A U.S. Navy official made a stunning admission last month, one that residents and Suffolk County officials had already suspected. For over a year the Navy withheld from the public test results that found dangerously high levels of the chemical PFOS in fish and the waters in Swan Pond near the former Naval Weapons Industrial Reserve Plant in Calverton.
In the wake of pressure from Suffolk County to clean up numerous environmental issues emanating from the former Grumman plant in Calverton, consultants for the U.S. Navy have unveiled a plan to capture a groundwater plume of the emerging contaminants PFAS that is believed to be spreading toward a nearby lake and the Peconic River.
The Trump administration announced plans this week to roll back portions of the nation’s first federal drinking water standards for PFAS chemicals, drawing criticism from environmental advocates on Long Island who say the move weakens protections for communities already grappling with groundwater contamination.
The Town of Brookhaven has released its plan to address a toxic groundwater plume spreading from the Brookhaven Landfill — but environmental advocates say the proposal does little to actually clean up the contamination.
This is a tale about unintended consequences in science, governmental malfunction affecting Suffolk County, and a mammoth spread, globally, of poison.
It began in 1938. As the website Health Brief related last week: “A chemist at the DuPont company accidentally discovered an exciting new polymer. It repelled water, it was chemically stable and nonreactive, and nothing stuck to it. The material — brand name: Teflon — has been used in countless consumer products since then to reduce friction between surfaces. Among its best-known applications is in nonstick cookware. … In the past few decades, however, the chemicals that go into nonstick surfaces have been linked to certain health issues and environmental pollution.”
After the U.S. Navy refused to allow the Suffolk County Health Department to present the results of its testing of wells surrounding plumes of contaminated groundwater from the former Navy-owned Grumman plant in Calverton at the February meeting of the Calverton Restoration Advisory Board (RAB), county representatives and members of the RAB took matters into their own hands Tuesday evening.
This guest essay reflects the views of Adrienne Esposito, the executive director of Citizens Campaign for the Environment, an advocacy organization based on Long Island.
I've spent decades fighting water contamination on Long Island. I've sat with families who found PFAS in their well water and helped communities and water districts scramble to obtain funding for expensive treatment systems. I've testified for congressional hearings to increase the understanding that PFAS, commonly called "forever chemicals," aren't a hypothetical threat — they are a daily, sickening reality for millions of Americans.
It was the first week of spring and Deborah Harris, of Riverhead, was visiting her local garden center, where she picked up two bags of fertilizer that she was told worked like a charm to keep deer off her hosta plants.
But after being advised to read the label for the product, Harris discovered the origins of the product were a sewage treatment facility in the Midwest, including the disclosure that it contained biosolids, one of the byproducts of waste treatment.
In a virtual presentation on March 6, environmental scientists and advocates broke down how long-lasting per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances have infiltrated Long Island produce. Citizens Campaign for the Environment Executive Director Adrienne Esposito along with other experts arranged a study focusing on how these “forever chemicals” impact Long Island farmland.
The Citizens Campaign for the Environment (CCE) hosted a webinar last Thursday, March 5, to discuss the impacts of toxic PFAS chemicals in New York, where scholars discussed their findings regarding the detection of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) on locally grown produce on Long Island.
The online panel follows a collaborative study between Stony Brook University, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) and Citizens Campaign for the Environment, according to the CCE website. The discussion featured PEER director of Science Policy Dr. Kyla Bennett, CCE executive director Adrienne Esposito, Stony Brook University professor Dr. Lokesh Padhye and research consultant Dr. Seven Lasee.
Suffolk County Legislator Steven Englebright (D-Setauket) invited Citizens Campaign for the Environment co-founder Adrienne Esposito and CCE board and staff members to the Suffolk County Legislature’s Nov. 25th General Meeting to honor them for 40 years of advocacy. Presiding Officer Kevin McCaffrey (R-Lindenhurst) joined Englebright at the podium, where the CCE team received a proclamation along with flowers and balloons.
No place could be more impacted than Nassau County by the EPA’s decision to postpone by two years the deadline for water utilities to comply with new federal water standards for PFAS until 2031.
These chemicals are dangerous, having been linked to a large number of illnesses – kidney cancer, testicular cancer, high cholesterol, immune suppression, thyroid disease, and pregnancy complications.
Despite widespread PFAS contamination on Long Island, SCWA delivers treated water with no PFOA or PFOS above federal limits.
The Suffolk County Water Authority announced today that all treated water it supplies to customers is in full compliance with the federal drinking water standards for PFOA and PFOS—six years ahead of the 2031 compliance deadline set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
New York State has awarded another $5 million grant to the Port Washington Water District to build a granular activated carbon treatment system designed to remove PFOA and PFOS contamination from another of its wells.
The grant will help the water district, which serves about 9,400 households, provide “water that meets or exceeds any standard out there” for removing PFOA and PFOS chemicals, district superintendent Paul Prignano said in an interview.
EPA administrator Lee Zeldin, a former Shirley congressman who spoke on Long Island last month, said the delayed deadline offers “common-sense flexibility in the form of additional time for compliance.” Credit: Newsday/Howard Schnapp
The Trump administration plans to rescind the federal limits on four "forever chemicals" in drinking water and delay the deadline for compliance for two others, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced Wednesday, weakening regulations of toxic contaminants that have been found in Long Island's water.
