FDA to set limits on PFAS in bottled water but not in food
A shopper pushes a cart with a plastic-wrapped case of bottled water outside a Costco store in Queens, New York, June 18, 2024. The International Bottled Water Association says it welcomes the US Food and Drug Administration’s plans to set limits on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in bottled water. Credit:
Sipa USA via AP
The US Food and Drug Administration plans to establish allowable levels for certain per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in bottled water, according to a June update of its PFAS web page.
Under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (PDF), when the US Environmental Protection Agency sets contaminant limits for public drinking-water supplies, the FDA is required to follow suit by either setting similar limits in bottled water or stating why those limits aren’t needed. In 2024 the Joe Biden administration set maximum contaminant levels for six PFAS, including perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS), in drinking water. The EPA recently proposed rescinding four of those drinking-water limits, which could impact what limits are set on PFAS in bottled water.
The FDA did not give a timeline for its review process for PFAS in bottled water. Its web page states that the agency “is reviewing EPA’s regulations to determine what allowable levels for PFAS are appropriate in our standard of quality regulation for bottled water.”
Matt Herrick, president and CEO of the trade association the International Bottled Water Association, welcomes the move toward formal PFAS standards in bottled water. “We look forward to working with the FDA to formalize these standards, which will only reinforce that bottled water is one of the safest, most strictly regulated and scrutinized beverages in the country,” Herrick says in an email to C&EN.
According to the FDA’s latest update of its PFAS web page, the agency will also evaluate future actions for addressing PFAS contamination in seafood and instant formula. This announcement comes after the agency denied a citizen petition (PDF) by the Tucson Environmental Justice Task Force to set limits for up to 30 PFAS in various fruits, vegetables, milk, eggs, fish, and bread. In a letter (PDF) dated June 17, Mark Hartman, director of the Office of Food Chemical Safety, Dietary Supplements, and Innovation, wrote that “there is insufficient evidence” to support the group’s requests.
“We are working to identify routes of PFAS exposure, understand associated safety risks, and reduce the public’s dietary exposure to those PFAS that may pose safety concerns,” Hartman wrote in the letter.
—Bec Roldan, special to C&EN
New members of EPA chemical advisory committee include contentious pick
The US Environmental Protection Agency announced 11 new members of the Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals (SACC) on July 1, including a past, controversial Donald J. Trump nominee to lead the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.
Michael Dourson, president of the chemical risk assessment organization Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment, withdrew his nomination for the position due to bipartisan opposition to his confirmation.
During the Senate’s consideration of his nomination to head the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, the environmental advocacy group Greenpeace released hundreds of pages of emails between Dourson and chemical-industry officials that the group had obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. This included correspondence with the American Chemistry Council about the group’s prepublication edits to a journal article on Dourson’s research while he was at the University of Cincinnati.
“EPA’s independent science advisors play an essential role in ensuring the agency’s decision-making is grounded in science,” Sarah Vogel, senior vice president of healthy communities at the environmental advocacy group the Environmental Defense Fund, says in a statement. Dourson’s inclusion on the committee “is a blatant attack on the scientific independence and integrity that the Toxic Substances Control Act [TSCA] requires to protect public health from toxic chemicals,” she says in the statement.
According to the EPA, the SACC’s job is to give independent scientific and technical advice on TSCA risk assessments, pollution prevention, and other procedures for chemical regulation.
The committee now has a total of 23 members, including the 12 existing members. Other new members joining Dourson on the SACC include toxicologists at Tesla and Lyondell Chemical Company, several employees of private chemical-risk companies, and three researchers at US colleges and universities. The members whose committee terms have expired are largely public health professionals at universities and hospitals.
The new SACC chair is Robinan Gentry, a toxicologist at Ramboll, who was already on the committee as a member. She replaces George Cobb, an environmental scientist at Baylor University.
—Leigh Krietsch Boerner
Appeals court blocks rollback of Biden-era PM2.5 standard
The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on June 26 denied the US Environmental Protection Agency’s request to vacate a stricter national ambient air quality standard for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) approved by the Joe Biden administration in 2024.
Back in March 2024, the Biden administration lowered the acceptable limit of PM2.5 from an annual average of 12 μg/m3 to 9 μg/m3. At the time, the EPA said the updated standard would prevent 800,000 cases of asthma, 4,500 premature deaths, and 290,000 lost workdays by 2032.
But shortly after the rule was finalized, two dozen states and industry groups sued the EPA and petitioned the court to reject the 2024 changes. They argued that the new standards would add unnecessary regulatory burdens to manufacturers.
The EPA initially defended the rule but then, in 2025, reversed its position. Under the second Donald J. Trump administration, the agency began arguing that the tightening of the annual standard was “unlawful” and done without the “rigorous, stepwise process that Congress required.”
But the DC Circuit found that former EPA administrator Michael S. Regan provided “reasoned explanations” for how he approached the revised standards and weighed the scientific evidence. “That is sufficient for us to uphold his decision on its merits,” wrote the three-judge panel.
In a press release, California attorney general Rob Bonta, who led a coalition to defend the Biden administration’s standard, celebrated the DC Circuit’s decision and said the ruling reaffirmed that “this attack on important and legally-required federal health protections was meritless.”
Industry groups, on the other hand, disagreed with the DC Circuit’s ruling. “Today’s court decision was a setback to EPA’s goal to establish a reasonable PM2.5 standard and avert the negative impacts of the current rule on the American steel industry’s international competitiveness,” the American Iron and Steel Institute says in a statement.
In a related case, the EPA on July 2 asked the US District Court for the Northern District of California for at least an 18-month extension of the current deadline, which passed on Feb. 7, for determining what areas of the country are not in compliance with the 2024 PM2.5 standards.
The appeals court’s June 26 decision is expected to be appealed.
—Krystal Vasquez
EPA air and radiation head to step down
US Environmental Protection Agency assistant administrator Aaron Szabo plans to step down as head of the Office of Air and Radiation on July 17.
According to a recording obtained by the New York Times, Szabo told staff on Tuesday that he’ll be leaving the Donald J. Trump administration. He did not give a reason why.
During his tenure at the EPA, Szabo oversaw many deregulation actions involving air pollution policy, including rolling back greenhouse gas (GHG) emission standards for fossil fuel–fired power plants, undoing Joe Biden–era rules to tighten standards on mercury emissions from power plants, and rescinding the 2009 endangerment finding, the agency’s scientific justification for regulating GHG emissions under the Clean Air Act.
The Senate confirmed Szabo to the post in July 2025 by a narrow margin along party lines. Prior to his EPA position, Szabo was a lobbyist who represented multiple chemical and petrochemical groups and businesses, including the American Chemistry Council, Chemours, the American Clean Power Association, and Chevron. He was also a contributor to Project 2025 (PDF), a plan to restructure the executive branch of the US government that was cowritten by the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation and officials of the first Trump administration.
—Leigh Krietsch Boerner
