah, we'll definitely link those in the show notes for anyone who's interested in checking that out or following those pages.
But Kate, thanks again. We really do appreciate it and we know this can be a very wonky sciency subject. So sometimes it's very difficult to relay some of this information. So we're glad that you were able to come on and do that and help our listeners and ourselves. Right. Jaron and I will also be now looking at some things a little bit differently in our lives when we make purchases. But yeah, we definitely appreciate you coming on to talk about pfas.
[00:28:31] Speaker A: Yeah, thanks so much for having me. It was a pleasure.
[00:28:34] Speaker C: Thanks for listening. If you liked this episode, make sure to rate and review the show on whatever platform you listen on. If you have thoughts about the show, we encourage you to reach out to us with your thoughts and
[email protected] and.
[00:28:46] Speaker B: Check out we act on Facebook at react4ej that's W E a c t F o r e J on Instagram x bluesky and YouTube weact4ej that's w e a c t number 4ej and check out our website react.org for more information about environmental justice.
[00:29:05] Speaker C: Until next time.
[00:29:07] Speaker B: Bye.
[00:29:18] Speaker C: SA.
