[CPEO-MEF] PFAS: "Maine plans to search out firefighting foam containing ‘forever chemicals’"

[Lenny Siegel]

Maine plans to search out firefighting foam containing ‘forever chemicals’


BY KEVIN MILLER 
Portland Press Herald (ME)
July 5, 2019

AUGUSTA - The Maine Emergency Management Agency will soon survey fire departments around the state as the first step in a potential take-back and disposal program for firefighting foam containing toxic chemicals. 

For decades, military and civilian firefighters used special foam containing chemicals known as PFAS to smother the intense flames caused by fuel fires. While manufacturers can no longer use two variants of the chemicals, large amounts of “legacy” PFAS-containing foam are still out there at fire stations, in storerooms or on response trucks nationwide. 

Members of a PFAS Task Force created by Gov. Janet Mills recently endorsed a plan to conduct a statewide inventory of firefighting foam containing the chemicals. The working group conducting the inventory also plans to solicit information on where and how often PFAS-containing firefighting foam was used in Maine, which could help state environmental regulators pin down contamination sites. 

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For the entire article, see
https://www.timesrecord.com/articles/front-page/maine-plans-to-search-out-firefighting-foam-containing-forever-chemicals/

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Lenny Siegel
Executive Director
Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
P.O. Box 998, Mountain View, CA 94042
Voice/Fax: 650/961-8918 
<lsiegel at cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org