Last week, a broader coalition of farm groups, among them the National Farmers Union, National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, and American Farmland Trust, released federal policy recommendations for addressing PFAS contamination on farms. In addition to provisions related to assisting farmers with cleanup and the reduction of future contamination, the groups included a section recommending the EPA further clarify and confirm that farmers will not be held responsible for contamination caused by fertilizers.

Zeldin put that issue—referred to as “passive receiver liability”— front and center in the EPA’s Sept. 17 announcement. “When it comes to PFOA and PFOS contamination, holding polluters accountable while providing certainty for passive receivers that did not manufacture or generate those chemicals continues to be an ongoing challenge,” he said. “EPA intends to do what we can based on our existing authority, but we will need new statutory language from Congress to fully address our concerns.”

But some experts say those concerns have already been addressed.

“The 2024 enforcement discretion policy resolved the situation, clarifying that EPA would focus enforcement only on polluters—not farmers and municipalities that received PFAS chemicals,” said Betsy Southerland, the former director of the EPA’s Office of Science and Technology in the Office of Water, in a statement released by the Environmental Protection Network.

Southerland welcomed the announcement that the EPA will keep the designations in place. She also warned it will offer little relief to people worried about forever chemicals in drinking water, because of Zeldin’s earlier decision to roll back limits on four other PFAS. The EPA also recently approved four new pesticides that qualify as PFAS based on an internationally recognized definition the EPA does not use.

“Let’s be clear,” Southerland said. “Our drinking water is still at risk because Trump’s EPA is recklessly allowing more toxic chemicals in Americans’ drinking water.” (Link to this post.)