Latest news with #toxicChemicals
The Guardian
5 days ago
- Health
- The Guardian
‘Alarmingly high' levels of forever chemicals found at airports in England, investigation reveals
'Alarmingly high' levels of toxic forever chemicals have been detected at English airports – in some cases thousands of times higher than proposed EU safe levels – with experts raising concerns over the potential impact on drinking water sources. Seventeen airports recorded elevated levels of Pfas in the ground and surface water sample on their sites, according to unpublished Environment Agency documents, obtained exclusively by the Ends Report and the Guardian via an environmental information request. Pfas, short for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a family of about 10,000 chemicals which persist in the environment and have been linked to a range of serious illnesses. They are used in many consumer products, from frying pans to waterproof coats, but one of their most common uses is in firefighting foams. The largest Pfas total recorded was at London Luton airport, with total Pfas in one groundwater sample, taken at a location described as 'fire training lagoon two', of 36,084 nanograms per litre. There is no regulatory limit for Pfas in ground or surface water in the UK, but in the EU a proposed threshold is being considered of 4.4ng/l. While Luton tested for twice the number of Pfas than that included in the EU threshold, the airport's highest total Pfas level was 8,000 times higher than the draft limit. Among the specific Pfas detected at these 17 airports were PFOS and PFOA – two banned and toxic chemicals which, respectively, are suspected and known carcinogens. One sample taken from 'borehole four' at London Luton contained 2,555ng/l of Pfas, with 24ng/l of PFOS and 39ng/l of PFOA. This total Pfas level is more than 500 times higher than the EU's proposed threshold. A London Luton airport spokesperson said: 'Like many airports and other industries in the UK and around the world, we are investing in and working closely with relevant agencies to assess and monitor Pfas.' They added that the data obtained by this investigation was from preliminary screening and should not be considered statistically representative, as a long-term monitoring programme was still under way. Of the airports sampled, Ends Report's analysis has revealed that four of the 17 are located within protected drinking water safeguard zones. These are designated areas set up around public water supplies where additional pollution control measures are needed. One sample taken at Farnborough airport, Hampshire, located in a drinking water safeguard zone, contained 180ng/l of PFOS. The Drinking Water Inspectorate has set a guideline safe level of 100ng/l for the total levels of 48 named Pfas. If test results in drinking water come close to this threshold, then the inspectorate states that precautions should be taken. The presence of elevated Pfas in the sample does not necessarily mean that drinking water is being contaminated by the airport's Pfas pollution. Experts say that for this to happen, pathways would need to exist to enable Pfas to enter drinking water sources. Dr Patrick Byrne, a reader in hydrology and environmental pollution at Liverpool John Moores University, said: 'The risk, if any, to downstream receptors like drinking water sources and ecosystems is unclear. To understand the risk, we need to establish if there is a transport pathway between the source and the receptor. If there is no transport pathway, there is a very low risk.' However, for Dr Shubhi Sharma, from the charity Chem Trust, the high levels of Pfas detected at airports are 'extremely worrying as some of these Pfas have been established as carcinogenic by the World Health Organization'. Dr Rob Collins, director of policy and science at the Rivers Trust, described the Pfas concentrations at UK airports as 'alarmingly high'. While uncertainty remains over the potential risk these may pose, Pfas contamination of drinking water from airports has previously been confirmed close to home. In Jersey, residents have been recommended bloodletting to reduce high concentrations of Pfas in their blood after private drinking water supplies were polluted by the use of Pfas in firefighting foams at the island's airport. In France, one region had to take whole drinking water supplies out of use due to Pfas contamination from an airport. A spokesperson for the trade association AirportsUK said: 'This year UK airports are spending around £5m in investigating the sources and nature of Pfas issues on their sites – it is this industry work that this data comes from. 'This work is being done with a view to identifying specific source locations so that appropriate actions can be assessed. Airports are working closely with the Environment Agency and local communities to ensure that they do not make their way into watercourses and food chains.' A spokesperson for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: 'We are reshaping the UK Reach [chemicals regulation] work programme to deliver stronger protections and are currently considering the best approach to chemicals regulation in the UK, including the development of a restriction dossier on Pfas in firefighting foams'.
