Leave it to the landfills

With each decade, it seems as though the solid waste industry must face a new environmental challenge, and this decade brings the challenge of managing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), also known as “forever chemicals.” This was the assessment of SCS Engineers Senior Vice President Robert Gardner during a July 21 webinar, “Managing PFAS in Landfill Leachate and Sludge in a Changing Regulatory Climate.”

From the 1970s through the early 1990s, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which was founded in 1970, shaped the rules and regulations for hazardous and nonhazardous waste—necessitating new technologies and methods for managing these materials, he said.

Evolving from these regulations was the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, through which the EPA issued standards to reduce emissions of methane-rich landfill gas from new, modified and reconstructed municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills in 1996. The EPA continues to refine these standards today.

Now, the solid waste industry is preparing to address PFAS.

The compounds—popularized for their water- and oil-repellent properties—emerged in the 1940s and are now found in various consumer products that range from carpet and furniture to food packaging and protective coatings.

As research continues to highlight possible health dangers, such as reproductive issues, developmental delays in children and an increased risk of some cancers, that can arise from exposure to high levels of certain PFAS, a spotlight has been cast on landfills, which typically are the final destination for PFAS-laden materials.

Addressing the problem

In recent years, the EPA has employed several methods to address PFAS contamination, including action plans, wastewater regulations and sampling requirements; however, the agency took a more aggressive approach this year.

Aug. 26, the EPA finalized a January proposal to designate two of the most widely used PFAS, perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), as hazardous substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA), or “Superfund.”

The proposed regulation has left some industry stakeholders concerned that PFAS regulation under CERCLA would assign environmental cleanup liability to essential public services and their customers, rather than to the companies manufacturing products containing PFAS.

In a joint statement to Congress in May, the Solid Waste Association of North America (SWANA), Silver Spring, Maryland, and the National Waste & Recycling Association, Arlington, Virginia, advocated for providing a limited exemption under CERCLA to the solid waste industry, along with other passive receivers.

“SWANA is very concerned about the unintended consequences of imposing Superfund liability on passive receivers such as landfills,” David Biderman, executive director and CEO of SWANA, says in a news release announcing that the associations submitted comments to the EPA in November. “The mere prospect of such liability is already slowing down site cleanups and increasing costs. We didn’t manufacture or use PFAS, nor did we profit from it. Our landfills accepted it in the waste that we safely manage.”

While the EPA says it has discretion over enforcement to avoid pursuing passive receivers, SWANA and NWRA say they believe the EPA would not prevent manufacturers and heavy PFAS users from bringing claims against landfills and other passive receivers.

If the designation of PFOA and PFOS as hazardous substances under CERCLA is approved, releases of the substances that meet or exceed the permitted quantity would have to be reported to the National Response Center, state or Tribal emergency response commissions and local or Tribal emergency planning committees.

The proposed rule-making, which was first announced as part of the EPA’s PFAS Strategic Roadmap in 2021, was under a 60-day comment period that was expected to close Dec. 6. The EPA also anticipated issuing an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking after the end of the comment period to seek feedback on designating other PFAS chemicals as hazardous substances under CERCLA.

Rigid regulations

To address the potential liabilities facing the solid waste industry under the looming CERCLA designation, SCS Engineers—a Long Beach, California-based environmental consulting company—hosted its July 21 webinar.

“[The] EPA has devoted a lot of resources to PFAS,” said Jeff Marshall, vice president at SCS Engineers and a panelist on the webinar. “I believe there’s been more activity regarding PFAS than any other emerging contaminant during my 40 years in the environmental industry.”

He said PFAS in drinking water is a major priority for the EPA, lending a particular focus to the activities of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). This has created implications for landfill owners and operators, which typically send their leachate to these facilities for treatment.

In May of this year, the EPA proposed a draft of Aquatic Life Ambient Water Quality Criteria, a set of standards that Marshall said could influence discharge limitations for WWTPs, affecting concentration limits for wastewater generators.

He said the EPA also is investigating PFAS contamination in biosolids as part of the PFAS Strategic Roadmap, adding that the initiative potentially could affect waste facilities that accept sewage sludge for disposal or for use in compost.

Also in May, Maine became the first state in the country to ban using industrial and municipal sludge as fertilizer or in compost because of its high concentration of PFAS.

Additionally, the state legislature passed L.D. 1875, requiring the Bureau of General Services to report PFAS treatment options for landfill leachate at two state-owned landfills: Juniper Ridge in Old Town and Dolby in East Millinocket. Findings must be sent to the legislature starting in 2023.

Preparing for change

During the July webinar, Marshall said the drinking water health advisories the EPA released in June drastically reduce PFOA and PFOS concentrations from 2016 levels, creating what Gardner said was a disconnect between the health advisories and what actually can be measured.

Marshall agreed, saying, “There’s a significant analytical laboratory snag here. The current EPA analytical methods for PFAS in water cannot achieve these new and exceptionally low concentration health advisories for PFOA or PFOS.”

Marshall noted that the Strategic Roadmap includes plans to improve laboratory capabilities for testing WWTP and drinking water.

As these proposed regulations have been introduced, Marshall said many of SCS Engineers’ landfill clients have begun to implement waste screening programs for nonhazardous industrial waste streams that don’t typically fall under the traditional MSW umbrella.

“These waste screening programs often require the generator to complete a questionnaire or waste profile and may require some sort of laboratory analysis,” he explained. “The special waste application submitted to the landfill has to be reviewed and approved prior to receipt of the first shipment of waste at the site. Some wastes are denied, even if they’re not hazardous.”

While screening programs typically have been aimed at hazardous waste, Marshall suggested expanding them to include materials that could have significant PFAS content. “I’m not talking about small amounts of PFAS that may be present on carpet or fast food wrappers or things that may be ubiquitous in MSW, but you may want to screen out industrial waste that contains concentrated PFAS constituents.”

This could be beneficial following the temporary prohibition on the Pentagon’s incineration of PFAS that the U.S. Department of Defense issued in late April, Marshall said, which could lead to increased requests for landfill disposal of PFAS wastes that formerly were incinerated.

The author is associate editor of Waste Today and can be reached at hrischar@gie.net.