- PFAS.

They're in waterproof, outdoor gear, makeup, non-stick pans, even our soil.

Living in Maine, you've almost certainly heard about PFAS, the so-called forever chemicals that linger in our environment.

Well, forever.

There are do-not-eat advisories for deer in parts of the state, links to adverse health risks and concerns about contaminated water, especially after accidents like the firefighting foam spill in Brunswick in 2024.

But what are PFAS, and why are they such a big problem in Maine?

That's what we're diving into today.

I'm Esta Pratt-Kielley, and this is "Maine Explained".

(bright music) First, a quick chemistry lesson.

PFAS stands for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances.

They're a group of man-made chemicals and have been used in consumer products since the 1940s.

Now there are hundreds, maybe thousands of chemicals considered to be PFAS.

The main feature of PFAS is the carbon-fluoride bond.

It's incredibly strong and makes them useful in a lot of consumer products.

They're resistant to high heat, good for things like firefighting foam, and they're oil and water repellent; think makeup, non-stick pans, and rain jackets.

But that bond means the chemicals don't break down over time.

Instead, they transfer from products to food, water, soil, and our bodies.

Then they can build up to really high quantities.

Every state in the US has some level of PFAS contamination, but Maine has enacted more PFAS-related rules than any other state, and that has to do with agriculture and how the high levels of PFAS got here to begin with.

- So in 2016, Fred Stone in Arundel, Maine, was notified by the public water folks in his area that they were finding high PFAS in some of the wells around his farm.

He traced that back to his practice of applying biosolid or sludge to his land over years.

- Sludge is liquid waste, a byproduct from wastewater treatment or industrial work.

Maine had and still has a sludge problem.

There's not really a great way of disposing of it, and farmers always need fertilizer.

So it seems like an ideal solution: spread the sludge on farm fields as free fertilizer and reduce waste.

So Fred Stone and many other farmers adopted the practice.

- The state and the federal government had promised farmers that it was a safe thing to do, and farmers had been even told that it was the right thing to do, that they were doing their duty as citizens to help dispose of this waste from our wastewater treatment plants.

- But the practice just created more problems because sludge contains high levels of PFAS.

The contamination can devastate a farmer's business as PFAS ends up in their crops, the feed for animals, and then into animal products like milk, and the runoff from the land goes into surface waters and eventually can reach public and private drinking water.

- We're still fighting new spots and new farmers, new people who are affected.

- Maine has since banned the spreading of sludge on farmland, the first state in the country to do so.

The Maine Department of Environmental Protection now tracks farms where sludge was spread and tests for PFAS.

The state and MOFGA are working to help farmers find ways to recover, like drilling new wells for uncontaminated water, growing different crops that don't take up an unsafe level of PFAS from the soil, and most importantly, more testing to make sure their products are safe to eat.

That's good news for the 90 farms in Maine that have found PFAS contamination.

- Of those over 90 farmers, only five have gone out of business, and that's really the success story with the way Maine has approached PFAS, is that we are looking out for our farmers and standing out for our farmers, and when they get the support they need, PFAS doesn't need to be the end of their farm, doesn't need to be the end of their way of life.

- [Esta] PFAS testing is a key step for any solution, but it can be slow and expensive to do.

- We will test anything and everything for PFAS, so of course we do well water and soils.

We also do wastewaters and effluents, manufacturing effluents, landfill leachates, biosolids, and sludges.

And then we do a ton of agricultural testing.

So a lot of plant tissues, animal tissues.

- [Esta] Katie Richards is the CEO and co-founder of PFAS Laboratories in Norridgewock, the first lab in the state capable of testing for PFAS.

Part of the testing challenge, she says, is that the chemicals are in so many products that they need to make sure that samples aren't contaminated by the testing equipment, and the tests have to catch an extremely low level of PFAS.

- So when you're trying to measure two parts per trillion, you're trying to imagine what that is.

You can think about it as one drop of food coloring in 20 Olympic-size swimming pools.

So it's a very tiny, tiny, tiny amount, and that's why you need the precision instrumentation that you have to invest in to be able to do the job.

- And finding PFAS is only half the battle.

Then you have to figure out how to remove it from the environment.

Some options include carbon water filters, but they can be expensive and hard to scale up.

In recent years, there's been more and more research into PFAS and how to remove them from the water, other parts of the environment, and our bodies.

- They're called endocrine-disrupting chemicals, part of, like, a huge class of chemicals.

And so they act as, like, basically in place of normal, like, signaling in your body.

- Dr.

Criswell sees a lot of patients with high levels of PFAS contamination.

She says PFAS are somewhat unusual because they accumulate in the blood, while other contaminants usually accumulate in the fat in the body.

And PFAS contamination is considered a risk factor for thyroid disease, liver issues, kidney cancers, low birth weight, and reduced response to vaccines.

- PFAS is a risk factor, one of many.

So it's really hard to say that PFAS caused an outcome in a person, but I try to again frame it that PFAS is like smoking or exercise or genetics, and that it's like one more straw that we're adding, you know, to your health camel or whatever.

- Dr.

Criswell says, even though PFAS don't break down, the human body will expel 'em over time.

- You know, we call them forever chemicals, but they do leave the body.

Usually, though, the longer ones go through your GI system, the shorter ones go through your urinary system, and they have half-lives of about three to seven years depending on the compounds.

- Most people don't have contamination levels high enough to put them at increased disease risk.

But for those who do, Dr.

Criswell is working to establish a clinical protocol for a cholesterol medication that has been found to expel PFAS from the body faster.

For those concerned about exposure, the biggest step is reducing the PFAS coming into their bodies.

- If you have high levels of PFAS in your well, getting a filter, which the DEP has been doing.

If you know that you're consuming PFAS-contaminated produce, stop doing that.

For folks who are, like, firefighters or military vets who have been exposed through occupational sources, it's, you know, working with the International Association of Firefighters or with employers to try to cut down on those exposures.

- Dr.

Criswell says PFAS are one of many exposures we have to consider in our overall health.

And all of our experts agreed that the best strategy for most people is to keep an eye on which products contain PFAS and consider alternatives.

PFAS contamination is a widespread challenge, touching every state and impacting many parts of life.

While it can feel overwhelming to tackle this public health and environmental crisis, Maine is leading the curve and addressing the problem head-on.

- [Dr.

Criswell] It's really exciting to live and work in Maine because while we're dealing with this really, like, heartbreaking and tragic contamination for a lot of folks, Maine's been so proactive about supporting affected folks and also looking at the larger picture.

- So while these chemicals may stick around forever, there are ways to decrease our exposure.

For now, that's "PFAS Explained".

(light music)