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Policy, the Production of Ignorance, & the Challenges of Building

More Circular Systems

Laura Rabinow, PhD

Director of Research�Rockefeller Institute of Government

A Case Study of Federal Standards for PFAS

Hi everyone, I want to thank Renee, Dan, Kelly and everyone at NYSARR for inviting me to speak with you.

My work hasn’t explicitly centered on the 3 Rs (aside from a little work here and there on things like recycled content requirements, and low carbon concrete). But, as I thought about what I wanted to have a conversation with you on today – I considered how much of my work has engaged with a systems level approach to thinking through some of the challenges we face today with respect to environmental policy and practice.

And, I’m very excited to be in room with so many people who are doing the critical day to day work of building the kinds of systems – more circular systems – that we need across so many areas of policy and practice, so many materials, and industries, and communities.

In particular, I’ve thought a lot about such systems with respect to PFAS, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or what are often referred to as “Forever Chemicals.” And what I want to talk about for a little while today with respect to certain federal standards for PFAS, are the relationships between policy and the production of ignorance, and the ensuing challenges of implementing more circular systems with respect to that dynamic. So please bear with me for a moment, while take us into a more policy focused discussion

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2014

(Times Union)

PFOA first detected in Hoosick Falls’ water

by resident Michael Hickey

My earlier research focused the absence of standards for what are often called “emerging” contaminants in drinking water (even though those “emerging contaminants” are not always or even often particularly new). And, more specifically, it addressed a case study of PFOA (perfluoroctanoic acid) contamination in Hoosick Falls, New York, just down the road from where I grew up. Some of you may be familiar already, but for those who aren’t - Hoosick Falls is a small village in upstate NY that, among other things, has a handful of current and former manufacturing sites some of which you can see on this map here - including plants owned by Saint-Goblin Performance Plastics and Honeywell International, where Perfluoroalkyl substances including PFOA were used for many years. PFAS was only discovered in the water supply in 2014, however, because a resident sent water samples to a lab following the tragic loss of his father due to kidney cancer with no apparent causal factors.

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2015

Existing Levels:

EPA’s Health Advisory: 400 ppt
NYS’s Standard for Unspecified Organic Contaminants: 50,000 ppt

New York State Department of Health:

Environmental Protection Agency:

I along with the broader public, perhaps some or many of you, became aware of the contamination in Hoosick Falls a decade ago, in December of 2015, as a local reporter began writing about conflicting guidance given by the NYS DOH and the EPA about whether or not it was ok for residents to drink the water. [1]

What, was most immediately underlying this conflicting guidance, and the reason this contamination was only discovered by a resident and not through routine regulatory testing, was the absence of enforceable standards at both the state and federal level for PFOA or any PFAS.

[1] [DOH initially concluded that “health effects are unlikely and we do not expect health effects from normal use of the water” - and the village’s administration framed drinking the water as a ‘personal choice’ based on this DOH’s guidance. The EPA on the other hand stated at the time that “it recommends that people (all caps and bolded) NOT drink the water”.]

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The co-production of ignorance contributed to the delayed/uneven testing for PFOA & other PFAS, and the absence of enforceable standards.
Ignorance. The absence and inaccessibility of knowledge or science.

Why did this come to light outside of regulatory testing?

Why was there no enforceable regulatory standard for PFOA at the time?

And, it was in that context, I began to wonder what explained this absence of an enforceable standard at the state or federal level – for a contaminant that had been manufactured and used in the United States for (at that time) roughly 70 years (now we’re talking 80).

And over the next four years, my research identified how ignorance – in this case referring to the absence and inaccessibility of knowledge or science – was strategically, structurally, and culturally produced across scale, by both industrial and regulatory actors. And, it reflected how ignorance contributed to the delayed and uneven testing for PFAS and the absence of enforceable standards for them leading up to their discovery in Hoosick Falls.

It showed that this production of ignorance occurred in at least three ways – and today I’m going to focus in two of those ways ignorance was produced related to the absence of federal standards and their important connection to building effective circular systems.

