WASHINGTON, DC, May 15, 2025 (ENS) – The Trump administration is rolling back drinking water protections from six PFAS, known as ‘forever chemicals,’ linked to decreased fertility in women, damaged child development, and higher cancer risks.
The rules, set by the Biden administration last year, would have required the removal of six prevalent types of toxic PFAS from drinking water systems throughout the country.
Lee Zeldin, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator, and former supporter of PFAS limits, announced the update Wednesday.
PFAS are a group of synthetic chemicals used in a range of common applications, from the linings of fast-food boxes, non-stick cookware, cosmetics and fabrics, to fire-fighting foams.
PFAS have been found in the bloodstream of 98 percent of people tested, according to a recent study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. These long-lasting chemicals have been identified at 57,000 contamination sites across the United States.
New research often shows that there is no amount of these chemicals safe for human exposure, yet about half of all Americans are regularly exposed to PFAS through their drinking water.
At least 45 percent of the nation’s tap water is contaminated with one or more types of these chemicals, called per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances, PFAS, found a 2023 study by the U.S. Geological Survey.
It was the first time anyone had tested for and compared PFAS in tap water from both private and government-regulated public water supplies on a broad scale throughout the country. This data was used to model and estimate PFAS contamination nationwide.
There are more than 12,000 types of PFAS, not all of which can be detected with current tests; the USGS study tested for the presence of 32 types.
With this study, USGS aimed to “help members of the public to understand their risk of exposure and inform policy and management decisions regarding testing and treatment options for drinking water.”
Drinking Water Protections Lifted
But that was during the Biden administration.
Now, Zeldin intends to roll back limits on four forever chemicals – PFHxS, PFNA, HFPO-DA (known as GenX) and PFBS.
At the same time he is delaying and weakening the limits on the remaining two – PFOA and PFOS.
The compliance deadline for the limits on PFOS and PFOS will be delayed for two years, until 2031, and a new rule will be issued that also establishes a federal exemption framework.
This rollback is a reversal for Zeldin. The EPA administrator has repeatedly stated his support for stronger PFAS protections. He voted for the PFAS Action Act of 2021 to address PFAS contamination while representing New York’s 1st Congressional District, on the eastern tip of Long Island, in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Just a few weeks ago, on April 28, Administrator Zeldin said, “I have long been concerned about PFAS and the efforts to help states and communities dealing with legacy contamination in their backyards.”
He then announced a long list of actions the EPA would take to stop forever chemicals from entering drinking water systems, and “initiatives to engage with Congress and industry to establish a clear liability framework that ensures the polluter pays and passive receivers are protected.”
“With today’s announcement, we are tackling PFAS from all of EPA’s program offices, advancing research and testing, stopping PFAS from getting into drinking water systems, holding polluters accountable, and providing certainty for passive receivers. This is just a start of the work we will do on PFAS to ensure Americans have the cleanest air, land, and water,” Zeldin said on April 28.
Mary Grant, water program director at the U.S. nonprofit Food & Water Watch, slammed the EPA rollback, warning, “Today’s decision is a shameful and dangerous capitulation to industry pressure that will allow continued contamination of our drinking water with toxic PFAS. This will cost lives.”
“Zeldin and the Trump administration are illegally gutting basic water safety protections, blaming the cost of upgrades to comply with those important public health rules. Yet just last week the administration proposed to virtually eliminate the main source of federal funding that would help make the necessary water system improvements to protect from PFAS,” Grant pointed out.
“Once again, the Trump administration has demonstrated that its priority is bending to corporate interests, not the safety and wellbeing of everyday people,” she said. “Nothing is safe from Trump’s greed-driven agenda – not even our drinking water.”
Drink at Your Peril
Called “forever chemicals,” due to their slow break down in the environment, PFAS are lab-made chemicals that have been linked to health problems including cancers, altered hormone levels, decreased birth weights, digestive inflammation, and reduced vaccine response.
