Small towns have big problems addressing water pollution – Bill Williams

Prescott and Prescott Valley are trying to deal with it

Legions of attorneys have begun to descend on large and small towns throughout Arizona, looking for municipal clients for a sort of class action lawsuit pitting the towns against chemical manufacturers.

Two of those small-town clients might soon include Prescott Valley and Prescott, Arizona.

The culprit is a water pollutant called PFAS. The lawsuit began with Arizona’s second largest city – Tucson, then on to Marana, which is a couple thousand residents larger than Prescott Valley, and now attorneys are spreading out across Arizona. Water districts and town water departments are very concerned about the pollution. Fifty-six Arizona water systems have detected PFAS in their water.

Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) are a group of manufactured chemicals. It’s not clear why Prescott Valley started testing for PFAS as long ago as 2015 but four wells in Prescott Valley were only recently shut down. Five wells in Prescott were also shut down.

Prescott Valley has a unique system which allows wells to be shut down and ‘bypass pipes can send water to all areas of town to bypass specific polluted wells without impacting total water supply to residents. Engineers describe this as having redundancies and blending water sources. Prescott Valley could drill more wells, and is assessing treatment options, and is participating in a $3 million dollar water sampling program sponsored by Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ), to be used by small Arizona towns.

Current scientific research, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), suggests that exposure to high levels of certain PFAS may lead to adverse health outcomes. However, research is still ongoing to determine how different levels of exposure to different PFAS can lead to a variety of health effects. Research is also underway to better understand the health effects associated with low levels of exposure to PFAS over long periods of time, especially in children.

The EPA says, current peer-reviewed scientific studies have shown that exposure to certain levels of PFAS may lead to:

• 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.

Some people have higher exposures to PFAS than others because of their occupations or where they live, such as industrial workers who are involved in making or processing PFAS or PFAS-containing materials, but that’s the mystery for Prescott Valley, which has never had a large manufacturer using caustic chemicals.

And that’s why Prescott Valley town council invited the ADEQ to give a presentation to council on September 8, 2022.

Paula Penzino, Science Officer for ADEQ with extensive experience in environmental issues and geology, clarified that PFAS are man-made and not naturally occurring such as other water woes felt by Prescott Valley such as arsenic.

Her presentation appeared reassuring, according to the looks on the faces and comments and questions of the town council and the mayor.

Even though 97-percent of Americans tested have PFAS in their blood, the levels are going down over time, said Penzino, most likely because the EPA outlawed PFAS in 2015.

Penzino did not opt for an alarmist attitude. She admitted Prescott Valley wells tested positive but had to admit to the conundrum that EPA has caused in not setting acceptable levels or maximum levels to be allowed.

EPA is studying the problem and prevalence and won’t have firm guidance or numbers until 2024. There could be draft guidance by this fall, but as is the case with all things EPA, there would be a one-year time period for public comment. EPA has sent out an advisory saying any levels above 70 parts per trillion is of high concern. Prescott Valley has not reached that level. Its wells with detectible pollution ranged from 2-to-13 parts per trillion.

Penzino also pointed out the EPA drinking water health advisory levels were revised three times with the most current one being a 2022 guidance and it actually lowered the health advisory levels for PFAS, possibly due to the new data showing blood levels of PFAS in Americans were falling rapidly. And she said EPA is proposing to designate PFAS as hazardous substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), also known as Superfund, indicating the agencies are taking this very seriously.

From a lawsuit standpoint, this could put a lawyer in an odd situation because: the pollutant is present, (there were as many as 20,000 PFAS manufactured) we are not sure how it got there, or what chemical manufacturer made the chemical (there are up to 30 different companies which have manufactured them) and there are no minimum/maximum levels accepted by the EPA. So, you would essentially be suing based on what you might find out in 2024.

Penzino stated only 600 PFAS have “been identified,” even though they know 20,000 were manufactured, indicating the EPA and ADEQ have their work cut out for them.

Penzino described how ADEQ and Prescott Valley plan to keep the four wells offline, and that they have been re-tested at two laboratories that confirmed the presence of PFAS. She sounded concerned with lack of EPA guidance saying she hopes EPA will develop criteria sooner and pointed out that right now there are no teeth in current regulations. Arizona also has on the books, Arizona revised statute 36-1696 banning PFAS used for foam training purposes (like firefighting); if you can’t adequately contain it, you are banned from using it, but there is no enforcement according to Penzino.

The pollutant was also found in Prescott Valley’s treatment plant off Fain Road, and in influent which comes from homes and sewer lines and effluent which comes out of the treatment plant. PFAS were also detected in ponds in Prescott Valley, and it was pointed out that Prescott Valley discharge and its underground aquifer actually recharges the Agua Fria River as it meanders downhill through tributaries like Big Bug Creek toward Cordes Junction.

Penzino painted a picture that PFAS are all over the United States and have been used in a variety of every day uses such as carpets, cleaners, food packaging, furniture, outdoor gear, clothing, adhesives, sealants, Teflon pans, stain resistant coatings, smoke stack discharges, textile manufacturing, seeping landfills that don’t have liners, and firefighting foam.

Penzino said all airports are required to have firefighting foam but has no data showing foam leached from the Prescott Airport into ground water. Foams are used in training and emergency response events at airports, shipyards, military bases, firefighting training facilities, chemical plants, and refineries. There is no indication that Prescott and the Forest Service’s brave air tanker crews used that grade of foam in last year’s forest fires from their squadron at Prescott Airport.

