EPA Issues New Draft Guidance For PFOA And PFOS In Biosolids; Identifies Alleged Flaws In Prior Draft PFAS Biosolids Risk Assessment

On June 29, EPA issued a draft guidance memorandum, “Draft Guidance for Reducing Risk from Perfluorooctanoic Acid (PFOA) and Perfluorooctane Sulfonic Acid (PFOS) in Biosolids.” The Draft Guidance reaffirms EPA’s endorsement of reuse of biosolids through land application as a fertilizer and soil conditioner as a viable option for wastewater utilities and the agricultural community. The Draft Guidance outlines practical recommendations for limiting exposure to PFOA and PFOS at locations where biosolids have been land applied, such as avoiding land application near fishable waters and drinking water sources, or on land where children are likely to have direct contact with soils. The Draft Guidance also recommends that wastewater utilities monitor for PFOA and PFOS in their biosolids and utilize source reduction and alternatives like surface disposal and incineration for biosolids with elevated levels of PFAS.

However, the Draft Guidance stops short of establishing levels considered safe for land application, or that would trigger further investigation and alternative disposal methods. Instead, the Draft Guidance discusses—but explicitly does not endorse—the approach taken by some states to identify and reduce industrial sources of PFAS in biosolids, or to monitor PFAS in biosolids. The Draft Guidance also discusses land application bans imposed in Connecticut and Maine, and the resulting costs and impacts.

Importantly, the Draft Guidance also identifies alleged flaws in the “Draft Sewage Sludge Risk Assessment for Perfluorooctanoic Acid (PFOA) and Perfluorooctane Sulfonic Acid (PFOS),” previously issued by EPA in January 2025. The Draft Risk Assessment identified potential health risks to individuals living on or near farms where biosolids containing low levels of PFAS are land applied, based on what EPA now contends are conservative assumptions about potential exposure pathways. According to the new Draft Guidance, the earlier Draft Risk Assessment led to an alleged misconception that “all biosolids and sewage sludge use and disposal practices will negatively affect the public.”

The Draft Guidance therefore purports to “provide clarity to stakeholders” and claims to “serious flaws in the Draft Risk Assessment, including: (1) the departure from “typical agency practice by failing to conduct a national survey to document occurrence of PFOA and PFOS in sewage sludge”; (2) the lack of an evaluation of what EPA now identifies as more “realistic” exposure scenarios or of the frequency at which the higher-risk hypothetical scenarios the Draft Risk Assessment is based on are actually used; and (3) an alleged misrepresentation of 1 part per billion (ppb) of PFOA or PFOS as a “safe level” in biosolids, where the level was purportedly used “as a start concentration to determine if use or disposal would result in any  unacceptable risk for the hypothetical circumstances presented.”

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