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Unseen Science

(Grandjean 2018)

“research that is conducted but never shared outside of institutional boundaries”

(Billott 2001)

(Richter et al. 2018)

First, Industry produced “unseen science” in the context of environmental regulatory structures that followed the initial manufacture of PFOA in the late 1940s:

Under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), industry was not required to provide substantive research on tens of thousands of chemicals already in use when it was enacted in 1976, including PFOA and other PFAS. This provided the context for industry’s production of what other researchers (Richter et al.) have conceptualized as unseen science - “research that is conducted but never shared outside of institutional boundaries” (691).

Despite PFAS’s longer industrial history since the late 1940s, much the early production of knowledge concerning these contaminants has only been in some way publicly available since 2001 (Bilott 2009) as the result of a court case brought against DuPont concerning contamination in and around Parkersburg WV (if you’ve seen the movie Dark Waters – it’s that case). Those earlier studies conducted but not shared by industry, were later catalogued by researchers at Harvard (Phillipe Grandjean) and published in 2018. The studies dated back to at least the late 1960s, and reflected that PFOA in particular (but not only PFOA) was toxic, persistent, and bioacummulative, that it was in the water near DuPont’s manufacturing plants, in the blood of workers, and in their children at birth. It is then following this discovery in 2001, that federal regulators are first aware of these studies, when attorney Rob Bilott who brought the case wrote this letter to the EPA outlining the “unseen science” he had found.

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Incommensurate Science

Science that is produced at speeds, scales, or in forms that cannot possibly address the speed, scale, or form of its subject matter

Unregulated Contaminants Monitoring Rule’s (UCMR) Incommensurate Science

(Eurofins Eaton Analytics)

Speed

Slowness with respect to large universe of potential contaminants

Scale

Exclusion of water �systems serving under 10,000 & private wells

Form

Reporting levels higher�than detection levels

Second, the absence of regulation for PFAS was also a consequence of federal regulator’s production of “incommensurate science” - by which I’ve referred to science that is produced at speeds, scales, or in forms that cannot possibly address the speeds. scales or forms of its subject matter.

In particular, it was compounded by the EPA’s production of incommensurate science related to chemical contaminants in drinking water through the implementation of the Unregulated Contaminants Monitoring Rule (the UCMR). The UCMR was established in the 1986 amendments to the SDWA to test public water systems for the occurrence of “Contaminants of Concern” – testing that is in turn used as part of the basis for further regulatory decisions with respect to federal drinking water standards.

This incommensurate production of science, its own kind of production of ignorance, of was reflected in at least three ways:

One, the UCMR established a relatively slow chemical-by-chemical process, with respect to the large universe of 85,000 or so chemicals in production or use. Setting a ceiling that the EPA consider no more than 30 contaminants every 5 years, and it only required the EPA to make a decision about whether or not to regulate five contaminants every five years.

- As a consequence of these limiting and discretionary policies, only about 90 contaminants out of the universe of 85,000 had been regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act since 1974 (US EPA 2015).

Two, amendments in 1996 revised the program to address PWSs serving over 10,000 residents, instead of 500. This is challenging with respect to rural areas with smaller systems including those for small industrial and post-industrial localities like Hoosick Falls, where certain contaminants may have been used. For broader context: 2.5 million New Yorkers rely on these smaller water systems. [And, if we include those on private wells which aren’t regulated under the CWA and other systems not tested under the UCMR, there are 6.5 million New Yorkers relying on those systems]. These systems, as you might have guessed, included the Village Hoosick Falls – in which the water system served just 4,925 people. So, even though six perfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) were finally included for testing under the (third) UCMR in 2012, and tested for across water systems from 2013-2015, Hoosick Falls was not included in that testing because it was too small.

And three, the EPA sets reporting levels in the UCMR process that are technology and not health-based, and that result in the detection of contaminants sometimes not being reported. So, for example, three labs were used in the third UCMR to test for PFOA. Among the three, the highest level of reliable detection was 15 ppt, while others could detect down to 2.5 ppt. The UCMR reporting level for all three labs was, however, 20 ppt.