The military uses this type of foam, and it is prevalent at all of Arizona’s bases, and in fact the lawsuit came mostly from complaints from residents near Davis-Monthan AFB and the adjacent Air Guard facility

There is an EPA program that helps municipalities regarding the foam issue, and ADEQ received funding from EPA to help test water systems in Arizona such as Prescott and Prescott Valley. A homeowner would have to pay $300-500 to have his/her tap water tested because finding trace amounts of PFAS requires very sophisticated tests. And rural well owners have to pay their own way for testing.

According to the EPA and ADEQ, PFAS can be present in our water, soil, air, and food as well as in materials found in our homes or workplaces, including, as posted on the EPA website:

• Drinking water – in public drinking water systems and private drinking water wells.
• Soil and water at or near waste sites –  such as those that fall under the federal Superfund and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act programs.
• Manufacturing or chemical production facilities that produce or use PFAS – for example at chrome plating, electronics, and certain paper manufacturers.
• Food – for example in fish caught from water contaminated by PFAS and dairy products from livestock exposed to PFAS. Penzino added to this EPA list the concept of “uptake” by man and animal, where PFAS get into the food cycle and even into human breast milk.
• Food packaging – for example in grease-resistant paper, fast food containers/wrappers, microwave popcorn bags, pizza boxes, and candy wrappers.
• Personal care products – for example in certain shampoo, dental floss, insect repellant and cosmetics.
• Biosolids – for example fertilizer from wastewater treatment plants that is used on agricultural lands can affect ground and surface water and animals that graze on the land.

But Penzino pointed out that the human testing looks at things “over a lifetime” not a random drink of water, and so, scientists are looking at what happens over 70 years to a human. Obviously, the towns want results sooner.

Penzino added that measuring for presence of a pollutant at a parts per trillion level cannot be detected in some laboratories and that can interfere with messaging especially when a town like Prescott Valley is trying to explain science, for instance, one drop of the pollutant in twenty Olympic size swimming pools is a part per trillion.

When Mayor Kell Palguta asked Penzino to try to place the pollutant in perspective, she answered, “This is not an acute contaminant, Prescott Valley is not exposed to high levels of it, and I don’t see it as bad a problem as lead or arsenic in Arizona.”

Palguta pressed her again, asking, “If we had never tested, say down the road twenty years, would we have a greater problem?”

Penzino replied, “I’m not a toxicologist but I can tell you PFAS have been detected in rainwater in remote regions of the world, and in deer tissue from hunters in Maine, and that caused cancellation of hunting in some counties. But Prescott Valley has done a good job of turning off contaminated wells. It is the new health advisories studying the lifetimes of cows and people that will help us, but then again, cows and deer don’t live to be 70.”

Neil Wadsworth, Prescott Valley Utilities Director, reminded council that 27 wells were tested, results from two are pending. The town had a capacity for pumping 20-million gallons per day and is now at 16-million gallons per day. Wadsworth’s eyes were clearly showing concern but not worry as he spoke in a professional and methodical and re-assuring way.

“We are not in danger of saying to our customers: don’t use your water.” About 21 compounds were tested for in wells with cute names such as GEN X and Little Pete – the town’s northern most well which tested positive. The Quailwood well had the highest concentrations, and the effluent from the treatment plant was high, according to Wadsworth. But being near a well with the contaminant does not mean a resident is more at risk because the water department can move water from one well area to the other.

The town has a reputation for thinking ahead and is part of a compact of sorts that could someday pump water from as far away as near Paulden and when this reporter wrote his two-part series about water quantity in Yavapai County, he learned that former town manager Larry Tarkowski and former water services director John Munderloh accepted an international award for the quality of the water department.

“We may never find out exactly what’s going on,” Wadsworth said in reference to not knowing the source and not having manufacturers using PFAS in town. “Was it Teflon tape used by well diggers and plumbers; we don’t know. We tested for DFAS back in 2015 and one well that tested negative then has now tested positive. Labs are getting better now. We can test for two parts per trillion now. Years ago, it was 40 parts per trillion.”

Wadsworth will visit other municipal water departments soon and discuss use of granular activated carbon ion exchange which is effective at eliminating some pollutants in water.

Penzino also highlighted how serious a problem Tucson has and disclosed that they are suing major chemical companies at this time.

Marana and Tucson have joined in a lawsuit suing five companies, including 3M, to pay for the removal of toxic and possibly cancer-causing chemicals found in some area water wells. Other jurisdiction Plaintiffs may add companies like DuPont and BASF as Defendants.

The lawsuit asks for unspecified damages against 3M and other companies that manufactured, marketed and sold a firefighting foam, according to the Arizona Daily Star’s recent reporting.

Toward the end of the town’s study session on September 8, town attorney Ivan Legler disclosed that the lawyers had come calling to both Prescott Valley and Prescott. Town mayor Kell Palguta replied, “It doesn’t cost us anything, maybe we should.” And Legler replied, “That’s correct, they are looking for 25-percent if we win.”

Although not stated, it is assumed the town wants the money to mitigate costs already incurred in shutting down wells. A shut down well can only be left shuttered for so long before policies state the whole thing must be cleaned before the laborious task of putting the well back into service.

We will report on Prescott wells and the current situation in Prescott, and how the lawsuit pleading might be worded, as well as interviewing a local environmentalist, in our next report.