Deep Dive: Why the EU wants to ban the chemical group PFAS

While the plastic waste on the beach, in rivers or in the whirlpool of the sea provides images that are as impressive as they are frightening, the flood of artificial chemicals into the environment cannot be seen with the naked eye. One group has been of particular concern to experts for several years: the per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances, or PFAS for short.

The fluorochemicals are found in frying pans, baking paper and burger paper, in waterproof jackets or bicycle chain grease, in impregnations for sofa fabrics or shoes, in heat pumps and air conditioning systems. They are also used in the semi-conductor and electroplating industries and have long been used in extinguishing foams.

PFAS in the environment and humans

The PFAS group of substances includes more than 10,000 representatives. Some are toxic, the health side effects of the vast majority? Unknown. The long-lived substances have long been distributed all over the world. Almost everyone has it in their blood. The EU Commission now wants to ban the entire group of substances. She presented a first proposal in February. The topic is given additional explosiveness by the European research initiative Forever Pollution Projectwhich recently published 17,000 officially recognized hot spots in Europe.

“PFAS are the most serious global chemical problem today,” says Martin Scheringer from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. The environmental chemist has been dealing with the topic for 15 years, has applications, possible substitutes and the distribution of the substances in the environment is examined. In the podcast interview with TR editor Andrea Hoferichter, he explains, among other things, why the useful substances are so dangerous, why current regulations are not effective and what the PFAS problem has in common with climate change.

More on that in the whole episode – as an audio stream (RSS-Feed):

(jl)