This meant that any detections under 20 ppt would not be reported, rendering those detections invisible. A reanalysis of data from one of the larger labs used in the third UMCR, however, reflected that while a 20 ppt reporting level resulted in detections in 1.8% of systems tested, a level of 5 ppt would result in detections in 12.5% of systems and a level of 2.5 ppt would result in 23.5% of systems showing detections of PFOA. And, again, this is primarily addressing those larger water systems, serving over 10,000, and not smaller systems (for which there is only a subset of samples taken) or private wells which are not regulated under the SDWA.

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Incommensurate Science

Third to Fifth Unregulated Contaminants Monitoring Rule (UCMR) changes:

Thankfully – two of the three things I just outlined that limited what we could know and see with respect to PFAS contamination have since shifted (as have others)

- In 2021 under the fifth UCMR the systems tested were expanded from those serving over 10,000 to all those serving over 3,300 – thereby including many more of those smaller systems.

- The Fifth UCMR also importantly lowered the reporting levels for PFOA and PFOS from the third UCMR from 20 ppt for PFOA and 40 ppt for PFOS to 4 ppt each – so that detections at lower levels would be included.

- In addition, it also included more PFAS in its testing – while the third UCMR only included 6 PFAS, despite having an EPA approved testing method (537 in 2009) for 14 PFAS at the time, the Fifth included 29 PFAS (including all those for which there were approved methods - 537, 533 in 2019, and 537.1 in 2020) .

- As the data from the Fifth UCMR continues to be reported, we are now seeing a lot more than we could prior.

- an analysis published earlier this year showed that UCMR 3 data reflected detections in water systems serving 97 million US residents, while the partial data available for UCMR 5 reflected detections in systems serving 143 million residents (though there are some varying estimates based on that early data).

https://www.food-safety.com/articles/10181-study-millions-of-americans-exposed-to-unregulated-chemicals-in-drinking-water-especially-hispanic-communities

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Policy & the Production of Ignorance

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Circular Systems: Biosolids

Biosolids. Treated sewage sludge that meets certain regulatory standards
Through the early 1970s ocean dumping used as a common disposal methods

In 1968, roughly 4.5 million tons of sewage sludge was dumped into the ocean in the U.S.

Now, if you’ll bear with me, I want to introduce one more piece of policy. The federal Biosolids Rule.

The term biosolids, sometimes used interchangeably with sewage sludge (though they aren’t wholly interchangeable), refers more specifically to treated sewage sludge that meets certain standards. They are a byproduct of wastewater treatment made of organic material (similar to compost) that is sometimes applied to land, including agricultural land, in the United States for its nutrient-rich qualities.

Until 1972, ocean dumping was a common disposal method for different types of waste in the US, including sewage sludge. In 1968, roughly 4.5 million tons of sewage sludge was dumped into the ocean in the US. This was in addition to barrels of radioactive waste and tens of millions of tons of other wastes.

Now some of you, may know where this story goes, but bear with me for a moment…

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Circular Systems: Biosolids

1972 — Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act (MPRSA)
1987 — Clean Water Act Amendments -> required new regulations
1988 — Ocean Dumping Ban Act

Biosolids Use and Disposal from 2022 Biosolids Annual Reports

The Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act of 1972 (MPRSA) first regulated the dumping of such wastes, including sewage sludge, in the ocean through permitting—though it did not prohibit it. The 1987 Clean Water Act Amendments then directed the EPA to develop new regulations to address “reasonably anticipated adverse effects of certain pollutants that might be present in sewage sludge biosolids.”

Those regulations were not finalized for six more years. But in 1988, the Ocean Dumping Ban Act was enacted. That Act amended MPRSA to prohibit the dumping of municipal sewage sludge, as well as industrial and medical wastes, in the ocean. While this prevented those types of waste from being disposed of in the ocean, there still remained a significant amount of such waste being produced each year that needed to be addressed or redirected.

