Roanoke lawmakers file bills to deal with contamination of Spring Hollow reservoir

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Aug 15, 2023

Roanoke lawmakers file bills to deal with contamination of Spring Hollow reservoir

The ProChem building at 5100 Enterprise Drive. The Elliston firm was identified

The ProChem building at 5100 Enterprise Drive. The Elliston firm was identified as the likely source of GenX, a hazardous chemical that has been detected downstream in the Roanoke River and the Spring Hollow reservoir.

The Spring Hollow Reservoir feeds water to the Spring Hollow Water Treatment Facility, seen in 2022 in Salem.

For seven years, an industry released a dangerous contaminant through its wastewater — allowing a "forever chemical" to make its way into the Roanoke Valley's public water supply.

ProChem Inc. of Elliston says it didn't know that its process of cleaning machinery for a major chemical manufacturer was creating the pollution, and stopped the releases as soon as it became aware.

A bill introduced in this year's General Assembly by Del. Sam Rasoul, D-Roanoke, aims to prevent that from happening again.

Rasoul's legislation (HB 2189) would require industries such as ProChem to test its wastewater for PFAS — short for per- and polyfuoroalkyl substances, which have a wide variety of industrial and manufacturing uses and are the subject of growing public health concerns.

A second bill, introduced by Sen. John Edwards, D-Roanoke, (SB 1013) would require any public water provider to notify its customers when PFAS are detected, or when their concentration exceeds maximum containment levels established by state or federal law. However, there are currently no regulations that establish limits for the discharge of forever chemicals.

Efforts to reach Rasoul and Edwards were unsuccessful Thursday.

But Mark Barker with the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, who has been pushing for the legislation, said it's needed to address problems that came to light with the discovery of GenX in the local water supply.

"When you’ve got someone like ProChem, maybe this will force them to take a more active stance in finding out who the heck they are dealing with," Barker said. "That knowledge might have helped us seven years ago."

Also vital, Barker said, is the need to inform the public about possible contamination of drinking water.

PFAS are called forever chemicals because they can remain in the air, soil and water indefinitely. There are more than 6,000 of the compounds that can resist heat, oil, stains, grease and water — making them popular in the manufacture of items such as nonstick cookwear, waterproof clothing, fast food containers, upholstery, carpets and cosmetics.

In 2015, ProChem began to perform what's called a "chemical washing process" of equipment from Chemours, which operates a plant in West Virginia that makes hexafluoropropylene oxide dimer acid, a forever chemical also known as GenX.

Wastewater from that process was sent to a nearby Montgomery County Public Service Authority treatment plant, where it underwent cleaning before being released into the South Fork of the Roanoke River.

But as a forever chemical, GenX is all but impossible to remove from the environment.

The chemical was first detected in January 2020 in the water of Spring Hollow reservoir, which is owned and operated by the Western Virginia Water Authority. The western Roanoke County reservoir is filled primarily by pumping water from the adjacent Roanoke River, at a spot about five miles downstream from ProChem.

At the time, the level of GenX was about 60 parts per trillion. In June 2022, the Environmental Protection Agency issued a public health advisory that recommended long-term consumption of no more than 10 parts per trillion.

With the health advisory, which came as state and federal governments stepped up their efforts to regulate forever chemicals, the water authority began to investigate where the GenX originated.

In early November, tests found high levels at two locations near ProChem: a manhole in the sanitary sewer that carried wastewater to the treatment plant, and a spot where the effluent was released into the South Fork of the Roanoke River.

The company, which provides expertise and products meant to solve industrial water problems, said that it was "dismayed" to learn that it "unknowingly contributed to the presence of GenX found in the local water supply."

Had ProChem been made aware that GenX was in "vessels" — which are the same configuration as home water softeners and serve essentially the same purpose — it cleaned for a West Virginia customer, it would not have accepted the order, the company said.

"As soon as this knowledge was obtained, the service of these vessels ceased," it said after the test results were announced in early November.

Although ProChem has not named the customer that was the original source of GenX, it has been identified by the water authority as Chemours.

This week, a statement from ProChem added new information: An internal investigation was launched after Aug. 29 and Sept. 11 articles in The Roanoke Times reported the discovery of GenX downstream.

"Through that investigation, ProChem determined that a customer's West Virginia facility was a potential source of this compound and the decision was made to immediately discontinue service to that customer until more information could be obtained," the company said.

When tests later confirmed the presence of GenX, ProChem "took immediate action to eliminate it from its facility, treat the process water, and test the effluent to confirm the effectiveness of the treatment," it said.

Recent tests at the plant show that discharges are below the EPA's public health advisory, ProChem said through an email from Strategic Communications, which has been handling public statements since news of the company's role broke in November.

The company acted "in the absence of any local, state or federal regulation for the GenX compound," it said.

A Virginia Department of Health work group has studied setting state regulations, but no action has been taken yet. At the federal level, the EPA plans to propose PFAS regulations in the coming weeks, a spokesman said Thursday. Once the proposed rule is reviewed and undergoes public comment, the agency anticipates a final set of regulations by the end of this year.

Tests results received by the water authority earlier this month show that GenX is still in the Roanoke River — which is not surprising, given its long life span.

"The Western Virginia Water Authority expects that it will take time for this ‘forever chemical’ to clear," said Sarah Baumgardner, a spokeswoman for the agency that provides drinking water to about 69,000 customers in the Roanoke Valley.

The most recent laboratory analysis of treated water at Spring Hollow found levels of GenX below those recommended by the EPA health advisory, which is based on a lifetime of consuming two liters of water per day. Those tests were of samples taken through mid-October.

More recently, the water authority has relied on a different type of testing. Rather than taking "grab samples," which capture a chemical's presence at a precise time, it has been using passive sampling, which does not measure specific amounts but establishes whether the compound was in the water over a prolonged time period.

The most recent data did not find GenX in the North Fork of the Roanoke River or in its south fork upstream of ProChem. But samples taken just downstream of the plant, and at the intake for Spring Hollow, were positive.

"This is further data to confirm the location source of GenX," Baumgardner wrote in an email.

Since the chemical was detected in the river, the water authority has suspended pumping to top off Spring Hollow, which this week had a capacity of 78%. Pumping will resume "once we are confident that GenX is no longer present in the source water," the email stated.

The amount of water from Spring Hollow that reaches customers has been reduced to approximately 4 million gallons a day, about half of its original load. The difference has been made up by other sources of water, such as Carvins Cove, that have not tested positive for GenX.

Reduced levels at Spring Hollow are attributed largely to a carbon filtering system that the authority is working to expand.

Meanwhile, a Chemours spokesperson recently responded to questions from The Roanoke Times, saying the company has filed a legal challenge in a federal appeals court that questions the methodology used by the EPA in issuing its health advisory.

The EPA has also taken enforcement actions linked to GenX at both the Chemours plant in West Virginia and one in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

Chemours is cooperating with Virginia and water authority officials in an investigation of the contamination of the Roanoke River. "We aren't able to offer additional comment until that is complete," the spokesperson wrote in an email.

A new report reveals just how widespread and dangerous the situation is. Veuer's Tony Spitz has the details.

Rasoul

Edwards

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Laurence Hammack covers environmental issues, including the Mountain Valley Pipeline, and business and enterprise stories. He has been a reporter for The Roanoke Times for more than three decades.

The legislation proposed by two Roanoke lawmakers is aimed at a "forever chemical" detected in the river and Spring Hollow reservoir.

The Virginia Department of Health says it will test the wells following the discovery of GenX in the Roanoke River.

A company upstream from the Spring Hollow reservoir, where a hazardous chemical was detected, is believed to be responsible.

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