Polluting the Food Supply with PFAS

For decades, the Environmental Protection Agency has promoted the use of sludge from sewage treatment plants as fertilizer. It seemed like a good idea at the time. The sludge – known as biosolids in the fertilizer industry – is rich in nutrients that crops need. Plus, using biosolids for this purpose kept them out of landfills. But now with the benefit of hindsight, it looks like this policy may have been polluting the food supply with PFAS.

These per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances are commonly known as forever chemicals because they stick around in the environment almost forever. This is a problem because they are implicated in a wide range of health concerns, including endocrine disruption and obesity.

Bankrupting Farmers

Maine has banned the use of biosolids on farmland. Other states are slower to sort out this problem. In Michigan, for example, testing has been limited. On one of the few farms to be tested, the state found high PFAS levels and ultimately banned that property from ever being used in agriculture again.

Now the state is holding off from widespread testing because of economic concerns. Abigail Hendershott leads the state’s PFAS response and told the New York Times:

“We’re very, very conscious about the consequences of doing testing and potentially hurting a farm’s economic success. We want to make sure we’ve got really good data before we go out and start disrupting things.”

Jason Grostic, a Michigan cattle farmer who lost his farm because of PFAS contamination, says the problem is widespread:

“This stuff isn’t just on my land. People are scared to death that they’re going to lose their farm, just like I did.”

Safety and Liability

This will be a huge problem to sort. In Texas, a stillborn calf on the ranch of Tony Coleman and his family went for testing at Texas A&M University. Its liver was full of PFAS – 610,000 parts per trillion. Coleman has stopped selling his livestock, saying:

“A lot of people are still scared to talk about it. But for us, it’s all about being honest. I don’t want to hurt anybody else, even though we feel people have hurt us.”

Coleman and other farmers are suing both EPA and the fertilizer company responsible for the biosolids on their farms.

Attention Needed?

Amid all the worry about ultra-processed food and its marketing, we have to wonder. Should a little more attention go to the possibility of polluting the food supply with PFAS and other endocrine disrupting chemicals?

Click here for free access to excellent reporting from the New York Times on this issue. For more technical background on PFAS, click here for perspective on endocrine disruption, here and here for perspective on a potential role in obesity, and here for insight on their presence in biosolids.

Farmhouse in a Wheat Field, painting by Vincent van Gogh / WikiArt

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September 3, 2024