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#forever chemicals
sataniccapitalist · 1 year
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odinsblog · 10 months
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Whether you call it climate change or pollution, it’s still a series of policy decisions (deregulation). Deregulation that is disproportionately upheld by greedy corporations, red state Democrats, and is enforced overwhelmingly by Republican and Libertarian controlled legislatures.
(sources and other relevant links beneath the cut)
👉🏿 https://heatmap.news/climate/wildfire-smoke-east-air-quality
👉🏿 https://www.volts.wtf/p/volts-podcast-david-wallace-wells
👉🏿 https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1666541345069219840.html
👉🏿 https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1648986424098652160.html
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hope-for-the-planet · 23 days
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wachinyeya · 2 months
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mindblowingscience · 1 month
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PFAS have earned the name "forever chemicals" with good reason—the man-made compounds, which can take thousands of years to degrade and are found in everything from grease-resistant food packaging to water-repellent clothing, have made their way into nearly half the U.S. tap water supply. Now, in a study featured in the Journal of Hazardous Materials, New Jersey Institute of Technology chemists have demonstrated a new lab-based method to detect traces of PFAS from food packaging material, water and soil samples in just three minutes or less.
Continue Reading.
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When plastic straws were banned, new alternative straws of paper, bamboo, and glass were advertised as more sustainable, eco-friendly, and healthy. Groffen’s team wanted to know if they hold up to the hype, but they found that the majority of them do not. With the exception of the stainless steel straws they tested, all of the brands they examined—which are commercially available in Belgium—contained chemicals that are harmful not only for the environment, but also for people. Known as PFAS, which stands for poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances, and dubbed forever chemicals, these compounds don’t break down under heat or sunlight and dissolve in neither water nor oil. For a few decades these PFAS were the darlings of the chemical industry, used in everything from fire-resistant cushions to water-repellant clothing and from nonstick pan coating to disposable plates. Unfortunately, what makes PFAS so durable in kitchenware and other products is also what makes it last so long in the environment. More importantly, in recent years, scientists have linked them to a gamut of damaging health effects, including thyroid disease, high cholesterol, pregnancy problems, liver damage, and several cancers. They have also been linked to adverse reproductive, developmental and immunological effects in animals. The team found PFAS to be present in 90 percent of the paper straws, 80 percent of bamboo, 75 percent of plastic, and 40 percent of glass ones.
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thoughtportal · 1 year
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cleaning up forever chemicals
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kp777 · 10 months
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saywhat-politics · 9 months
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At least 45% of the nation's tap water could be contaminated with at least one form of PFAS known as "forever chemicals," according to a newly released study by the U.S. Geological Survey.
The man-made chemicals — of which there are thousands — are found in all sorts of places, from nonstick cookware to stain-resistant carpets to contaminated sources of food and water. They break down very slowly, building up in people, animals and the environment over time.
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aquitainequeen · 2 years
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FAS, a group of manufactured chemicals commonly used since the 1940s, are called ‘forever chemicals’ for a reason. Bacteria can’t eat them; fire can’t incinerate them; and water can’t dilute them. And, if these toxic chemicals are buried, they leach into surrounding soil.
Now, Northwestern University chemists have done the seemingly impossible. Using low temperatures and inexpensive, common substances, the research team developed a process that causes two major classes of PFAS compounds to fall apart—leaving behind only benign end products.
The simple technique potentially could be a powerful solution for finally disposing of these harmful chemicals, which are linked to dangerous health effects and may be common in your water supply.
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fenrislorsrai · 2 months
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But what made my raincoat so trustworthy that day on the mountain could also, in theory, kill me — or, more likely, kill or sicken any of the thousands of people who live downstream of the manufacturers that make waterproofing chemicals and the landfills where waterproof clothing is incinerated or interred. Outdoor apparel is typically ultraprocessed and treated using perfluoroalkyl and poly-fluoroalkyl substances, a class of water- and stain-resistant “forever chemicals” that are more commonly referred to as PFAS (pronounced “pee-fass”). After decades of work by environmental groups and health advocates, states and retailers are finally banning the sale of textiles that have been treated with the chemicals, which in the outdoor industry often manifest in the form of Gore-Tex membranes or “durable water repellent” treatments. These bans are fast approaching: Beginning in 2025 — less than 12 months from now — California will forbid the sale of most PFAS-treated textiles; New York will restrict them in apparel; and Washington will regulate stain- and waterproofing treatments, with similar regulations pending or approved in a number of other states. Following pressure from activists, the nation’s largest outdoor retailer, REI, also announced last winter that it will ban PFAS in all the textile products and cookware sold in its stores starting fall 2024; Dick’s Sporting Goods will also eliminate PFAS from its brand-name clothing. - - - It is also because of this bond that PFAS are so stubbornly persistent — in the environment, certainly, but also in us. An estimated 98% to 99% of people have traces of PFAS in their bodies. Researchers have found the molecules in breast milk, rainwater, and Antarctica’s snow. We inhale them in dust and drink them in our tap water, and because they look a little like a fatty acid to our bodies, they can cause health problems that we’re only beginning to grasp. So far, PFAS have been linked to kidney and testicular cancer, decreased fertility, elevated cholesterol, weight gain, thyroid disease, the pregnancy complication pre-eclampsia, increased risk of preterm birth and low birth weight, hormone interference, and reduced vaccine response in children.