As of May 14, 2025, the EPA website shows these health effects of forever chemicals, citing current peer-reviewed scientific studies as information sources:
- Reproductive effects such as decreased fertility or increased high blood pressure in pregnant women.
- Developmental effects or delays in children, including low birth weight, accelerated puberty, bone variations, or behavioral changes.
- Increased risk of some cancers, including prostate, kidney, and testicular cancers.
- Reduced ability of the body’s immune system to fight infections, including reduced vaccine response.
- Interference with the body’s natural hormones.
- Increased cholesterol levels and/or risk of obesity.
The EPA says that its scientists, those in other federal agencies, in academia and in industry are continuing to review the growing body of research about PFAS. Still, the agency says, health effects associated with exposure to PFAS are difficult to specify.
There are thousands of PFAS with potentially varying effects and toxicity levels, yet most studies focus on a limited number of the better known PFAS compounds.
People can be exposed to PFAS in different ways and at different stages of their lives, the EPA points out. The types and uses of PFAS change over time, which makes it challenging to track and assess how exposure to these chemicals occurs and how they will affect human health.
Lawsuit Prompts Rule Rollback
Last year, after decades of community organizing, the Biden EPA finalized protections to remove six types of PFAS from drinking water.
In April 2024, the EPA set maximum contaminant levels for PFOA and PFOS of four ppt each; MCLs for PFHxS, PFNA and GenX at 10 ppt, and limits on a combination of four PFAS types – PFNA, PFHxS, PFBS and GenX – based on a hazard index.
Utilities had five years to comply with the new limits – not until 2029.
The decision to roll back the Biden EPA limits on forever chemicals in drinking water comes in response to a consolidated lawsuit from water utility associations and industrial associations, including the National Association of Manufacturers, the American Chemistry Council and Chemours.
In a brief petition, against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) filed in June 2024 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit under the Safe Drinking Water Act, the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Chemistry Council called the Biden rule “arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of discretion”.
The chemical lobby has long-fought regulations on these toxic substances, while “hiding a growing body of evidence linking their products to serious health problems,” Food & Water Watch said.
A Food & Water Watch report found the chemical industry spent more than $110 million from 2019-2022 lobbying Congress on scores of bills, including many to address PFAS contamination throughout the country.
Grant alleges that the Trump administration has “stacked the EPA with former executives and staff from the American Chemistry Council and lawyers who have defended companies from PFAS pollution claims.”
For its part, the American Chemistry Council criticized the science on which the Biden PFAS rules were based on behalf of “local governments and water agencies.”
“We share the goal of protecting access to safe drinking water for all Americans, and we strongly support the establishment of a science-based drinking water standard for PFOA and PFOS. With scarce resources and other water priorities, we need to thoughtfully follow sound science when developing these standards,” the ACC said Wednesday.
“Unfortunately, EPA’s previously issued National Primary Drinking Water Regulation for certain PFAS chemistries was not consistent with the state of the science or the requirements of the Safe Drinking Water Act,” the ACC said.
The future of any new PFAS protection for drinking water is uncertain as the Trump administration has issued an executive order requiring that 10 rules be removed for every new regulation issued.
A Solution Emerges
In a breakthrough that could help address the problem of water contamination by forever chemicals, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, have developed a new filtration material based on natural silk and cellulose. The innovative filter can remove a wide variety of PFAS chemicals, as well as heavy metals, from drinking water. Its antimicrobial properties can help prevent the filter from becoming fouled.
“These materials can really compete with the current standard materials in water filtration when it comes to extracting metal ions and these emerging contaminants, and they can also outperform some of them currently,” said senior author Benedetto Marelli, an MIT professor of civil and environmental engineering. Lab tests show the new material can extract orders of magnitude more contaminants from water than commonly used filters like activated carbon.
Featured image: Most Americans drink tap water, surveys show. undated (Photo courtesy U.S. Army)