Telegraph
25-06-2025
- Health
- Telegraph
Fake flea treatment ‘could poison your cat'
Pet owners have been warned of fake flea treatments that are poisoning animals. Government officials have issued an alert that counterfeit over-the-counter veterinary treatments are being sold illegally with many containing toxic chemicals. One cat was treated with fake anti-flea medication that contained an insecticide, which caused the animal to become seriously ill. Smokey the cat became very sick and spent a week at the vet and required surgery to survive. Owner Alan Wall, from Preston, sent the product to be tested and analysis at the University of Bath revealed it contained Pirimiphos-methyl, an insecticide that is harmful to cats. The drug, which was a fake 'Frontline' product, also only contained one of the two active compounds and was therefore likely to not be fully effective in treating fleas. The Intellectual Property Office (IPO) and the Veterinary Medicines Directorate (VMD) on Wednesday sent a warning to owners and urged caution when buying these products. Dr Heilin-Anne Leonard-Pugh, a veterinary surgeon at VMD, said: 'Pirimiphos-methyl is toxic to cats. 'Exposure to this insecticide can prevent the cat's body from breaking down a substance called acetylcholine, leading to an overstimulation of the cat's nervous system. 'This can cause symptoms such as vomiting, uncoordinated gait, muscle tremors, weakness, paralysis, increased sensitivity to touch, difficulty breathing, restlessness, urinary incontinence, low heart rate and seizures. In some cases, even death can sadly occur. If you suspect your pet has been exposed to a counterfeit medicine, seek veterinary advice immediately.' Telltale warning signs that the product is not authentic and likely fake are spelling errors, poor-quality packaging, unusual smells and missing information. Owners have been warned to be wary when buying online and told that if the price seems very cheap then it probably is too good to be true and should be avoided. Any suspicions about counterfeit products should be reported to Trading Standards, officials say, who will investigate any counterfeits. Data from the VMD reveals there were 122 seizure notices for the selling of unauthorised animal medicines and supplements in 2024, which prevented 18,000 illegal items from reaching consumers. Caroline Allen, RSPCA Chief Veterinary Officer, said she was 'very concerned about counterfeit vet treatments on sale'. 'We appreciate financial pressures can lead some owners to look for cheaper treatments online but they could be unwittingly putting their beloved pets in serious danger,' she added. The IPO's Deputy Director of Enforcement Helen Barnham, said: 'We are a nation of animal lovers, and criminals dealing in counterfeits are targeting pet owners with complete disregard for the animal's wellbeing. 'We are urging pet owners to be vigilant when purchasing any type of animal treatment, and beware of any offers that 'look too good to be true'.'
Mail & Guardian
17-06-2025
- Health
- Mail & Guardian
Toxic pesticide ban a victory for people and environmental justice, say activists
The ban on the importation and use of Terbufos signals a shift toward safer, people-centred agriculture Civil society groups have welcomed the cabinet's In October last year, Commonly known as Halephirimi, Last Thursday, the The committee said the department of agriculture would lead the consultation process on the ban in line with its 2010 plan to eradicate poisonous insecticides and pesticides over a period of time and also work on identifying safer alternatives to Terbufos. The banning of Terbufos signals the beginning of the transformation of an agriculture system that is 'riven with conflict of interest, inequity, abuse of worker rights and the unchallenged hegemony of toxic chemicals,' the South African People's Tribunal on AgroToxins (SAPToA) said. 'We will now likely see the deaths of children from this poison decline rapidly just as we saw with Aldicarb was prohibited in 2016. Swanby pointed out that not only do children die from organophosphates such as Terbufos but those who survive live with a lifetime of health and neurological problems. The law governing the registration of pesticides is ancient, she noted. 'It goes back to the post-war era where these chemicals that were used in the war were being repurposed for agriculture and we know a lot more about them now than we did back then, and of course this was also the apartheid era.' With the Constitution and Bill of Rights, the pesticide registration in the country is 'incongruent with our current law', she said. 'That needs a complete overhaul and as it stands now, it suits industry but that has to really be changed as soon as possible if we want to stay safe.' Mechanisms for phasing out pesticides must be included in that law 'so it's not just automatically if you come with your pesticide and you can tick a few boxes, you automatically get registration'. 'The first port of call is to see how we phase out pesticides and how we think about the risks and benefits and what the trajectory of our agricultural production should look like in this new era with our Bill of Rights and our Constitution,' Swanby said. SAPToA noted that despite a government policy adopted in 2010 to phase out highly hazardous pesticides and a regulation being issued in 2023 to restrict Terbufos, 'business continued as usual for the chemical industry who, in the week before the Naledi children died, were still insisting they have more time to prepare for any regulations'. 'For industry, the death of our children due to their products is not an urgent matter. This cabinet decision, recognising our constitutional imperative to put the child's best interests first, marks the end of a long era where the chemical industry has undue influence over the regulation of their deadly products. 'The highest level of government has reined in corporate impunity and said that all South Africans, particularly children, have the right to a safe and healthy environment.' SAPToA said civil society would continue to push for the immediate ban of all 194 highly hazardous pesticides registered in South Africa and to reject the notion of phase-out periods subject to industry discretion, which is a 'fig leaf for industry delay and prevarication'. It is also calling for transparency in governance of agricultural toxins, beginning with making available a public database of all pesticides registered in the country as a constitutional right for all South Africans. The Human Rights Commission said the cabinet's decision to ban Terbufos is a milestone in the realisation of critical socio-economic rights, including the right to health, clean water, a safe environment and adequate food. 'It reflects an emerging shift towards a people-centred food system, where communities are empowered to determine their own approaches to production, markets, ecology, and culture, aligned with principles of social, economic, and environmental justice.'
