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Cancer-Linked Chemicals Manufactured by 3M Are Turning Up in Drinking Water
- andreygrehov 8y agoCurious, is there an easy way to test the water quality at home?
- CaliforniaKarl 8y agoYou can arrange with an appropriately-certified lab to get a testing kit. You then have to ensure you get a sample that is not contaminated. You should also get samples from multiple points in the home, so that you do not confuse a contaminated tap with contaminated water.
- zzzcpan 8y agoNot really, maybe TDS/EC meters. But those are mostly useful for reverse osmosis water filters. Just get such water filter if you care about water quality.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- alexandercrohde 8y agoI've looked into this myself. Unfortunately it's not practical. Firstly, there are a number of different chemicals you might test for. Secondly, for chemicals that are dangerous at 1ppb only gas-chemotography / mass-spectrometry can detect that, which would cost upward of $500 per test per chemical and be done at a university lab. Might be more practical to only drink filtered or distilled water. Normal water filters do a shockingly good job with most chemicals, not sure about PFAs.
- tshannon 8y agoCarbon filters clean up "some" of them, but not all. Reverse Osmosis is better if you can afford it. The filtering really should be done by the city / government on an industrial scale (like CG did in the article) where it's not only more cost efficient, but also their responsibility.
- smolder 8y agoReverse osmosis also wastes a certain amount of water as it filters, doesn't it? I remember there being a drain line on kits I looked at.
- zzzcpan 8y agoYes, like 10x of water in those kits.
- nwellinghoff 8y agoI run the drain line to my garden.
- loceng 8y agoCould this process not be scaled, automated somewhat, to bring the cost per test down?
- nwellinghoff 8y agoI run a RO/DI filter with a 11 gallon reservoir. Unless its smaller than a water molecule and the DI does not pick it up. Its not getting through. The annual cost is about 30 dollars to replace the various filters and media. Plus you have 99.9% pure water at your disposal at all times for making drinking water, carbonated water and base water for anything where you need to know the chemical composition. (saltwater fish tanks etc.). I highly recommend it!
- sigstoat 8y ago> Firstly, there are a number of different chemicals you might test for. Secondly, for chemicals that are dangerous at 1ppb only gas-chemotography / mass-spectrometry can detect that, which would cost upward of $500 per test per chemical i don't think anyone uses GC/MS to find heavy metals. that would tend to be more of an ICP/MS sort of thing. $500/compound seems pretty steep for GC/MS work, when it can generally see multiple compounds in the same run (that's the whole point of doing the chromatographic separation). > be done at a university lab. plenty of non-universities run GC/MSes, and other fancier instrumentation. you probably need to look into this a little more, i think you probably stumbled across some places that didn't do the sort of work you want on a regular basis, so they were quoting you rather expensive prices to make you go away.
- BitterSweets 8y agoIs there anywhere in the US that you can live without fear or worry of having contaminated water or air?
- empath75 8y agoPretty much everywhere. Tap water in the us is perfectly safe in most places.
- dmm 8y agoThe absence of specific dangers is not the same as safety, but the former is all that water supply testing can provide.
- rayiner 8y agoWe test for things that are really dangerous (e. coli, arsenic, heavy metals, etc.). If microplastics were dangerous like those things, it would be pretty obvious by now.
- okmokmz 8y ago>If microplastics were dangerous like those things, it would be pretty obvious by now. You're right, it is pretty obvious "The chronic biological effects in marine organisms results due to accumulation of microplastics in their cells and tissues. The potential hazardous effects on humans by alternate ingestion of microparticles can cause alteration in chromosomes which lead to infertility, obesity, and cancer." https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28815367 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28815367 "Not only is the potential migration of the plastics throughout our body a concern, but the additives in plastics may carry health risks. Many of these additives are known endocrine disrupters. According to Dr. Herbert Tilg, president of the Austrian Society of Gastroenterology and chair of the UEG Scientific Committee, microplastics could possibly be one of the factors contributing to inflammatory bowel syndrome or even colon cancer, which is on the rise among young adults." https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/10/22/659568662/microplastics-are-turning-up-everywhere-even-in-human-excrement https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/10/22/659568662/mi...
- post_break 8y agoChemicals in the drinking water, plastic in the salt. It's either you embrace ignorance or live in fear of what is in your food, drink, air. Kind of depressing.
- expectsomuch 8y agoUm, I believe there is another alternative, wherein we use that information to regulate the use and release of those chemicals and microplastics....
- post_break 8y agoMy point isn't that we should just accept this, just that it's already in the food supply.
- whatshisface 8y ago"Embrace ignorance or feel afraid" describes the situation for literally every significant problem.
- artursapek 8y agoIs this something a reverse-osmosis system can filter out at home?
- jxramos 8y agoI'm curious about that too. We use a RO system, and so far I've only replaced the carbon sediment filters. I'm a year or two away from replacing the RO membrane cartridge. I cut them open when I replace them, I always wanted to do some kind of chemical analyses of the filters. Visibly they're just brown and saturated with rust from old galvanized pipes our building uses.
- ohthanks 8y agoI think it's actually pretty hard to tell much from the membrane itself, my understanding is that most of the process is based in the membrane preferring the smaller water-only molecules and allowing the waste run off to carry away anything else. So they shouldn't really be catching much in the element. They fail either from the chlorine degrading the membrane film which will start allowing larger dissolved solids through (your TDS will increase) or by having the pores scale and plug over time which will slowly decrease the output.
- lvs 8y agoGranular activated carbon filters that meet NSF P473 test standards will work. http://www.nsf.org/newsroom/frequently-asked-questions-about-nsf-p473-and-perfluorochemicals http://www.nsf.org/newsroom/frequently-asked-questions-about...
- dbcurtis 8y agoRO doesn't catch everything, and are kind of a maintenance hassle. You need to be religious about changing the filters, back-flushing, etc. In the end, I decided it wasn't worth the hassle. We have a counter-top water distiller. It does 1 gallon at a time. Over the years, I've gone through 4 of these machines, I think. But I do trust the resulting water. (I don't mean to shill, but before someone asks, I have an earlier version of this one: https://waterwise.com/product/waterwise-3200-countertop-distiller/ https://waterwise.com/product/waterwise-3200-countertop-dist... )
- alexandercrohde 8y ago"Last November, she announced that areas around the Cottage Grove plant had elevated levels of some cancers including childhood cancers , and lower fertility. And, she said in court filings, 3M was to blame." - I wonder if chemicals are the cause of the 50% drop in male sperm count in developed countries [over the last 30 years].
- chinathrow 8y agoI wonder the same. Might these all be signs of the great filter at work? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Filter
- pmastela 8y agoSome scientists are putting your assumption to the test. Here's an HN discussion from a couple months back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17942744 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17942744
- hammock 8y agoThe answer is almost definitely yes, at least in great part. Furthermore, the top two killers in America are heart disease and cancer. 80% of heart disease is preventable by diet - avoiding foods that cause insulin resistance (sugar) and gut dysfunction (chemicals). The top cancer and many others are triggered by environmental variables (chemicals). And I know I am going to be downvoted for not citing, maybe someone who agrees can help back me up, and also for saying "chemicals" and there are people here who cringe because everything is chemicals and most chemicals are good, I want to be clear I'm talking about the bad chemicals here- PFCs like the ones in the article, heavy metals, other petroleum-derived baddies, and some others.
- village-idiot 8y agoDon’t forget seed oils!
- mr_toad 8y ago
- tomatotomato37 8y agoI'm having a hard time following this. Is this cancerous like asbestos is cancerous, or is this cancerous in the same way California says coffee is cancerous?
- maxton 8y agoIt's cancerous in the sense that a consultant for 3M called it "one of the strongest cancer promoters I’ve ever seen." (quote from TFA)
- resters 8y agoIt's nice to see the local officials concerned and doing something about the problem, but in many municipalities the local officials are part of the problem. I think that the mayor of every city should be required to eat a fish caught in the most polluted stream that runs through the city, and state governors should be required to eat a fish caught from the most polluted stream in the state. To wash it down, each should be required to drink a glass of water from the tap of the area of their jurisdiction with the dirtiest tap water. This should happen weekly so that the toxins create a real health concern for the officials ingesting them. We live in a world where most officials allow our natural resources and infrastructure to fail with impunity. This has to change. That we don't see local "watchdog" groups staging these sorts of tastings for television illustrates that the corruption spreads beyond the officials and into the media as well.
- mfoy_ 8y agoNow that is the definition of putting some skin in the game.
