The federal EPA earlier this year adopted new drinking water standards for the toxic chemical group, giving public water systems throughout the country five years to craft and implement plans to come into compliance with contamination limits.
Wastewater in this study was measured against federal standards for aquatic life, according to Ohio EPA director Ann Vogel. This means results from the samplings showed levels below 49 milligrams per liter (mg/L) for PFOA and 3 mg/L for PFOS, two of the most common types of PFAS.
“We’re not comparing it to drinking water standards. This is discharged out of a manufacturing facility. We’re not drinking this water,” Vogel said. “But we’re happy that it’s not above those levels.”
Studies of the group of forever chemicals on fish are often used to determine safety for water recreation.
Dayton is the region’s largest water provider, supplying drinking water to the city and hundreds of thousands of residents in Montgomery and Greene counties. PFAS has been detected in the city’s public water system above the EPA’s new limits of 4 parts per trillion.
“The city of Dayton is reviewing the PFAS Study of Dayton’s Sewer Collection System and will continue to work with the Ohio and U.S. EPA as they develop rules and guidelines for PFAS level discharges into the sanitary sewer system and the Water Reclamation Facility,” said Toni Bankston, a spokesperson for the city.
The Ohio EPA and Dayton city officials identified locations that fit the U.S. EPA’s criteria of facilities that have a potential to discharge PFAS in their wastewater effluent.
This ranged from chemical distributors, manufacturers, airports or spaces that are used for firefighting training, landfills and more. Businesses need a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit to legally discharge pollutants from a “point source” — pipes, ditches, channels, tunnels, or other vessels — into water sources.
Included in the study were permitted locations like Dayton International Airport, Stony Hollow Landfill and dozens of manufacturers that work with metals and chemicals in the Dayton area. All of the sampled locations have permits to discharge into water within the Little Miami watershed.
One business, the Dayton Manufacturing Company, was removed from sampling because it changed its manufacturing procedures and was no longer a permitted wastewater discharger in Dayton.
Another business, DuPont Electronic Polymers in Dayton, declined to participate in sampling. DuPont de Nemours, Inc. and other manufacturing companies have been sued for their production or use of the harmful group of forever chemicals.
The company did not participate in the study because its discharge is outside the scope of this study, said Daniel Turner of corporate media relations for DuPont.
“The site does not discharge any process water to the publicly owned treatment works,” he said.
The Dayton location also does not use any of the substances referenced in the U.S. EPA’s laboratory-validated method to test for 40 PFAS compounds in wastewater, surface water, groundwater and more.
Dayton PFAS sewer study
| Facility name | PFAS type | Highest detected amount (ng/L) |
|---|---|---|
| Apex-Cooper Power Tool Division | PFHxS | 9.6 |
| Aps Materials Inc | PFBA | 3.5 |
| Custom Nickel, LLC | PFHxS | 11 |
| Dayton International Airport | PFOA, PFDA | 120/120 |
| Dayton International Airport Terminal | PFNA | 350 |
| Dayton Metal Finishing | PFHxS | 9.6 |
| Dayton Water Systems | PFOA | 3.6 |
| Electro Polish | PFHxS | 9.7 |
| Electro Polish - Hunter Building | PFHxS | 9.6 |
| Fuyao Glass America Inc | PFHxS | 1.4 |
| Gem City Chemicals Inc | PFBA | 6.6 |
| Hayes Metal Finishing, Inc. | PFHxS | 8.2 |
| Hohman Plating, LLC | PFOS, 6:2 FTS | 4100/6300 |
| Mancor Ohio, Inc. | 6:2 FTS | 62 |
| Norwood Medical, LLC 1,3 | PFPeA, PFOS | 6/23 |
| Paragon Medical | 6:2 FTS | 50 |
| Parker Lord | PFxHA | 0.6/2.4 |
| Plating Technology, Inc. | PFOS | 8 |
| ProLine Finishing | PFHxS | 11 |
| Riteway Black Oxide & Deburr, Inc. | PFHxS | 8.5 |
| Stony Hollow Landfill | PFBS | 16,000 |
| Stony Hollow Landfill Inc | PFxHA | 1000 |
| Summit Finishing Technologies, Inc. | PFOS | 6.7 |
| Techmetals, Inc. (Building 2) | PFHxS, PFHxA | 10/10 |
| Techmetals, Inc. (Building 3) | PFOS | 44 |
| Techmetals, Inc. (Building 5) | PFHxS | 6.8 |
| Techmetals, Inc (Building 8) | PFHxS | 8 |
| Wright Bros Aero Inc | PFBA | 8.1 |
Source: Ohio EPA
All of the sampled locations had sewage below the threshold deemed dangerous for waterlife. Some locations had PFAS levels ranging from 4,100 to 16,000 ng/L. This falls well below the EPA standards because 16,000 nanograms per liter (ng/L) is equivalent to .016 milligrams per liter (mg/L).
Vogel said the Ohio EPA wants to work with sampled businesses, with their participation, to reduce their use of any material or process that contains PFAS.
CT Consultants, Inc., hired by the Ohio EPA, sampled the participating locations earlier this year.
This analysis comes after a statewide study that began in 2020 to test for PFAS compounds in 1,550 public water systems throughout Ohio.
As part of the H2Ohio Rivers program, Ohio is also completing a statewide survey to measure its large rivers for the existence of PFAS by sampling water and tissue of aquatic life.
Research about the impact of PFAS on human health is ongoing, but multiple studies link PFAS to liver, bladder and even certain kinds of lung cancer, as well as issues related to the immune system.
Exposure to PFAS in utero may also have an impact on developing children, with effects that aren’t reversible, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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