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On 29 March 2024, the U.S. District Court, Division of South Carolina approved 3M’s settlement agreement with U.S. public water suppliers (PWS) over per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) detected in drinking water. Depending on the claims, the final amount of the settlement will potentially range from $10.5 billion to $12.5 billion. Payments could start as soon as the third quarter of this year and will continue through 2036.
According to a press release from 3M, the settlement will support PFAS remediation “for U.S. public water suppliers (PWS) across the country that have detected any form of PFAS at any level or may do so in the future.”
“This is yet another important step forward for 3M as we continue to deliver on our priorities,” said 3M Chairman and CEO Mike Roman. “The final approval of this settlement and continued progress toward exiting all PFAS manufacturing by the end of 2025 will further our efforts to reduce risk and uncertainty as we move forward.”
The Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA) is a policy-making organization for metropolitan drinking water suppliers. It serves as the voice for large, publicly owned drinking water systems on federal water policy issues pending before Congress, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Homeland Security, and other agencies. AMWA members are public water supply agencies that each represent, directly or indirectly, 100,000 or more people.
AMWA CEO Tom Dobbins, CAE, told 3E News that while the association “appreciates that 3M and other chemical companies are being held accountable for their role in contaminating drinking water sources with PFAS contamination, the overall amount of the settlement is a fraction of what community water systems and ultimately their ratepayers will pay to remove these chemicals from our drinking water.”
Under phase one of the settlement, recipients must file their claims within 60 days of the court order taking effect, while Phase Two recipients would need to do so by 1 January 2026. The entire claims process will conclude by 31 December 2030.
Estimated Cost to Remove PFAS from Drinking Water
EPA estimates that its just-published National Drinking Water Standard will impact between 6% and 10% of the 66,000 public drinking water systems. Those water systems may have to take action to reduce PFAS to meet the new standards. All public water systems have three years to complete their initial monitoring for these chemicals. They must inform the public of the level of PFAS measured in their drinking water. Where PFAS is found at levels that exceed these standards, systems must implement solutions to reduce PFAS in their drinking water within five years.
The American Water Works Association (AWWA) commissioned Black & Veatch to examine three different types of PFAS abatement – granular activated carbon (GAC), ion exchange, and nanofiltration (NF) and reverse osmosis (RO) – and develop a national cost estimate for water systems to remove PFAS from drinking water.
The study estimated the national cost for water systems to install treatments to remove PFOA and PFOS to levels anticipated by EPA’s proposal exceeds $3.8 billion annually, with a total national cost estimated at $47.4 billion.
“The vast majority of these treatment costs will be borne by communities and ratepayers, who are also facing increased costs to address other needs, such as replacing lead service lines, upgrading cybersecurity, replacing aging infrastructure, and assuring sustainable water supplies,” said AWWA in a statement.
Dobbins said AMWA looks forward to working with Congress “to develop additional funding sources to help communities offset the remaining costs of addressing PFAS in their water supplies.”
Ideally, PFAS would be kept out of the water supply entirely. “At the low levels set in the EPA proposed standards, protecting source water from PFAS contamination – especially at locations where it is released into the environment – is critical,” stated AWWA.
The association is urging EPA, Congress, and other decision-makers “to implement policies that keep harmful PFAS out of our drinking water supplies and our communities.”
Working with Congress to Protect Water Systems
Dan Hartnett, Chief Advocacy Officer, AMWA, shared with 3E that in recent months, the association’s primary objective on the Capitol Hill has been to protect water systems and their ratepayers from incurring liability under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) for the cleanup of waste disposal sites where water treatment residuals containing PFAS have been deposited.
“Because EPA is proposing both to establish a drinking water standard for certain PFAS – thus requiring water systems nationwide to filter them out of their water supplies – and a designation of certain PFAS as hazardous substances under CERCLA – triggering potential environmental cleanup liability for entities that possessed PFAS before its disposal – there is a strong possibility that drinking water ratepayers could be forced to pay more than once to address the same PFAS,” said Hartnett.
The first-time ratepayers might get dinged is when the PFAS is initially filtered out of drinking water supplies, and again years or decades later, should that PFAS’ ultimate disposal site ever be subject to a CERCLA cleanup, Hartnett said. In that case, any entity that contributed pollution to the site could be held liable for a portion of the cleanup costs, “including water systems that only possessed the PFAS in the first place because they filtered it out of their water to comply with the EPA drinking water standard,” Hartnett added.
“AMWA does not believe this is appropriate, as the responsibility to rectify environmental PFAS contamination should rest with the producers and users of the chemicals — not water utilities that are protecting public health by complying with EPA standards,” said Hartnett.
AMWA and other water sector organizations have endorsed S. 1430, the Water Systems PFAS Liability Protect Act, introduced by Senator Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming. This legislation would apply the necessary liability protections under CERCLA for water systems that appropriately handled and disposed of treatment residuals containing PFAS and ensure that the actual polluters pay the bill.
The Senate EPW Committee recently held a hearing on this topic, and AMWA submitted a statement for the hearing record. Hartnett said AMWA expects a House version of the bill to be introduced soon, so “we are hopeful that these measures will spur congressional action this year.”
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About the authors: Richa Satikumar is a news writer and editor. She joined 3E after a 10-year stint at S&P Global, where she covered the Real Estate desk.
Sandy Smith, Senior Reporter, 3E, is an award-winning newspaper reporter and business-to-business journalist who has spent 20+ years researching and writing about EHS, regulatory compliance, and risk management and networking with EHS professionals. She is passionate about helping to build and maintain safe workplaces and promote workplace cultures that support EHS. She has presented at major conferences and has been interviewed about workplace safety and risk by The Wall Street Journal, CNN, and USA Today.
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