EPA Announces PFAS Strategic Roadmap

 

On October 18, 2021, EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan announced the agency’s PFAS Strategic Roadmap, laying out a whole-of-agency approach to addressing PFAS.

The roadmap sets timelines by which EPA plans to take specific actions and commits to bolder new policies to safeguard public health, protect the environment, and hold polluters accountable. Cumulatively, these actions will build upon one another and lead to more enduring and protective solutions.

Several key topics were proposed, including:

• EPA will propose monitoring requirements at facilities where PFAS are expected or suspected to be present in wastewater and stormwater discharges using EPA’s recently published analytical method 1633, which covers 40 unique PFAS
• EPA will propose that National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NDPES) program permits
• contain conditions based on product elimination and substitution when a reasonable alternative to using PFAS is available in the industrial process;
• require best management practices to address PFAS containing firefighting foams for stormwater permits
• require enhanced public notification and engagement with downstream communities and public water systems
• require pretreatment programs to include source control and best management practices to protect wastewater treatment plant discharges and biosolid applications.
• EPA will recommend that state-issued permits use analytical method 1633, follow the full suite of permitting approaches that EPA will use in federally issued permits, and will suggest monitoring at facilities suspected of containing PFAS
• EPA will issue updated guidance on PFAS destruction and disposal
• EPA will establish a PFAS Voluntary Stewardship Program, challenging industry to reduce overall releases of PFAS into the environment

The roadmap comes as more and more states continue to push forward their own legislation and regulation on PFAS chemicals. Handling the issue at the federal level would allow for consistency across all 50 states with uniform compliance requirements. ILTA continues to update its state PFAS legislation and regulation tracking resource on our website, accessible after logging into your membership account.