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hope-for-the-planet · 2 years
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“The team created a composite of boron nitride and titanium dioxide and discovered that they had a substance with the best of both worlds. It was activated by the UV light in the atmosphere and it was capable of destroying PFOA very quickly. In deionized water, it took less than three hours to break down 99 percent of the PFOA into carbon dioxide, fluorine, and minerals. In salty water, the process takes about nine hours.
The team will now investigate how good this substance is at breaking down other perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) – the broader class of forever chemicals.”
There’s been a lot in the news about PFAS lately--there is tremendous effort being put into addressing this issue and, while faster would be better, progress is being made.
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wachinyeya · 6 months
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mindblowingscience · 6 months
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New research suggests that ultrasound may have potential in treating a group of harmful chemicals known as PFAS to eliminate them from contaminated groundwater. Invented nearly a century ago, per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances, also known as "forever chemicals," were once widely used to create products such as cookware, waterproof clothing and personal care items. Today, scientists understand that exposure to PFAS can cause a number of human health issues such as birth defects and cancer. But because the bonds inside these chemicals don't break down easily, they're notoriously difficult to remove from the environment. Such difficulties have led researchers at The Ohio State University to study how ultrasonic degradation, a process that uses sound to degrade substances by cleaving apart the molecules that make them up, might work against different types and concentrations of these chemicals.
Continue Reading.
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"Based on the latest U.S. guidelines for PFOA in drinking water, rainwater everywhere would be judged unsafe to drink. Although in the industrial world we don't often drink rainwater, many people around the world expect it to be safe to drink and it supplies many of our drinking water sources," Cousins continue.
The Stockholm University team have conducted laboratory and field work on the atmospheric presence and transport of PFAS for the past decade. They have noted that the levels of some harmful PFAS in the atmosphere are not declining notably despite their phase out by the major manufacturer, 3M, already two decades ago. PFAS are known to be highly persistent, but their continued presence in the atmosphere is also due to their properties and natural processes that continually cycle PFAS back to the atmosphere from the surface environment. One important natural cycling process for PFAS is the transport from seawater to marine air by sea spray aerosols, which is another active research area for the Stockholm University team.
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"So now, due to the global spread of PFAS, environmental media everywhere will exceed environmental quality guidelines designed to protect human health and we can do very little to reduce the PFAS contamination. In other words, it makes sense to define a planetary boundary specifically for PFAS and, as we conclude in the paper, this boundary has now been exceeded," said Scheringer.
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reasonsforhope · 1 year
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“3M plans to phase out “forever chemicals” over the next few years, the manufacturing giant announced today. The announcement comes as the company faces a slew of lawsuits over its toxic legacy with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as PFAS or forever chemicals.
Specifically, 3M says it will discontinue the use of forever chemicals in its portfolio of products and “exit all PFAS manufacturing by the end of 2025.” Currently, 3M nets around $1.3 billion in annual sales of PFAS it manufactures. The chemicals have gone into many of its most iconic products over the years, including Scotchgard fabric protector. In the 1960s, the company also worked with the Navy to develop firefighting foam using PFAS...
Forever chemicals are found in soil, drinking water, and in human blood. It’s often found at low levels, and researchers are still trying to understand what that means for our health and environment. But bigger problems have cropped up for communities exposed to higher concentrations of PFAS at more contaminated sites like factories and military bases. Exposure to high concentrations of PFAS has been linked to greater risks of certain kinds of cancer, liver damage, increased cholesterol, and reproductive health issues.
That’s how 3M has gotten itself into legal troubles it faces now, in the form of some 2,000 lawsuits, according to Bloomberg Intelligence. The state of California, for example, filed suit against 3M and other manufacturers in November for continuing to make PFAS products despite allegedly knowing the dangers associated with them for decades. Minnesota filed a similar lawsuit against 3M alleging the company damaged drinking water and natural resources; it was settled in 2018. The company faces up to $30 billion in potential legal liability for the hundreds of products it has developed with PFAS over the better part of a decade, Bloomberg Law reports.” -via The Verge, 12/20/22
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