\u201cDEQ will continue to investigate this situation and will ensure that public health is protected and the environment is restored,\u201d says Sheila Holman, assistant secretary for the agency.<\/p>\n
Citizens have expressed their concerns in public meetings. When an unfamiliar chemical like GenX ends up in drinking water, that\u2019s when \u201cthe rubber meets the road,\u201d said Mark Strynar, a chemist with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency<\/a>, in a recent seminar at NC State University<\/a>. \u201cPeople take notice.\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, the story of GenX isn\u2019t unique. Scientists periodically identify contaminants in drinking water that have previously gone undetected \u2014 and that aren\u2019t regulated by entities that set drinking-water standards.<\/p>\n In other words, the discovery of GenX in Wilmington drinking water represents a larger problem facing the public, says Detlef Knappe, a civil and environmental engineer on faculty at NC State. \u201cThe current regulatory framework is not sufficiently protective, because there are so many unregulated compounds that can be discharged into our drinking water sources,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n So what exactly is GenX, how did it get in the water, and what effects does it have on health?<\/p>\n The Cape Fear watershed is from the piedmont to the coast. Kmusser \u00a9 2008\/Wikimedia Commons<\/a>\/CC BY-SA 3.0<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n The chemical GenX is an industrial surfactant, used to bring molecules together to make polymers, such as those used in nonstick coatings.<\/p>\n GenX is part of a large class of synthetic compounds collectively called per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances, or PFAS<\/a> for short. Since manufacturers first started synthesizing them around 1950, PFAS (sometimes referred to as fluorochemicals) have been used in a range of industrial- and consumer-related applications, including water and stain repellents such as in carpets and furniture, firefighting foams, cosmetics, and some food-packaging coatings, to name a few.<\/p>\n There are least 3,000 PFAS currently available on the global market, according to a 2015 report<\/a> by the Swedish Chemicals Agency. One hallmark is their persistence.<\/p>\n That is, they don\u2019t easily break down in nature, if at all. They\u2019re also indiscriminate travelers. They can hitch a ride in water, air, soil, dust, and more, which contributes to widespread dispersion around the globe.<\/p>\n Based on available evidence, the primary means of exposure to PFAS \u201cis likely ingestion via drinking water and food,\u201d says Jamie DeWitt, an environmental toxicologist in the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University<\/a>. \u201cThere also may be skin exposure or inhalation exposure for items that contain PFAS, such as textiles.\u201d<\/p>\n Often, companies that manufacture PFAS consider them trade secrets, according to the Swedish Chemicals Agency report. Lack of public information about\u00a0the composition and use history of many of these substances hinders efforts to estimate their prevalence in the environment and set health standards based on that prevalence.<\/p>\n \u201cIt makes our job that much more difficult in terms of understanding what\u00a0is in the water, understanding what is the toxicity, if we don\u2019t even know exactly what the structure of the compound is and how much is being produced, who is it sold to, how is it distributed around the country, around the world,\u201d Knappe says.<\/p>\n Clues that GenX had made its way into drinking water date back at least several years.<\/p>\n In 2015, EPA\u2019s Strynar published a study<\/a> in Environmental Science &\u00a0Technology<\/em> that, by his account, received little attention at first. He and colleagues had collected water samples from various locations along the Cape Fear River \u2014 which serves several public water utilities \u2014 and its tributaries.<\/p>\n NC State\u2019s Detlef Knappe led a research study on PFAS in the Cape Fear River watershed. Photo by Julie Williams Dixon<\/p><\/div>\n They uncovered what they described as a dozen \u201cnovel\u201d PFAS \u2014 compounds found in water that, until that point, had gone unreported in the scientific literature. One of those compounds was GenX.<\/p>\n A year after Strynar\u2019s paper came out, a research team led by Knappe published a related study<\/a> in Environmental Science\u00a0& Technology Letters<\/em>. In collaboration\u00a0with EPA researchers, the team collected samples of source water used by three drinking-water treatment plants along the Cape Fear River watershed and analyzed them for PFAS. They found GenX only in samples gathered at a plant located downstream of the Chemours facility, suggesting that the chemical was coming from the factory\u2019s wastewater effluent.<\/p>\n The team also analyzed samples of water as it moved through that plant\u2019s drinking water treatment process. They found that the plant couldn\u2019t remove GenX, and that the chemical \u201cmade its way into the finished drinking water,\u201d Knappe says.<\/p>\n Initially, Knappe recalls, he thought discharges of GenX into the river began when Chemours\u2019 parent company, DuPont, started making the product commercially around 2010. But he eventually learned that he was mistaken.