Thus… In the context of the ocean dumping ban, biosolids became an really important way to deal with the resulting ‘excess’ sewage sludge within the framework of a circular system or circular economy

And you can see here, that by 2022 most biosolids (56%) in the US, were being beneficially used in land application, with most of those (31% of the total) being applied to agricultural land. Though a significant portion were also being applied to other land (24%, for landscaping or gardening) or were being sent to landfills (27%)

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Biosolids & PFAS

But, as some of my more recent work with my colleagues at the Rockefeller Institute has discussed there have been a number recent and not so recent cases of soil contamination in several states by PFAS and the resulting contamination of groundwater, crops, and animal byproducts (milk, meat, etc.) Perhaps, most notably this has impacted farms in Maine, where the legislature and governor enacted a law in 2022 prohibiting the use of biosolids on agricultural land (https://www.biocycle.net/connections-biosolids-ban-pfas/)

Research has demonstrated the pathways through which PFAS can move into wastewater—from wastewater into biosolids, and from biosolids into the further environment—resulting in human exposures. This research and these cases have added to concerns about the adequacy of regulatory standards for biosolids. (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-90184-z)

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Circular Systems: Biosolids

1972 — Marine Protection, Research and Sanctuaries Act (MPRSA)
1987 — Clean Water Act Amendments

required new regulations

1988 — Ocean Dumping Ban Act
1993 — First federal regulation for biosolids finalized

“Biosolids Rule”
EPA review based on available information

Drawing from the 1987 Clean Water Act Amendments, in 1993 the first federal regulations for biosolids were finalized. This new rule, was referred to as the Biosolids Rule.¹

[which fell under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit program under the Clean Water Act’s Standards for the Use or Disposal of Sewage Sludge (40 CFR part 503),]

Now, I’m not going to get into the nitty gritty of the Biosolids Rule, but I want to note what’s important about this policy and how it’s structured is with respect to the production of ignorance…

The underlying law (the Clean Water Act) provides that the EPA “shall identify those toxic pollutants which on the basis of available information on their toxicity, persistence, concentration, mobility, or potential for exposure, may be present in sewage sludge in concentrations which may adversely affect public health or the environment and propose regulations” (Sec. 405 (d)(A)(i) of the Clean Water Act).

This review then acts as the basis for further risk screening and assessment, from which the EPA decides whether or not to regulate a given pollutant. However, the EPA is not required to produce or compel the data necessary to complete the review of any potential contaminants, including those known or presumed to enter wastewater systems, it is only required to consider available research that meets a certain criteria.

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Circular Systems, Ignorance, & Interlinkages

1940s	PFAS begin to be manufactured and used in the U.S.
1960s	Industry studies
2001	EPA notified of earlier industry studies
2013	13 PFAS included in Biosolids Bienniel Review
	No human health toxicity data identified
2013 - 15	3rd UCMR includes 6 PFAS
2023 - 25	5th UCMR includes 29 PFAS
	Includes smaller systems; lower reporting levels
2024	First national drinking water standards for PFAS
2025	Draft Risk Assessment for PFOA & PFOS in Biosolids

In the context of PFAS…the persistent production of ignorance through industry’s unseen science and regulatory production of incommensurate science over many decades, not only resulted in an absence of federal drinking water standards for PFAS until 2024, contributed to the continued circulation of these contaminates through our wastewater, soil, ground water, and food systems.

Because of the ignorance produced by unseen and incommensurate science in the context federal toxics and drinking water regulations, there had been little available research on which the EPA could base a review of PFAS in biosolids (though that is not to say there was none). Reviews under the biosolids rule have sometimes been late or intermittent, and are themselves structured in certain narrowing ways that can also at times produce ignorance.

That said, the absence and inaccessibility of knowledge about PFAS related to drinking water, helped further underpin ignorance about them in wastewater, biosolids, and other environmental and human systems. And, because these systems and the environmental media that moved through them is interlinked - this ignorance served to create a kind of disappearing act. Where - PFAS that exists in drinking water, moves into wastewater, and then into biosolids, and becomes invisible (at least for a time) from a regulatory knowledge and monitoring perspective.

So when we think about and are working toward building circular systems, and make no mistake – I’m saying it is incredibly important that we do so the answer here is certainly not to start dumping waste back into the ocean, nor is it to think we can endlessly fill up our landfills – we also need to consider and understand the interlinked systems of not only physical materials and environmental media, but of knowledge and ignorance, and of their relationships to policy - and that’s why organizations like NYSARR that provide that link between policy and practice are so important - so that we ensure that we are creating and improving systems in ways that both prevent further potential harms and realize the true promises of more circular systems.