Washington Post
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
EPA moves to weaken limits on power plant emissions
The Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday a proposal to eliminate Biden-era regulations restricting power plant greenhouse gas pollution, a move that would significantly increase U.S. emissions that contribute to climate change. In a separate proposal, the EPA plans to weaken controls on power plant emissions of mercury and other toxic chemicals. The agency will leave in place 2015 controls on these chemicals, which also include carcinogens such as arsenic and benzene, while proposing to strike down stronger 2024 limits.
BBC News
10-06-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Warning over 'dirty secret' of toxic chemicals on farmers fields
Successive governments have failed to deal with the threat posed by spreading sewage sludge containing toxic chemicals on farmers' fields, a former chair of the Environment Agency has told the 3.5 million tonnes of sludge – the solid waste produced from human sewage at treatment plants - is put on fields every year as cheap campaigners have long warned about a lack of regulation and that sludge could be contaminated with cancer-linked chemicals, microplastics, and other industrial Howard Boyd, who led the EA from 2016 to 2022, says the agency had been aware since 2017 that the sludge can be contaminated with substances, including 'forever chemicals'. "Forever chemicals" or PFAS are a group of synthetic chemicals which come from things like non-stick saucepans. They don't degrade quickly in nature and have been linked to seen by BBC News suggest the water industry is now increasingly concerned that farmers could stop accepting the sludge to spread and that water firms have been lobbying regulators and making contingency plans in case rules Howard Boyd says efforts to update rules, which date back to 1989, to include new contaminants were "continually frustrated by the lack of ministerial appetite to deal with this issue." In a public letter signed by more than 20 others she called on the current Environment Minister Steve Reed, to act Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) told the BBC regulations around sludge spreading are being looked at. The water companies trade body Water UK told the BBC they were aware of the concerns but that no legal standards for contaminants had been set by the government. Unlike the cleaned water that is discharged from wastewater treatment plants, the sewage sludge, or biosolid as the industry calls it, is considered "exempted waste".That means the treatment focuses mainly on killing bacteria and testing for heavy metals in the is no routine testing for chemicals, including "forever chemicals", which have been developed over the last three decades and are getting into the sewage network from both from domestic and industrial users."I think the big concern is because these substances (forever chemicals) are so persistent they'll stay around in the soil for hundreds, if not thousands of years," says Alistair Boxall, professor of environmental science at York University."It may be in 10 years' time that we start understanding that these molecules are causing harm," he said. "Then we're going to be in a bit of a mess, because we'll be in a situation where we'll have soils in the UK that will have residues of these molecules in them, and at the moment we have no way of cleaning that up."In 2022, the US state of Maine became the first state to ban the spreading of sludge contaminated with "forever chemicals" after high levels were found in water, soil and crops. Reports and emails shown to the BBC by Greenpeace's Unearthed investigation unit and obtained using Freedom of Information Act requests, reveal the water industry is acutely aware that attitudes are changing and is both lobbying government and making contingency companies are concerned on two fronts: that general rules regarding the spreading of sludge on land (so called Farming Rules for Water) may soon be tightened due to fears that it's polluting watercourses and that farmers' concerns about the chemicals in the sludge might make them unwilling to put it on their water industry has already commissioned reports looking at what might happen if the spreading is of them predicts that the "most likely" scenario is a shortfall of about three million hectares in land needed to spread the sludge. The water industry says that would lead to them either incinerating it or putting it into landfill. Both options would bring extra costs that would be passed on to billpayers."This investigation is yet more proof that we can't trust the privatised water companies to deal with waste responsibly," Reshima Sharma from Greenpeace said."So long as they can get away with it, they will just pass any problems on to our countryside and pocket the money they should be investing in solutions." In 2017 a report commissioned by