Area-based PFAS approach: system & governance analysis

• In two cases to be determined, identify the governance actors with a role in the detection and mitigation of PFAS emissions to water, and the allocation of responsibilities in this network.
• Analyse the actors’ range of options on the basis of the case study and identify opportunities to enhance that range of options, area-specific or otherwise.

Importance and objective

PFAS are a group of thousands of persistent, mobile, toxic and environmentally alien substances with a wide range of applications. People are exposed through different pathways to PFAS concentrations that exceed the health risk limits recommended by the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). PFAS also constitute a group of substances with actual or potential negative effects on the conservation status of aquatic and possibly terrestrial nature due to pressure on ecosystems and specific species (including target species), such as fish.
Policies are being developed at the national and international levels to effectively reduce human and environmental exposure to PFAS. The decision-making process for a European ban on PFAS was initiated on 7 February 2023. The pesticide dossier shows that a ban is effective but that phasing out substances, and their elimination from the environment, can take decades. In addition, PFAS are already widespread in our living environment and will continue to be so for some time.
A European ban on PFAS alone will therefore not be enough to adequately reduce human and environmental exposure in the coming decades. This applies specifically to exposure through drinking water and the reuse of waste flows from treatment plants. That will also require, at least provisionally, a mix of source-, route- and/or effect-based measures. Insights into the sources and pathways of PFAS in surface water allow for the identification of the available options for detecting and reducing PFAS emissions in the water chain.

Experience acquired in the context of fertiliser policy (nitrate, for instance) shows that an area-based approach is both complex and knowledge- and information-intensive, and that parties with different interests, competencies and action perspectives must engage in new alliances. In addition, alliances of this kind can only be effective if the parties involved feel there is a shared responsibility for water quality.
This project aims to identify the origin of PFAS in surface water in the Meuse catchment by combining the monitoring data that are already available from SMWK with literature relating to PFAS sources and area information from water management authorities. The focus here is on the six PFAS in the Meuse that are relevant for reduction from the perspective of drinking water: PFOA, PFOS, PFNA, PFHpA, PFBA and TFA. The next step will be to use this knowledge to identify possible options for governance actors in different positions in the water chain and water system. The project focuses specifically on industries/activities that contribute to a diffuse/semi-diffuse PFAS load on surface water, and the smaller point sources. Large point sources that have already been identified such as PFAS-producing or PFAS-processing industries, and firefighting training sites (such as airports), will not be covered by this project since they have already been studied. The outcomes will be used to establish building blocks for water quality management on the basis of the shared responsibility of government authorities and parties in the chain.

Deliverables and impact

Work Package 1 (System analysis)

• A synthesis of the existing literature covering the potential emission sources of the six drinking-water-relevant PFAS in the Meuse.
• Insight into the distribution, origin and potential sources of the six PFAS on the basis of water quality data from the Clean Meuse Water Chain (SMWK).
• Insight into the information about the origin and behaviour of the six PFAS which can be derived (or not) from PFAS monitoring at various locations in the water system, possibly supplemented with information from literature and source analysis tools.
• A set of simple visualisation and data processing techniques for showing the distribution and origin of PFAS in surface water on the basis of monitoring data.

Work Package 2 (Governance analysis)

• Overview of the actors in the operation and management system for the detection and management of PFAS emissions to surface water, including an analysis of the formal and perceived responsibilities, and the gaps in that respect.
• Insight into the options open to these actors at present with respect to detecting and addressing PFAS emissions to surface water at various locations in the water chain, and the openings they see for expanding that range of options.
• Lessons transcending the individual cases will be formulated where possible on the basis of the above in order to establish an appropriate governance structure for an approach to detecting PFAS in surface water.

The deliverables will be passed on to the drinking water utilities and stakeholders as follows:

• in a concise report about system analysis (the presence and origin of drinking-water-relevant PFAS) and governance analysis (policy and network analysis, available options)
• the sharing of spatial information about the presence and sources of PFAS in the
  SMWK Web Viewer
• a contribution to a presentation for the International Meuse Conference.

Given the urgency of addressing PFAS, the deliverables will be made public immediately so that they can be used without delay for raising awareness, monitoring, source detection and policy development related to PFAS.