2023-10-31 10:30:09
The publication of a confidential email from the director of the regional health agency (ARS) of Occitanie raises serious public health questions regarding the chemical quality of drinking water.
Worrying revelations
In an internal email made public by Le Canard chainé on October 18, 2023, the general director of the ARS d’Occitanie, Didier Jaffre, addressed his executives by informing them that tap water “must no longer be consumed, but only used for everything else […] ». According to the extracts revealed, a significant concentration in water of so-called “eternal” pollutants, PFAS[1]would be in question: “There are PFAS and metabolites everywhere. And the more we look for, the more we will find.”. To circumvent these high levels, the director proposes to suspend control measures for these substances.
Faced with the scale of the controversy, Didier Jaffre justified himself by deploring that this email had been “taken out of context”. He reassures users of the region by specifying that “Occitanie water can be drunk safely”.
Indestructible and toxic chemicals
The acronym PFAS designates per- and polyfluoroalkyl compounds, originating from the chemical industry and developed since the 1940s. This family brings together nearly 4,000 synthetic chemical compounds, including Pfoa (perfluorooctanoic acid) and PFHxS (perfluorohexane sulfonic acid). . They are massively present in many everyday consumer goods: Teflon™ non-stick pans, food packaging, textiles, shampoos and even makeup.
Equipped with non-stick and waterproofing properties, these molecules are almost essential for many industrial sectors.
Their persistent and bioaccumulative nature in the environment over thousands of years has earned them the nickname “forever pollutants”. The presence of very strong carbon-fluorine bonds explains this extremely slow decay. These almost indestructible compounds are likely to be released into our environment and to contaminate various water sources by accumulating there.
In the event of chronic exposure, their harmfulness for human metabolism is attested by certain studies (fertility disorders, fetal development, increased risks of obesity or certain cancers – prostate, kidneys and testicles).
A culpable inaction of political power?
A report commissioned by the Ministry of Ecological Transition from the General Inspectorate of Environment and Sustainable Development (IGEDD) and published on April 14 warns of France’s “worrying” delay in the detection and quantification of PFAS . The report recommends that the government act “without delay”.
At the beginning of 2023, the ministry took up the subject and launched a “PFAS 2023-2027 action plan” which aims to evaluate and reduce the toxic effects of these molecules while emphasizing that actions must be taken on a scale. European. Last June, a ministerial decree, as part of this action plan, required 5,000 industrial sites to screen for the presence of PFAS in their aqueous discharges.
At the end of 2022, with the transposition into French law of a 2020 European directive, a maximum threshold was set at 0.10 μg/L for 20 PFAS deemed to be of concern and must be respected for drinking water by 2026.
Possible alternatives
PFAS might be replaced by less harmful substances that already exist, as recommended in the IGEDD report.
The implementation of techniques for the destruction and elimination of PFAS might also represent an alternative. Note that a promising remediation method working on a dozen PFAS has been published in the journal Science. Researchers have managed to identify a weakness at one end of some PFAS that can be targeted by a common solvent and reagent at temperatures averaging 80 to 120°C, causing the entire molecule to collapse, without emitting of harmful products. It remains to identify the Achilles heel of other types of PFAS…
[1] Pronounce “pifasse”
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