<\/p>\n In fact, GenX is much older than its trademarked name. Chemours has been generating the chemical as a byproduct since 1980, in a separate manufacturing \u00a0area, Knappe says. \u201cThe wastewater from that area got routed to a wastewater treatment plant on site, and then into the Cape Fear River,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n The revelation\u00a0\u201cis something we only learned this [past] summer, through disclosure from Chemours,\u201d Knappe adds.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, in\u00a0July the DEQ reported that the company had stopped discharging the treated wastewater from commercial production of GenX, and would instead collect it for incineration offsite.<\/p>\n Various studies on humans and animals\u00a0indicate that exposure to some PFAS can damage the liver, interfere with the immune and endocrine systems, affect fetal development, and cause tumors in the kidneys and testes, among other problems.<\/p>\n These adverse health effects have\u00a0led to the retirement of certain PFAS. For instance, in 2006, eight major companies voluntarily agreed to phase out production of a type of PFAS called PFOA, as well as PFOA-related chemicals by 2015. The EPA states<\/a> that there are a limited number of ongoing uses, however.<\/p>\n But, as Knappe notes, phasing out one PFAS doesn\u2019t mean that nothing takes its place. \u201cSomething else gets made,\u201d he says. GenX is what he calls a \u201cfluorinated replacement for PFOA.\u201d<\/p>\n Environmental toxicologist Jamie DeWitt participated in a forum in Wilmington in July. Photo by Mary Goughnour\/StarNews<\/p><\/div>\n While the federal government has\u00a0not issued health guidelines for GenX exposure, the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services has set 140 parts per trillion as the level at which no adverse health effects would be expected over a lifetime of exposure for the most sensitive of consumers \u2014 namely, bottle-fed infants. But how GenX behaves in people is yet to be determined.<\/p>\n \u201cTo the best of my knowledge, there\u00a0have been no studies on GenX elimination in humans,\u201d DeWitt says. \u201cThere is one published study on GenX elimination in rats, mice, and monkeys, and it is eliminated more rapidly in these species than is C8 [another name for PFOA], but we have no basis to say that the same will be true of GenX\u201d without hard data, she adds.<\/p>\n Soon, researchers and water customers might know a little more. A team led by Jane Hoppin, deputy director of the Center for Human Health and the Environment at NC State<\/a>, is running a study<\/a> of about 300 people who live in the Wilmington area, and who were served by the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, which draws much of its water from the Cape Fear River.<\/p>\n \u201cWe collected blood and urine\u00a0from individuals age\u00a0six and over, and we also collected a water sample from people\u2019s homes, and then we collected\u00a0questionnaire information,\u201d explains Hoppin, whose team includes DeWitt and Knappe. The samples will be tested in a laboratory at the EPA for GenX and several other PFAS.<\/p>\n Hoppin says that as the study pertains to GenX, the goal is three-fold: to determine if that compound is detectable in people; to see if certain members of the demographic are more inclined to accumulate it in their body; and to see if there might be any health effects associated with the presence of GenX in the body.<\/p>\n The study has limitations, Hoppin notes. For instance, the results will not help scientists draw a cause-and-effect relationship between GenX exposure and health problems. But the work is an important first step toward better understanding how GenX behaves in the body.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is really research,\u201d Hoppin says. \u201cWe don\u2019t know what we\u2019re going to find, but we\u2019re trying to be public about it and trying to keep information moving.\u201d<\/p>\n Keeping drinking water clear of emerging contaminants is a constant challenge. Most wastewater treatment plants, in essence, rely on microbiology to remove organics from the water, according to Knappe. But GenX, like many of its fluorinated cousins, doesn\u2019t biodegrade easily.<\/p>\n Plus, GenX \u201cbasically loves to be in\u00a0the water,\u201d says Knappe. \u201cIt\u2019s a compound that is quite soluble in water and interacts strongly with water, so it\u2019s difficult to pull\u00a0it out by processes like activated carbon adsorption.\u201d Simply put, standard water treatment technologies won\u2019t remove GenX.<\/p>\n Knappe says that methods that involve membrane filtration \u2014 such as reverse osmosis \u2014 show potential, based on lab experiments he\u2019s done. \u201cThese processes work to remove fluorochemicals,\u201d he says, but he cautions that they\u2019re energy intensive, and generate a waste stream containing a high concentration of the compounds.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/03\/Capefearrivermap.jpg\")
WHAT IS GENX?<\/h2>\n
COMING TO THE SURFACE<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/03\/Env-Lab_Knappe_March-2016-21-CCCE-e1520352888464.jpg\")
HEALTH MATTERS<\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2018\/03\/Jamie-DeWitt_Mary-Goughnour_StarNews.jpg\")
LOOKING AHEAD<\/h3>\n