- kodablah 8y agoAlthough surely not serious, lots of naivete here. This assumes everyone values personal health over financial health. This prevents anyone from wanting to get elected to fix an existing problem. This places guilt even on the innocent if they are subjected to upstream or state-level pollution. On and on and on. You either have a problem with existing laws not being enforced or there not being laws to enforce concerning the issue. This happens in many other areas of concern too. It's going to require a citizenry that cares, though PR stunts always feel good on paper.
- rsync 8y ago"Although surely not serious ..." Not your parent but I took it seriously and I think "skin in the game" structures like this should be taken very seriously - they are likely the best mechanisms for aligning interests. "This assumes everyone values personal health over financial health." Very easy to solve this one - the elected official doesn't eat the fish and drink the water, their children do. "This prevents anyone from wanting to get elected to fix an existing problem." This is a good and important point - you would scare away potential candidates for office if existing systems are already broken/unsafe. I don't know how to arrange a neat solution to this.
- ksec 8y agoWhat are the current best Home Water Filter we could get? Are the Brita MAXTRA+ any good? And which one is the most affordable? ( We now need to paid extra money to get drinking water, in many ways I think this is backward as a society )
- lumberjack 8y agoYou can get a full blown Reverse Osmosis system. But it does deplete the water of all minerals.
- Jaepa 8y agoBrita's are pretty much unless unfortunately. As are most pitcher style filter systems. Faucet mounted systems are probably the easiest way to go (eg Pur), but better under the counter or household water filters do exist. Its also worth mentioning that there good chance that a water filter won't actually filter this out. Water treatment plants will often treat the water through multiple levels of filtration, reverse osmosis, UV treatment, ozone treatment, etc.
- driverdan 8y ago> Brita's are pretty much unless unfortunately. How do you figure that? They're the same carbon filters as found in the faucet systems.
- srj 8y agoThey're granulated. The good under sink filters are carbon block.
- Jaepa 8y agoThey are both carbon filters, but they are not the same. I got concerned about water quality (specifically lead) right before the Flint after doing some plumbing work in my apartment. After some digging I found a report detailing PPM before and after filtration. Brita's generally filtered less than 20 percent of containment with the exception of things like chlorine which naturally off gas. The faucet systems generally removed 80-90%.
- Canadauni 8y agoI find this interesting as in my undergrad I was working with a 3M supplied poly-fluorinated ether which was said to be a highly stable compound. We were breaking it apart with all manner of amine compounds producing various levels of HF and and HF2 along with poly-fluorinated amides that had a small amount of research mostly pointing to negative environmental impacts. Nothing really came of it as my reactions had no applications relevant to the goals of the lab I was working in.
- cjensen 8y agoNote that much of the background on this issue appears to be provided by the Environmental Working Group (EWG). They are an organization which frequently promotes their agenda through scaremongering scientific claims which are frequently flat-out wrong or misrepresented. The valid stuff in the article is the stuff where the Minnesota department of health altered their allowable limits based on published scientific concerns, and the town was over the limit. The other stuff... I can't tell the wheat from the chaff.
- OnlineCourage 8y agoI'm from Cottage Grove area, in fact my childhood dentist was there. None of this is news, it is a terrible legacy, Cottage Grove was not the only area contaminated, much of the entire Eastern Twin Cities suburbs have problems in the water with ongoing cleanup efforts. 3M is a chemical company, in essence. How much cancer did it cause? I don't know...some. While many Americans don't agree that climate change is an important issue, I think it's well accepted that just dumping chemicals is bad. I think the issue is whether it's in one's own back yard or not.
- atombender 8y agoThere was an excellent article in the NYT a couple of years ago about the fight against the PFAS industry (PFOA, etc.) [1]. The legal fight against DuPont, 3M and others has been going on for decades, and their environmental abuses have been going on since the 1950s. PFAS are scary, and they're absolutely everywhere. And every time a much-maligned pollutant such as PFOA or PFOS gets phased out or banned, a new fluorochemical takes it place that has more or less the same properties; same story all over again. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/magazine/the-lawyer-who-became-duponts-worst-nightmare.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/magazine/the-lawyer-who-b...
- nerdponx 8y agoDo alternatives even exist?
- hnmonkey 8y agoYes, they themselves produce alternatives but they have the same issues generally speaking as the original chemicals. As noted above they'll usually move to the new one because they've exhausted what they can get from the original and the new one isn't tainted by regulation/lawsuits/studies yet. The EPA isn't proactive about testing these things so it then takes time for people to study them and determine that they're not healthy for people and the cycle continues. Generally speaking though, things like teflon and such and the chemicals that make them up are probably always going to be bad for the endocrine system. I'm hopeful I'm wrong and we can find alternatives that aren't but the human body doesn't seem to do well with chemicals that make things hydrophobic/slippery/nonstick.
