Senator Shaheen Secures Federal Funds for PFAS Efforts in NH

U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen from New Hampshire initiated and supported numerous measures in recently-approved federal legislation which will bring needed funds to the State to deal with its per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) challenges. Senator Shaheen is a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee serving alongside other New England State Senators Susan Collins from Maine, Patrick Leahy from Vermont, Christopher Murphy from Connecticut, and Jack Reed from Rhode Island. Senator Leahy will be the Chair of the Committee for the upcoming 118th Congress.

According to a press release from her office, Senator Shaheen helped add more than $50 million to support funding for research, addressing PFAS contamination, and undertaking regulatory actions at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) related to PFAS and other contaminants of emerging concern. This includes an additional $2.7 million for the USGS to continue work to examine and test PFAS substances in watersheds and aquifers. This funding will support EPA’s research and regulatory work to establish water standards for PFAS, as well as $20 million to support the state’s efforts to address PFAS through remediation and cleanup.

Senator Shaheen has spearheaded important efforts in Congress to better understand PFAS health impacts as well as respond to major chemical exposures and remediate polluted sites. According to her office, Senator Shaheen successfully fought to include $15 million to continue the PFAS health impact study that she created in the 2018 NDAA and worked to include $205 million for PFAS remediation. The Senator has seen to it that legislation includes $1 million in funding for new grants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to support the development of education courses on best practices for physicians who are caring for patients with significant PFAS exposure. With respect to PFAS health impacts, she continues to encourage the Veterans Administration to create a PFAS Registry for service members exposed to PFAS through aqueous film forming foam (AFFF) used to fight fires on military installations like New Hampshire’s former Pease Air Force Base, now home to the New Hampshire Air National Guard. Senator Shaheen has led efforts in Congress to phase out use PFAS-containing fire-fighting foams by the Department of Defense.