the Environment Agency found that sludge contained potentially harmful substances, including microplastics and "forever chemicals", at levels that "may present a risk to human health" and may create soil that is "unsuitable for agriculture".It said that "perhaps the biggest risk to the landbank" is from the spreading of physical contaminants such as microplastics into agricultural soil. The report also said it had heard evidence from EA staff indicating that some companies may be using wastewater treatment plants to "mask disposal of individual high risk waste streams not suitable for land spreading"."EA colleagues were continually frustrated by the lack of ministerial appetite to deal with this issue," Ms Howard Boyd, who was chair of the regulator at the time, told the BBC in an email. "EA proposals since 2020 to reform the regulations were treated with a lack of urgency, hampered by delays in passing requests up to the relevant ministers for decision-making, and a consistent failure by successive secretaries of state to take the matter seriously."The letter Ms Howard Boyd has signed jointly signed was organised by campaign group Fighting Dirty. It calls the contents of the sewage sludge a "dirty secret" and demands that Environment Secretary Steve Reed take action. Sewage sludge is cheaper than other fertilisers, and can sometimes be free, though farmers may have to spread it Lewis-Thompson tells me it has "the smell of death"."It lingers in the air for somewhere around two to three weeks," she tells me when I go to visit in her home on Dartmoor in the south-west of gathered together a group of neighbours who've all had direct experience of sewage sludge being spread near their properties. Before we start recording there's a long discussion about whether they should speak out for fear of upsetting nearby farmers and the contractors who spread the sludge, who are often of their concerns are about the smell and about potential contamination of their water sources. One young woman leaves in tears saying it had made her sick."The fact it's spread for free ought to raise a few eyebrows," Richard Smallwood, a local beef and sheep farmer who doesn't use sewage sludge, tells me."If we're starting to produce food on grassland and arable land which is filled up to the ear holes with PFAS compounds and nano and micro-plastics that find their way into the food chain I think my job's over before I begin." With the alternatives to sewage sludge disposal costly, there's broad agreement that the recycling of sludge into fertiliser has to be made to work."In principle, I think using properly treated human sewage to spread on the land, put it back into the ground for growing food in the UK, that's the right thing to do," Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, the cook, writer and broadcaster, tells me at his small farm and café in east Devon. He's also signed the protest letter to the environment minister."We know it's happening. Our farmers are rightly worried. We've got to take action. Government's got to take action," Mr Fearnley-Whittingstall says."That means regulations are not voluntary regulations or guidelines, [they should be] legally enforceable regulations that stop these pollutants getting into the sewage and onto our land."Despite the concerns there are still plenty of farmers who see the sludge as a cheap way to fertilise their Oliver is on the National Farmers Union Crops Board. He says he applies about 800 tonnes of sewage sludge every year to fields where he grows maize destined for animal water company provides the sludge for free and Mr Oliver says he's careful how much he uses and trusts the company to make sure it doesn't have chemical contamination."If we can be sensible with how it's used and spread on the land, it can be positive for farmers and for the water companies," he says."I'm doing it because it's adding value. It's improving our organic matter. It's benefitting the crop that I'm growing, and it's reducing my spend on bagged fertilisers." The Department for Environment Fisheries and Agriculture did not contest anything the former chair of the EA Ms Howard Boyd told the BBC."We need to see the safe and sustainable use of sludge in agriculture to help clean up our waterways," a spokesperson said."The Independent Water Commission will explore a range of issues, including the regulatory framework for sludge spreading, and we continue to work closely with the Environment Agency, water companies and farmers in this area."Water UK represents the water companies of England and Wales, said: "Although there are some concerns that some bioresources may contain contaminants, such as microplastics and forever chemicals (PFAS), there are no legal standards for them and, in some cases, no agreed assessment techniques.""Any standards and techniques are a matter for the government and the regulator and need to be based on firm evidence and detailed scientific research."