- flashman 8y agoI'm following this story because our local air force base (in Australia) used 3M firefighting foam for decades, and the run-off has contaminated residential properties, including creeks where people used to fish. The Australian government and Defence Force have basically tried to rely on 3M's health advice to tell everyone that their cancers aren't related to the chemicals, but nobody really trusts them.
- agumonkey 8y agoI believe we will need a great deal of nanoscale filters.
- viburnum 8y agoI'm a libertarian, and I believe in the free market above all else, so it's important to not regulate this, because whatever else happens will inevitably be worse.
- zkomp 8y agoDid you forget the sarcasm tag, or do you really equate free markets with the made up "freedom" of polluting the environment and give cancer to everyone who in turn will have to pay for health care or just die? That is not what free markets means...
- justtopost 8y agoThanks for strawmanning libertarians. This is why I don't tell everyone to vote. Many people dont have the time or means to be educated on the issues.
- vmh1928 8y agoThere is no contradiction between a "free market" and the government regulating the production of goods and services so that the harm caused by such production (and by the goods themselves,) is factored into the cost of production. We know (and this article is just one example of many,) that companies(and governments) will cut costs in every possible way. Whether by disposing of hazardous waste in Love Canal, the Hudson River(GE, IBM and who know who else,) or down dry wells in Phoenix, AZ(Motorola,) or buried in landfills all over the country (including Minn.,) or skimping on product safety or skimping on worker safety. While the pursuit of a Dollar, Pound, Euro or Rupee is and amazing motivating factor, regulating to mitigate the harm done is a valid government (and it is government, industry has shown itself hopeless at self-regulation without oversight,) function. This should include the global supply chain as well. Moving low cost production to Bangladesh often(always?) means low cost hazardous waste disposal.
- brohoolio 8y agoThere’s an auto supplier upstream of my town that was dumping PFAs into the drain. It’s containminated the whole river and all the lakes. The river is where my town gets our drinking water. They are installing carbon filters which should help. I use a carbon filter for all our water. The thing is we have a dixione plume approaching our water intake too. The parts per trillion is kinda mind blowing too. Take a large pool, let’s say 40,000 gallons. There’s 90,000 drops per gallon. So your pool is made of 3.6 billion drops of water. It takes .0036 drops of this stuff to raise your pools concentration to 1 part per trillion. That means a quarter of a drop of this stuff will turn the pool into something that is above EPA limits. It’s insane and mind blowing.
- RaceWon 8y ago15 years I ago I worked on the construction phase of a microchip manufacturing facility, well actually they were adding another separate plant to make gaming chips. The computer giant that owned the land and had done so much ecological damage to the water table they had to supply the town with city water. Dead birds could be found all over the rooftops, no worms or insects were in any of the soil near the plant. At the time I had no idea of the chemicals used to make chips but I do now, and it's TERRIFING. Here's a few off the top of my head: 100% ultra high purity Sulphuric acid, Hydrochloric Acid, Hydrofluoric Acid, Potassium Hydroxide, Arsine, Arsenic, Silane gas (my personal fav, it's deadly to breathe but that won't kill you because it typically explodes when it mixes with air), and also a patented chemical that the company named J1000... but we all called it 2 step because if you got even One drop on you--you'd take 2 steps and be dead. I worked there for just a few months... I was involved with the testing of the gasses some inert most were deadly though and could fuck you up just by touching your skin; one night I had a dream that a valve cabinet failed, and I tasted pink bubble gum--I woke up before I died in that dream. The next day I quit.
- ianai 8y agoDid anyone die while you worked there?
- onetimemanytime 8y agoNot the OP but all those things can't be good for you at all. The worst part is that it may happen 22 years later and just blame second hand smoke or something.
- ianai 8y agoVery true. My skin harshly reacts to many things that are just common place today. Don’t want to go near stuff like that. I fully back leaving a workplace like that. It’s sad our field relies on such harmful compounds.
- onetimemanytime 8y ago
- blablabla123 8y agoI wonder if you had been living in an area with production plants as a child for a while exposed to this whether this still has an effect in adulthood.