Via WI Examiner:

Wisconsin’s Natural Resources Board (NRB) voted 6-1 Wednesday to impose limits for PFAS, PFOA, and PFOS chemicals in drinking water, set at 70 parts per trillion (ppt), far from the 20ppt recommended by the Department of Health Services. The lower limit was rejected by the board, with board members pointing to high costs associated with replacing and treating wells. Environmental advocates are decrying the decision as hazardous to people who consume affected drinking water throughout the state.

“Everyone in Wisconsin has a right to drink clean water and eat the fish they catch,” said Clean Wisconsin water program director Scott Laeser. “The Natural Resources Board’s action today to approve surface water and modified drinking water standards is an incomplete but important step down the long road we must all walk together to fix this mess.” While setting standards of any kind is a positive, Laeser stressed that “by voting down groundwater standards, the board failed to protect the tens of thousands of Wisconsin rural families who draw their water from private wells. The drinking water rule passed by the NRB today will only apply to municipal water systems.”