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Circular Systems, Ignorance, & Interlinkages

For now EPA recommends states monitor sewage sludge for PFAS
January 14, 2025

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued its anticipated Draft Risk Assessment for PFOA and PFOS in Sewage Sludge (Draft Risk Assessment) on (https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/01/15/2025-00734/draft-sewage-sludge-risk-assessment-for-perfluorooctanoic-acid-pfoa-and-perfluorooctane-sulfonic)

May 2025

EPA extended its public comment period on the Draft Risk Assessment until August 15, 2025.

NYC has a plan to divert a 100% of it’s biosolids from landfills to beneficial uses by 2030 as part of a larger effort to reduce the city’s carbon footprint, right now most goes to landfills (approximately 1,300 wet tons of dewatered biosolids each day)

https://www.nebiosolids.org/nycdep-shifting-to-reuse#:~:text=New%20York%20City's%20Department%20of%20Environmental%20Protection,costs**%20*%20**Commitment%20to%20reducing%20greenhouse%20gasses**

NYSDEC Department of Materials Management has a program policy, DMM7, called the Biosolids Recycling Interim Strategy for the Control of PFAS Compounds, which requires sampling of biosolids that are recycled and based on those results, directs specific actions to be taken—this includes prohibiting land application of certain biosolids if PFOA and PFOS concentrations are too high from a particular source.
(https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2025/S5759/amendment/C#:~:text=Senate%20Bill%20S5759C%20is%20a%20bill%20that,for%20each%20violation%2C%20plus%20an%20additional%20penalty)

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For now EPA recommends states monitor sewage sludge for PFAS
January 14, 2025

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued its anticipated Draft Risk Assessment for PFOA and PFOS in Sewage Sludge (Draft Risk Assessment) on (https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/01/15/2025-00734/draft-sewage-sludge-risk-assessment-for-perfluorooctanoic-acid-pfoa-and-perfluorooctane-sulfonic)

May 2025

EPA extended its public comment period on the Draft Risk Assessment until August 15, 2025.

NYC has a plan to divert a 100% of it’s biosolids from landfills to beneficial uses by 2030 as part of a larger effort to reduce the city’s carbon footprint, right now most goes to landfills (approximately 1,300 wet tons of dewatered biosolids each day)

https://www.nebiosolids.org/nycdep-shifting-to-reuse#:~:text=New%20York%20City's%20Department%20of%20Environmental%20Protection,costs**%20*%20**Commitment%20to%20reducing%20greenhouse%20gasses**

NYSDEC Department of Materials Management has a program policy, DMM7, called the Biosolids Recycling Interim Strategy for the Control of PFAS Compounds, which requires sampling of biosolids that are recycled and based on those results, directs specific actions to be taken—this includes prohibiting land application of certain biosolids if PFOA and PFOS concentrations are too high from a particular source.
(https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2025/S5759/amendment/C#:~:text=Senate%20Bill%20S5759C%20is%20a%20bill%20that,for%20each%20violation%2C%20plus%20an%20additional%20penalty)

Drinking Water

In 2024, EPA finalized its first-ever national primary drinking water regulation for six PFAS chemicals, setting Maximum Contaminant Levels (MCLs) for five individual PFAS and a Hazard Index (HI) approach for a combination of four others. The rule establishes MCLs at 4.0 parts per trillion (ppt) for PFOA and PFOS, and 10 ppt for PFHxS, PFNA, and GenX chemicals

PFOA 4 ppt
PFOS 4 ppt
PFNA 10 ppt
PFHxS 10ppt
HFPO-DA (GenX) 10 ppt
Hazard Index of 1: PFNA, PFHxS, HFPO-DA, PFBS

In September, 2025, EPA said in a motion filed with respect to an ongoing court case that it would no longer defend its determinations to regulate and enforceable standards for four PFAS chemicals — GenX, PFHxS, PFNA, and PFBS. Separately, EPA previously announced that it will seek to extend the compliance deadline for PFOA and PFOS standards by two years from 2029 to 2031.