-- Shares Facebook Twitter Reddit Email view in app Grist is a nonprofit, independent media organization dedicated to telling stories of climate solutions and a just future. It's late October in the northeast corner of Wisconsin. Trees have started to change colors and a colder wind whips across Lake Michigan.
Gas station marquees welcome back fall hunters on their annual pilgrimage. Tucked away at a technical college, citizens of the rural town of Peshtigo, population 4,006, try to get comfortable in plastic chairs, ready to hear from state officials, once again, about ways they may one day safely drink their home's well water. Cindy Boyle, the town's board chair, is there with her husband, Chuck, one row up from the back.
Cindy recently took to the political arena after years of cooking and cleaning with just bottled water. Across the room, Jeff Budish, an avid angler and outdoorsman, waits to speak. He's footed thousands of dollars buying his own bottled water and water filters; he also just wants to be able to fish safely.
A few rows up from him sits Doug Oitzinger, a founding member of a local clean water advocacy group, taking diligent notes. If a clear solution was sought by those in attendance at the state's most recent in-person Peshtigo PFAS meeting, residents walked away empty handed. Officials told residents that plans to provide new groundwater wells are coming from the company responsible for the pollution, but not everyone gets a well.
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, or DNR, employees spoke at length about new data from water testing, but, without clear guidance from both the state and the federal government, and the mounting costs of providing alternative drinking water, officials' hands are tied. Boyle, the town supervisor, said the DNR was doing everything in their limited power to help, but the company responsible is "uncooperative. " The entrance of Johnson Control's Ansul Fire Technology Center can be seen in Marinette, Wisconsin, just outside of the town of Peshtigo.
Previously known as Ansul, the company produced firefighting foam for decades in the region. Grist / John McCracken Residents in Peshtigo are exposed to dangerously high levels of a group of toxins known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, in their groundwater, the source of their drinking water. PFAS are called " forever chemicals " because they are hard to break down in the environment.
They're also linked to high blood pressure in middle-aged women and stunted developmental growth in children, as well as kidney and testicular cancers . Peshtigo's PFAS problems stem from a local manufacturing facility that produces firefighting foam — a source of the chemicals so toxic that the Department of Defense recently banned their use. Over decades, a plume of PFAS spread through the community's vast groundwater networks.
Now, residents in this rural part of Wisconsin are forced to use bottled water to cook, clean, and drink until officials find ways to lower the chemicals' concentrations. The chemicals can be found everywhere: outdoor clothing , cosmetics , beef , rain , and even your blood . Cities from California to North Carolina have wrestled with contamination, with nearly every state having some form of pollution from these toxins and many now banning PFAS in all products sold within their borders.
At the start of this year alone, communities in Washington State , Massachusetts , and along the Mississippi River have reported elevated PFAS levels in groundwater and drinking water. The chemicals will take forever to break down in their environment, and if the rural town of Peshtigo is any indicator, the cleanup process will be just as long and arduous. Without enforceable standards from the federal level, states are scrambling to set their own standards and clean up procedures, a process that is often mired in politics.
"There was always a looming comment of 'There's something in the water. '" –Craig Koller, who grew up in Peshtigo, Wisconsin Peshtigo residents are torn over their options for getting clean water, which include the possibility of being absorbed into a nearby city and its public utilities, digging new wells at the expense of the company responsible, or building a brand new water utility system for Peshtigo itself. Hundreds of households are living on bottled water and water filtration systems.
The town, state, and individuals have sued the company responsible. Budish told Grist what he wants is simple: "What I'm looking for is clean water. " But when PFAS are found in thousands of products, used in a variety of industries, and are now polluting every city in the country, determining who is responsible for the contamination and how it will be cleaned up gets messy.
In 2017, the state learned that Tyco, a subsidiary of global chemical conglomerate Johnson Controls International and one of the largest employers in the region, had been discharging PFAS into local streams and ditches in the region. According to state records , Tyco knew about these elevated levels at least four years earlier and failed to warn residents. "This community has not been treated fairly," Boyle told Grist.
The pollution stems from Tyco's operations at a fire testing center that operated from the 1960s to 2017. This facility is located on the southern edge of the city of Marinette, roughly a mile from the town of Peshtigo. Grist First responders and military personnel would light planes, automobiles, and other heavy-duty equipment on fire at a location near the area high school, and then test the fire-suppressant foam Tyco sold.
Afterward, gallons of foam would be washed away off the pavement into nearby streams where it would seep into the surrounding groundwater, eventually making its way into Peshtigo drinking wells. Tyco also has found elevated levels of the chemicals in groundwater near a Johnson Controls chemical production plant, known locally as the Stanton Street plant, in the city of Marinette on the Lake Michigan shore. With PFAS present, Marinette residents are cautioned against recreation and fishing in local waterways, but their drinking water is safer than their neighbors as Marinette draws its municipal water from Lake Michigan.
Founded in 1915 as Ansul Corporation, the company had been making fire suppression technology in the area since 1934 . It eventually merged with the publicly traded Johnson Controls International in 2016. Tyco still tests the firefighting foam at its facility in the region, but these tests are now done indoors, company officials told Grist, and all foam and water used are captured and disposed of properly.
Johnson Controls International has been working on bringing a PFAS-free foam to market, but the product is not available yet. But these new testing procedures don't erase decades of PFAS pollution into area streams. Town of Peshtigo residents living near the testing facility have cited ongoing health problems , such as stomach cancers and developmental delays in children, that they believe to be linked to years of drinking PFAS-contaminated water.
Craig Koller, who grew up drinking Peshtigo well water, was diagnosed with two forms of testicular cancer right after he graduated high school. He said he's seen classmates with the same cancer, and friends' parents with stomach cancers and immunity disorders, all of which are linked to prolonged exposure to the chemicals. "There was always a looming comment of 'There's something in the water','" Koller told Grist.
Since his initial diagnosis, he estimates he's had hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of invasive treatments and surgeries, and is spending at least $1,200 a year on his weekly, post-surgical testosterone treatment. Koller, who now lives in the suburbs of Milwaukee, said the response from Tyco has been disingenuous and help at the local, state, and federal level has been disjointed. "Normally FEMA [or the Federal Emergency Management Agency] would come in if a flood wiped out an entire community," Koller said.
"But this response is not conducive to helping people move on with their lives. " The area has been severely impacted by PFAS contamination, with levels of the chemicals found reaching astronomical numbers over the state standards. Concentrated, PFAS-filled foam, which looks like a pillowy, toxic cloud, has been found throughout the region's waterways.
DNR testing has found levels of the chemicals as high as 750,000 parts per trillion, or ppt, for the foam that sits on top of surface water. Some of the area's creeks have reported levels as high as 3,800 ppt. Groundwater wells closest to the facility have reported concentrations of roughly 2,100 ppt, or 30 times the state's drinking water standards.
Nearly 10 miles away from the fire testing facility, wells have tested positive for chemical levels over five times the state regulations. A sign in Peshtigo warns of the dangers of touching and consuming the area's water. The area's creeks and groundwater have tested for PFAS upwards of 3,800 parts per trillion, or ppt, of the various chemicals.
This level is over 54 times the state's drinking water standard. Grist / John McCracken Wisconsin recently established a drinking water standard of 70 ppt, which affects municipal water utilities. But this doesn't change much for Peshtigo, or the other nearly third of the state that relies on groundwater for drinking.
Groundwater standards are being reviewed again this year after political football struck them down last year. The state created a grant program for replacing contaminated private wells last year, including those impacted by PFAS, and Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, a Democrat, recently announced a 2023 budget proposal that would invest $100 million in PFAS cleanup across the state . This budget, however, has to make it through the state's Republican majority.
At the federal level, the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, has found that basically no consumption of these chemicals is safe. The agency is in the midst of a review of its practices and regulations of drinking water standards for the chemicals. Currently, there is no national standard for PFAS in drinking water.
Peshtigo residents have urged federal officials to declare the fire testing facility and the Stanton Street plant as a Superfund site, which would allow the EPA to clean up the site on Tyco's dime. The agency said it is still reviewing the petition, which noted that the sites are a threat to human health and the environment after half a century of firefighting foam testing went unregulated. The EPA told Grist that it expects to respond to the petition by March of this year.
To Liz Hitchcock, director of federal policy for Toxic-Free Future , a national consumer safety nonprofit that studies and advocates for PFAS cleanup in various industries, the federal government isn't moving quickly enough. Most federal responses, she noted, have been prompted by a bubbling up of state-level action. "This is not a problem that's happening in isolation," Hitchcock told Grist.
"It's happening all over the country because PFAS chemicals have been in use for years without adequate regulation. " Because of the ubiquitous use of these chemicals, the federal response has varied by different agencies, from the military to the Food and Drug Administration. "There are so many uses of PFAS," Hitchcock said.
"It's not just an issue of cleaning it up, but preventing the problem in the first place. " Johnson Controls acknowledges its role in the contamination and has pledged to fix the problem for the area's most impacted residents. Katie McGinty is Johnson Controls International's Chief Sustainability Officer and a former environmental advisor to the Clinton administration.
"Tyco takes full responsibility for the impact of the water of these 169 neighbors from our historic activities," she said. This 169 number, however, is controversial. According to McGinty, Tyco currently provides water filtration systems and bottled water for those homes because they fall within what is known as the "potable well sampling area," or PWSA: a sliver of the town that both the company and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, or DNR, agree that Tyco polluted.
The company has also constructed a $25 million Groundwater Extraction & Treatment System to remove the chemicals from the groundwater surrounding the fire testing facility. Outside of that, the two can't agree on much. Since the public announcement of the contamination, the DNR has conducted tests to study the spread of the contamination throughout the area's groundwater systems.
Forever chemicals have been found at elevated levels outside of the area Tyco takes responsibility for, a region known as the "expanded site area. " Tyco is required to complete a site investigation to define the degree and extent of contamination related to its discharges of PFAS. In a statement, the DNR said results from Tyco's completed site investigation, which the agency monitors, will be used to determine the company's responsibility.
Results are expected to be released this spring. McGinty denies the company's responsibility for these additional properties, arguing that the widespread prevalence of PFAS from various industries and consumer behaviors could have also played a role in contaminating groundwater in these expanded sites. "We hope that the DNR will take action to determine and stop the sources of PFAS in that area, but Tyco is not the source," McGinty said.
Last year, the Wisconsin Department of Justice filed an environmental enforcement lawsuit against the company for alleged failure to adhere to the state's hazardous spill laws. "It's not just an issue of cleaning it up, but preventing the problem in the first place. " – Liz Hitchcock, director of federal policy, Toxic-Free Future As the back and forth of enforcement and corporate finger-pointing unfurls in legal battles and slow testing, residents that live outside the agreed-upon contamination area are on their own.
Budish, the angler from the Peshtigo town meeting, has lived at his property for 30 years, just off a state highway tucked behind rows of thick pine trees that stretch for miles, where neighbors get around using four-wheelers. He lives outside of Tyco's recognized area, but his drinking water is contaminated. He's paid for private testing on his property and found high PFAS levels in his private well water, nearly 10 miles from the fire facility and even farther from the other plant, prompting him and his wife to buy their own bottled water for cooking and consumption for the past five years.
Speaking at the October meeting, he said he wonders if the ponds, creeks, and ditches surrounding his property on the outskirts of Peshtigo are also contaminated, but so far, he's only been able to afford to test his groundwater drinking well. He told Grist he estimates that he's spent at least $100 a month on bottled water for the past five years. He has also purchased a water filtration system, which can range between $1,000 and $3,000.
Budish, wearing
