Canada wants cities to start filtering toxic forever chemicals from public drinking water, but that’s no easy feat (newsinteractives.cbc.ca)

submitted 1 week ago by RandAlThor@lemmy.ca to c/canada@lemmy.ca

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[-] Thedogdrinkscoffee@lemmy.ca 18 points 1 week ago

Have we stopped the global production of PFAS? It is non-biogradable and thus cumulative in the environment and due to earth's natural hydrological cycle, it doesn't respect borders.

Filtering our drinking water while not banning it entirely and leading the charge to a global ban is just whistling past the graveyard.

[-] Badabinski@kbin.earth 7 points 1 week ago

Banning the production of all PFAS will take time. There are no alternatives to Teflon in many contexts, and many medical devices would simply not work if not for Teflon. A hard and immediate end to PFAS production would be devastating for medical care. It's a bit of a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.

[-] Thedogdrinkscoffee@lemmy.ca 13 points 1 week ago

True, but medical devices are probably very very minor sources of pollution compared to textiles and firefighting foam. 80/20 rule is a clear step forward. Let's not artificially invent uneccessary arguments to stall progress.

[-] Badabinski@kbin.earth 5 points 1 week ago

I'm all for phasing out PFAS, especially in textiles. I want the firefighting foam gone too, now that effective alternatives have been developed. I apologize if I misunderstood your intent. I just read this as calling for all complete and immediate halt to all PFAS production, which includes Teflon and its manufacturing aids: