[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.A.S.C. No. 116-89]
ADDRESSING THE LEGACY OF
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE USE OF PFAS:
PROTECTING OUR COMMUNITIES AND IMPLEMENTING REFORM
__________
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
SEPTEMBER 15, 2020
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
47-046 WASHINGTON : 2022
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SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS
JOHN GARAMENDI, California, Chairman
TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado
ANDY KIM, New Jersey, Vice Chair AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia
KENDRA S. HORN, Oklahoma JOE WILSON, South Carolina
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania ROB BISHOP, Utah
JASON CROW, Colorado MIKE ROGERS, Alabama
XOCHITL TORRES SMALL, New Mexico MO BROOKS, Alabama
ELISSA SLOTKIN, Michigan ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York
VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas JACK BERGMAN, Michigan
DEBRA A. HAALAND, New Mexico
Jeanine Womble, Professional Staff Member
John Muller, Professional Staff Member
Sean Falvey, Clerk
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Garamendi, Hon. John, a Representative from California, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Readiness...................................... 1
WITNESSES
Nelson, Herbert H., Director, Strategic Environmental Research
and Development Program and Environmental Security Technology
Certification Program, Department of Defense................... 5
Sullivan, Maureen, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for
Environment.................................................... 4
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Garamendi, Hon. John......................................... 29
Nelson, Herbert H............................................ 38
Sullivan, Maureen............................................ 31
Documents Submitted for the Record:
Prepared Statement of Terry M. Rauch, Acting Deputy Assistant
Secretary of Defense for Health Readiness Policy and
Oversight, Office of the Secretary of Defense.............. 47
Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:
[The information was not available at the time of printing.]
Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:
Ms. Houlahan................................................. 55
Ms. Torres Small............................................. 55
ADDRESSING THE LEGACY OF DEPARTMENT OF
DEFENSE USE OF PFAS: PROTECTING OUR COMMUNITIES AND IMPLEMENTING REFORM
----------
House of Representatives,
Committee on Armed Services,
Subcommittee on Readiness,
Washington, DC, Tuesday, September 15, 2020.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 1:05 p.m., in
Room 2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John Garamendi
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN GARAMENDI, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM
CALIFORNIA, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON READINESS
Mr. Garamendi. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, I call this
committee of the Readiness Subcommittee to order. I have to do
the boilerplate so stand by. I will do it as quickly as I
possibly can.
I would like to welcome the members who are joining today's
markup remotely. Those members are reminded that they must be
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that their time is up.
Doug, did I complete my work?
Thank you, Doug.
Now, following this meeting and before the next meeting, we
will ask all of the members participating in the hearing to
repeat verbatim what I have written because you have heard it
enough times to have memorized it.
Okay, deep breath and move on to the real hearing.
With these administrative remarks out of the way, I move on
to the substance of the hearing.
The scourge of contamination from PFAS [per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances] and PFOA [perfluorooctanoic acid]
and other perfluorinated compounds is being experienced by
communities across the country and, indeed, around the world.
Our constituents are worried. They are afraid that they are
being poisoned by their drinking water or that PFAS is going to
contaminate their livestock or produce and impact their ability
to earn a living and support their families.
This is not a partisan issue. Communities in my district
surrounding Travis and Beale Air Force Base are dealing with
DOD [Department of Defense]-originated PFAS contamination and
the fear and anxiety of going with not knowing what that means
for their health or how long they will have to wait for
polluters--in this case, the military--to clean up the
contamination.
I know that many members of this committee on both sides of
the aisle represent communities with similar concerns. While
the task of addressing PFAS contamination must eventually fall
on all polluters, this committee's mandate is to ensure that
the Department of Defense is acting to address its legacy of
contamination. The Department must keep faith with communities
that host its installations and that are now being asked to
shoulder this contamination burden.
With this history in mind, we have required DOD to phase
out AFFF [aqueous film forming foam] by 2024. This is the
firefighting foam. We are not blind to the enormity of this
task, but with the focus provided by a looming deadline we are
confident that with the Department's resources they can find a
solution that protects both our communities and the aircrews
and shipmates who rely upon the protection currently provided
by AFFF.
We are confident this year's NDAA [National Defense
Authorization Act] also aims to increase the transparency by
requiring the Department of Defense to publish on a public
website the results of drinking water and groundwater testing
conducted on military installations or former defense sites and
to notify the congressional defense committees when there has
been an uncontrolled release of PFAS-containing firefighting
agents. We also established a prize program to incentivize
research into viable replacement agents and authorized
additional funding for cleanup and research into PFAS disposal
technologies.
Now I look forward to this hearing from the witnesses about
the Department's ongoing efforts to develop solutions to the
myriad of problems presented by these forever chemicals and how
the Department is implementing the requirements of the fiscal
year 2020 NDAA to address the Department's PFAS legacy impacts
on human health and the environment.
With that, Mr. Lamborn, I believe you are remote, so, Doug,
it is your turn. Welcome, and thank you for joining us
remotely.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Garamendi can be found in
the Appendix on page 29.]
Mr. Garamendi. Well, Doug, you are not with us.
Mr. Brooks. Yo, over here.
Mr. Garamendi. Mr. Brooks, I understand you are the stand-
in.
Mr. Brooks. I am the stand-in.
Mr. Garamendi. So it is all yours.
Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Chairman Garamendi. My remarks will
be very brief. Ranking Member Lamborn and many of our GOP
[Republican Party] members are at a signing ceremony for the
Abraham Accords at the White House and should be joining us
shortly.
I thank our witnesses for their testimony. You, not me, are
who we want to hear from today. So with that I conclude my
remarks with, let's get to it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield
back.
Mr. Garamendi. Without objection, the remarks of Mr.
Lamborn or other members that are not with us at the moment
will be entered into the record. So ordered.
Let me introduce our witnesses.
First, Maureen Sullivan, Deputy Assistant Secretary of
Defense for Environment. You have a fascinating record, some 40
years of participation in environmental issues at the
Department. You and I were having a conversation earlier. I
think we may have worked together in the late 1990s in the run-
up to the Kyoto Climate Conference.
Also joining us is Dr. Herb Nelson, Director of Strategic
Environmental Research and Development Program and
Environmental Security Technology Certification Program.
I understand that Dr. Rauch will not be able to join us.
The edict coming from the White House is that all witnesses
must testify in person and Dr. Rauch has a health problem which
prevents him from venturing out into such contaminated places
as the House of Representatives hearing room and will not be
joining us.
I want to make it very, very clear that this committee
leadership believes that that requirement from the White House
is incorrect. It denies the Congress the opportunity to obtain
valuable information. Dr. Rauch has a specific task as the
Assistant Secretary of Health Readiness Policy and Oversight.
We will not be able to have his testimony today. And, however,
we do have his written testimony and, without objection, that
will be entered into the congressional record.
Hearing no objection, so ordered.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Rauch can be found in the
Appendix on page 47.]
Mr. Garamendi. So let us move on. One more thing before I
move on to the testimony of Ms. Sullivan, I want to say happy
birthday to Dr. Nelson. It is your birthday today. Thank you
for coming across the river and joining us, Doctor. I will
await your testimony.
Ms. Sullivan, you go first.
STATEMENT OF MAUREEN SULLIVAN, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
DEFENSE FOR ENVIRONMENT
Ms. Sullivan. Chairman Garamendi, Ranking Member Lamborn,
Mr. Brooks, sir, and distinguished members of the subcommittee,
I am Maureen Sullivan, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of
Defense for Environment. My portfolio includes policy and
oversight of DOD's programs to comply with environmental laws
such as the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Comprehensive
Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act,
CERCLA.
I want to thank this subcommittee for the opportunity to
discuss per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. We believe DOD has
been leading the way to address these substances. Over the last
4 years, DOD has committed substantial resources and taken
action to respond to concerns with PFAS. In July 2019, as one
of his first actions, Secretary Esper stood up a task force to
provide strategic leadership and direction to ensure a
coordinated, aggressive, holistic approach on DOD-wide efforts
to proactively address PFAS.
CERCLA provides a consistent approach across the Nation for
cleanup. DOD, like other Federal agencies, is specifically
authorized under CERCLA section 104 to take actions to address
pollutants or contaminants like PFAS regardless of a CERCLA
hazardous substance designation. DOD's priority is to quickly
address PFAS and PFOA in drinking water above EPA's
[Environmental Protection Agency's] lifetime health advisory
where DOD is a known source. DOD actions are consistent with
EPA recommendations. DOD prioritizes sites for action using the
longstanding CERCLA risk-based process ``worst first.''
These known or suspected PFAS release areas are in various
stages of assessment, investigation, and cleanup. To prevent
further releases to the environment, DOD limits the use of
aqueous film forming foam, AFFF, to responses to emergency
events and no longer uses it for land-based testing and
training.
The Department treats each release of AFFF as a spill
response. Currently available AFFF meets the military
specification, contains PFOS [perfluorooctanesulfonic acid] but
does not contain PFOS or PFOA above the 800 parts per billion
limit of quantitation. None of the commercially available PFAS-
free foams meet DOD's strict safety standards. The Department
is working aggressively to meet the requirements of the fiscal
year 2020 NDAA related to AFFF; however, this is a formidable
task. There are many circumstances where we use AFFF, so we
have been identifying those situations and evaluating what
needs to be done. We have an inventory of facilities with
installed AFFF systems. Our fire protection engineers are
documenting the viable options and criteria per facility type,
determining the best approaches in developing funding
requirements and implementation schedules. The Department has
identified over 200 airports--Active, Reserve, and National
Guard--that are joint use airports.
These airports have a mixture of emergency response
services with almost all currently using AFFF. We are
partnering with the Federal Aviation Administration to ensure
that these airports, ours and the commercial airports, maintain
the current level of protection for passengers, crews, and
equipment.
It is important to note that mutual aid is a cornerstone of
fire and emergency services. Providing mutual aid can involve
the use of AFFF. These emergencies range beyond aircraft
crashes to include overturned vehicles, large industrial fires,
or large structural fires. We need to maintain these levels of
firefighting support and understand the feasibility of using
alternative foams in the future.
In summary, DOD is taking actions to reduce the risks of
PFAS. Our efforts reinforce DOD's commitment to meeting
critical mission requirements while protecting human health and
the environment. DOD recognizes that this is a national
challenge involving a wide array of industries, commercial
applications, as well as many Federal and State agencies.
Therefore, it needs a nationwide solution.
We look forward to working with you as you move forward.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Sullivan can be found in the
Appendix on page 31.]
Mr. Garamendi. Thank you very much for your testimony. Your
written testimony provides a lot more detail and I will bring
that to the attention of the committee members and the general
public.
I will repeat that. Thank you for your testimony. It is
very complete. Your written testimony provides even more detail
and I would advise members of the public who are interested to
look at your written testimony. There will be questions, of
course.
Dr. Nelson.
STATEMENT OF HERBERT H. NELSON, DIRECTOR, STRATEGIC
ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM AND
ENVIRONMENTAL SECURITY TECHNOLOGY CERTIFICATION PROGRAM,
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Dr. Nelson. Chairman Garamendi, Mr. Brooks, and
distinguished members of the subcommittee, so as the chairman
said, my name is Herb Nelson. I am the director of DOD's
Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program which
often is called SERDP and that is executed in partnership with
the Department of Energy and the EPA, and also the director of
the Environmental Security Technology Certification Program
which is often called ESTCP because there is no real good way
to say that acronym.
So these are DOD's environmental research, development, and
demonstration programs and our mission is to improve DOD's
environmental performance, reduce cost, and enhance and sustain
mission capabilities. I would like to thank Congress for the
many years of very generous support for these programs and I
would like to thank this subcommittee for the opportunity to
discuss the PFAS and AFFF problem that we are going to talk
about today.
SERDP and ESTCP are leading DOD's R&D [research and
development] response to these issues and we do that through
funding individual research projects that are led by academics,
people in industry, people at DOD laboratories and other
Federal agencies. These projects range from small-scale
laboratory studies up to large-scale, almost pilot-scale
demonstrations at DOD facilities, so we span the gamut from
basic research through almost operational scale.
SERDP initiated research into the fate, transporting, and
remediation of PFOS and PFOA shortly after the EPA released its
provisional health advisory in 2009. It became clear pretty
early on in this that this was a much more complex problem than
many of the contaminants that we have dealt with in the past,
so our research program has expanded into, really, four areas
covering all of the scope of PFAS. That is sampling and
analysis, fate, transport, and characterization of the
compounds themselves, ecotoxicity of these compounds, and
remediation, of course; the goal at the end, of course, is
remediation.
Similarly, in the AFFF area, we have a four-prong line of
approach to that also. We are looking to develop new PFAS
reformulations. We are looking to demonstrate the performance
of both commercially available and developmental formulations
in large-scale tests where we can really document the
performance of PFAS-free materials. We are also looking at the
ecotoxicity of these potential replacement compounds.
And, finally, one that maybe is a less well thought of, we
are looking at strategies for cleaning out the firefighting
hardware. If we change over to a PFAS-free material, we
obviously have to get it cleaned up in the hardware so we don't
have to bear the price of replacing all the hardware. All of
these efforts that we are working on are coordinated closely
with our colleagues in the military departments, the EPA, FAA
[Federal Aviation Administration], NASA [National Aeronautics
and Space Administration], and also a number of international
partners, and we do this through twice-yearly program reviews
for each of these projects and periodic workshops where we all
get together and talk about the issues.
So in summary, I think we have established a wide-ranging
research and development program. We are confident that SERDP
supported research and development will make a significant
contribution to the solutions of this problem that is a
national problem. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Nelson can be found in the
Appendix on page 38.]
Mr. Garamendi. I thank you very much, Doctor.
Normally, questions would go to--for my opportunity first,
followed by Mr. Lamborn. I don't know if, Mr. Brooks, do you
want to take up questions or do you want to await Mr. Lamborn's
arrival?
Mr. Brooks. I am happy to go ahead and get my questions in.
Mr. Garamendi. Why don't you do that.
Mr. Brooks. With the chair's permission.
Mr. Garamendi. Before you do that, I am going to yield my
questions to Ms. Slotkin and she can take my time. And when her
time eventually arrives, I will take my turn then.
Ms. Slotkin.
Ms. Slotkin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you to our witnesses for being here. You know from
our previous meetings that there is a lot of us who care a lot
about this issue and I know that puts you in a tough spot
because you are trying to navigate between the Department of
Defense where I used to work and the communities who are really
dealing with this problem.
I represent a community that has a number of PFOS
contamination sites. People can't eat the fish from the rivers.
They can't let their dogs or their children touch the foam that
is coming up on their beachfront property. And they are
concerned about their drinking water. So it is something that
is pretty serious for our community. And in our last NDAA, we
were able to pass six provisions on PFAS that the chairman went
through.
The question I have is on an issue we have discussed, Ms.
Sullivan, about adhering to the strictest possible standard
when it comes to cleanup, State versus Federal. And in our
State, we just promulgated a new, more stringent standard which
is quite different from the EPA standards. And I know when we
talked when you were generous enough to come to my office about
your concerns about that provision, but could you elaborate for
the communities that are living--why can't the Department of
Defense clean up PFAS up to the most stringent standards, given
the health implications?
Ms. Sullivan. Well, let me clarify, ma'am.
Ms. Slotkin. Of course.
Ms. Sullivan. So as part of the CERCLA process, the State
standards do come in as part of the cleanup decision.
Ms. Slotkin. Right.
Ms. Sullivan. So when we get to the remedy selection, the
State standards play an integral role in that remedy selection.
So, ultimately--it is called an ARARs, applicable and relevant
and--I always get this wrong--applicable and relevant,
required, appropriate standards--so the State standard, the
Michigan standard, will come in, actually, in the remedy
selection when we get to that phase of the process. Absolutely.
Ms. Slotkin. Yeah. I understand that. But factoring it in
and having to live by it are very different things. And in our
experience of sort of these painstaking and somewhat painful
negotiations on some of--around some of our retired military
bases in Michigan, you may have considered that standard but
not used it in the end. And we haven't seen any movement by the
Department of Defense to do anything other than the EPA
standard.
So I guess my question is, wouldn't it just be easy enough
to replace the EPA's Federal standard with the State standard
given that we are talking about people's health here? What is
to prohibit us from doing that?
Ms. Sullivan. So let me distinguish two things.
Ms. Slotkin. Yes.
Ms. Sullivan. So one is the actual remedy, the cleanup, the
long-term decision. We are not at that point in those sites in
Michigan.
Ms. Slotkin. Yeah.
Ms. Sullivan. And that is where it will come in. Where you
are talking about is a decision point earlier in the process
which is called a removal action. The way the current CERCLA
process works, it is unclear, legally, how those standards come
in. So I am trying to work through this with our general
counsel to get a clarity in terms of that. But right now, the
State standards come in at the remedy selection, the long-term
solution. I need clarity from our attorneys on the issue of how
it plays in, in a removal action which happens before, early,
much earlier in the process.
Ms. Slotkin. Yeah. And I do understand removal versus
remediation.
Ms. Sullivan. Right.
Ms. Slotkin. And again, we are not--I understand the
complications that this would cause the Defense Department to
have to live by these different State standards, but we are
only doing it out of sheer desperation because the EPA won't do
their job and set a clearer standard that is based on science.
So based on science, sir, if I can turn to you--and happy
birthday, by the way--Michigan State University, which I
represent, is one of the few PFAS research institutes in the
country. Can you talk to us about what is needed on
remediation? We know it is difficult. We know there is not a
lot of answers. What would kickstart the investigation and
support of remediation methods?
Dr. Nelson. Well, I actually don't know that it needs a
kickstart. I think we are starting to move some remediation
methods out of SERDP which would be the R&D, the laboratory
scale and maybe a small, little plot in the backyard, out to
installations. So we had a few successes. What is not so far
successful is bioremediation. That is used a lot in other
contaminants where there is some, you find some microbes that
will help you break down the compounds.
Since the carbon-fluorine bonds in PFASs are very, very
strong, it is really difficult to find candidates for
bioremediation. So I guess I just answered the question without
answering the question. If we could find some more, make some
more progress in bioremediation I think this whole thing would
go faster.
Ms. Slotkin. Thank you.
And I know my time has expired. Thank you, Chairman, for
yielding your time.
Mr. Garamendi. I thank you very much, Ms. Slotkin.
Mr. Brooks.
Mr. Brooks. I had turned it off rather than on.
Just for the benefit of everyone who is watching, PFAS
refers to per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances and it is
called PFAS, for short.
This question is for Dr. Nelson. In your written testimony
you state ``none of the commercially available PFAS-free foams
meet the Department of Defense's strict safety standards to
rapidly extinguish dangerous fuel fires and prevent their
reignition during rescue operations.''
Are you confident the Department of Defense will be able to
not only identify an effective PFAS-free foam, but also by 2024
install PFAS-free foams on all Department of Defense
installations that use aqueous film forming foam?
A lot of tongue twisters.
Dr. Nelson. Absolutely. So that is why people say AFFF
instead of trying to say that whole--I don't know if confident
is the right word, but quite optimistic. We are making good
progress in the research program on identifying substances that
can meet the extinguishment requirement. All the PFAS-free
foams meet the reignition standard, so it is get the fire out
and then keep it out while the rescue people go in or something
like that.
So they all meet the reignition standard. They don't yet
meet the 30 seconds for a 28 square-foot gasoline fire. That is
the qualification test for the military specification. Many of
the PFAS-free foams can do it in 40 or 45 seconds. So we are
making progress. We are not there yet.
Mr. Brooks. Ms. Sullivan, this is for you. Our forces
operate on several joint use airports across the Nation where
they share firefighting responsibility with their civilian
counterpart. How is that impacting the PFAS replacement effort
and can you give us some insight into the Department's
collaboration with the Federal Aviation Administration or other
Federal agencies to address PFAS use in these cases?
Ms. Sullivan. Thank you, sir. It is actually quite a
complicated situation because we have basically four types of
joint use airports where DOD provides all of the support, DOD
provides partial support, provides minimal support, or none.
Where we provide partial or minimal, we have to ensure whatever
foam that we are in fact using is compatible with the foam that
the commercial airport is providing so that the foams can
interact properly and don't discount each other. So we are
working very closely with FAA on demonstration, validation,
sharing test results to be able to make sure that the foams are
in fact compatible. The other thing is we really need to be
careful in terms of not going down a sole-source type of
airport foam. We need to have multiple types of foams so we
have multiple sources and ensure how they can all interact
together while in fact continuing to support at the level of
protection that the airports need.
Mr. Brooks. This question is for either one of you
concerning PFAS alternatives that are now being looked at,
researched and developed. Has there been any environmental
testing done of these alternatives to determine their level of
risk compared to PFAS?
Dr. Nelson. So we have just started that. Normally, of
course, we would develop something that worked and then we do
environmental testing. Since we have the short deadline, we are
having to do everything in parallel, so we have six projects
started this fiscal year looking at the environmental impacts
of these alternatives.
So some of that effort is going to end up being wasted
because we are having to test things that haven't quite proven
themselves out yet in the firefighting, but that is what we
have got to do to get this to go on. So I think that we are
adequately covering that issue.
Ms. Sullivan. So if I could add to that, we are also in
addition to the work that Dr. Nelson's group is doing, we are
partnering with the National Toxics Program to look at the
human health aspects of these alternatives. That studying takes
a lot of time so we need to be patient and work with them. That
is part of NIH so, because that is their mission to look at
human health.
Mr. Brooks. Are there any early indicators as to whether
these PFAS alternatives are going to be environmentally safer
or more hazardous if used?
Dr. Nelson. I think it is too early to answer that
question. We are just getting started. Normally, on this day I
could give you some early indicators, but as like everyone else
on this Earth, they have really taken a delay because of the
COVID [coronavirus] situation. Many of the people are out of
their laboratories, so maybe they are 6 months further behind
than we would expect them to be.
Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Mr. Garamendi. I thank you, Mr. Brooks. A very good line of
questions along the way.
I will simply add one thing to your question about the 2024
deadline. I suspect there may be one or two of us in this room
that did all of its work before the final exam, or did we wait
until the final exam deadline? The deadlines are necessary for
that purpose. A lot of work, obviously, needs to be done.
Our next--let me run down the gavel order here--Horn,
Stefanik, Houlahan, Slotkin, back to Slotkin again.
Ms. Horn.
Ms. Horn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to our
witnesses. I want to ask about our assessment and understanding
of contamination. Specifically, in my district and home State,
Tinker Air Force Base, which is right at the edge of my
district and is incredibly important, we have seen five sites
in Oklahoma City that have been identified to have PFAS in
drinking water or groundwater and three of these sites were
military related. And with seven bases across our State, five
have had identified areas of contamination.
And this question is for both of you. So what I am trying
to understand is that in the 2017 report, Secretary Sullivan,
the 2017 report showed that Tinker had 73 to 170,000 points
above the EPS--excuse me--the EPA's health advisory. But then
there is also the March 2020 task force that claims that no one
on or off base is drinking water above the EPA's level of 70
parts per trillion.
So I know there is issues of cleanup and adjusting the
foam, but what I am trying to understand is those two things
seem to be contradictory to me that we have identified sources
of contamination but then there is another report that says
they are not. So how do we address this?
Ms. Sullivan. Thank you, ma'am. Good question and I
appreciate the opportunity to clarify.
So let me distinguish groundwater versus drinking water. So
what is really important is we may have identified the presence
of these compounds, PFOS and PFOA, in the groundwater. That
does not mean it is in the drinking water. Not all sources of
groundwater are used as drinking water. There may be treatment
processes in between the groundwater and the drinking water. So
I want to make that distinction in terms of there may in fact
be presence in the groundwater, but it is not in the drinking
water.
These are two separate tests and I will point out that EPA
only has an approved test method for drinking water. There is
no approved test method for groundwater. We have identified 676
installations across the United States where we need to go and
look. We are looking in every one of them. But I will say that
we have been studying cleanup issues in groundwater around our
bases for decades now, so we have a lot of information about
the groundwater flows which enables us to actually identify
where we suspect it is in the drinking water outside the base
and move quickly to do the testing. And if the water is above
EPA's lifetime health advisory, we have the authority to act
right away and work with either the private landowner or the
municipality to treat the drinking water.
So that is the distinction I would want to make. Where we
know it is in the drinking water and we are in fact the DOD
source, we are acting right away. The other sites we are
following the standard CERCLA process to do the full
investigations.
Ms. Horn. Thank you.
Dr. Nelson, do you have anything to add to that?
Dr. Nelson. No, ma'am. I think I have covered it pretty
well.
Ms. Horn. Okay. A few, a couple more questions, actually. I
want to change directions just a little bit and talk about our
veterans and preparing the VA [Department of Veterans Affairs],
because what we know is that there are--we know about the
implications of PFOS and PFOA contamination for the health of
our current and former service members, and as I mentioned
seven military installations in Oklahoma and five have tested
positive for PFOS. And then there was a 2012 report that
estimated about 750,000 veterans and family members qualified
for filing a claim related to incidents between 1953 and 1987.
So my question is what we need to be doing to prepare for
health impacts now for our veterans.
Ms. Sullivan. Most of that, ma'am, I am going to have to
refer to Dr. Rauch who is not here today. But I can tell you,
one of the things I was very specific about in that we have
done is we tested back in 2016, all of the drinking water that
we provide on our bases as well as working where we buy water,
and all that information I have made sure is archived in our
safety and occupational health databases.
So we will have that data readily available for historic
questions so people will know what the levels were now. We also
just updated all our policies that are going to do another
round of drinking water testing on all of our bases. Again, all
that information will be readily archived and available for
future use.
Ms. Horn. Thank you very much, and my time has expired so I
yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Garamendi. I thank you, Ms. Horn. I appreciate your
work on this as well as your work on the housing issues. I
enjoyed our visit to your district and where we went into both
of these questions.
Ms. Stefanik.
Ms. Stefanik. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Assistant Secretary Sullivan, in June of this year, the
Department of Defense released the report titled ``Remediation
Plan for Cleanup of Water Impacted by PFOS and PFAS.'' Within
the report are outlined steps for DOD to investigate and clean
up contaminated sites. I represent Fort Drum and the 10th
Mountain Division in Upstate New York which has been identified
as having PFAS detections on the installation. Can you provide
an update on the status of DOD's remediation plan for the Fort
Drum community?
Ms. Sullivan. Sorry. Yes.
Ms. Stefanik. Great.
Ms. Sullivan. Too many things at once.
Yes, the preliminary assessment site investigation is
ongoing and actually it is supposed to be completed in the
first quarter of 2021, so this coming fall. That collects all
the information that they have, does some testing, and
determines the levels of unacceptable risks that are in the
community and what the path forward should be.
Right now, the Air Force is predicting that it will go to
the next step which is a remedial investigation sometime in
2021, which is a much more in-depth look, a lot of engineering,
water modeling data collection. So that is well on its way at
Fort Drum.
Ms. Stefanik. Thank you very much. I yield back.
Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Ms. Stefanik.
Ms. Houlahan.
Ms. Houlahan. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you all for
being here today. I think that some of my questions are
probably better served for Mr. Rauch, Dr. Rauch, so I will
start with what I can ask here today.
One of the questions that I have follows along Mr. Brooks'
line of questioning. I am intrigued because it sounds as though
in an effort to find substitutes for PFOS there is a
concurrent, you know, accelerated program ongoing where we are
finding them, studying them, investigating, you know, their
hazardousness, and it sounds an awful lot like what we are
doing in response to COVID in terms of our rapid fire, rapid,
you know, response plan for COVID vaccine.
It sounds for me based on what you guys are talking about
that this is a relatively unique approach to a very acute
problem that we are having. Is this a new idea to be
effectively doing a warp speed project on something like PFOS?
Dr. Nelson. So I would be loath to call it a new idea. It
is not the normal way the Department does it. Normally, a much
more staged approach to things. Obviously, in this case we
don't have the time to do that so we are having to do things in
parallel. Others have done this, of course.
Ms. Houlahan. Is there any, has there been any thought to
sort of a postmortem of sorts when we get to the point where we
have passed the deadline, so to speak, when the term paper is
due, to see if that accelerated approach has been more
effective than not or more cost-effective than not?
Dr. Nelson. Actually, that is a great idea. Yeah. I think
it will turn out to be there will be some inefficiencies. We
are going to study some compounds that are not going to make
the final cut, so that is just what is going to happen when we
do this quickly. But did we get there quicker? Is it net a good
thing? That is a very good idea.
Ms. Houlahan. And also maybe some of the compounds that
don't make the cut maybe they make some other cut, they are
useful for some other purpose.
Dr. Nelson. Absolutely. And on that line, ESTCP, the
demonstration program, is clearly aimed right at the deadline
because we have to have something ready to go. The SERDP
program, which is the R&D program, will continue on this and
there can be a generation 2 and a generation 3 and a generation
4 as we learn more things in the laboratory. So that won't stop
when we get to the deadline.
Ms. Houlahan. Excellent. I think that maybe we should take
a look at that together. I think it would be an interesting
problem set to solve.
My next question is also for you, Dr. Nelson. And you
mentioned in your introduction some of the cross departments
that you are working with. One of the things that I was able to
introduce in this NDAA, this year's NDAA, was the Interagency
Research Coordination Strategy Act to make sure that we are
coordinating efforts across the Federal Government in addition
to the DOD, but with others.
So could you describe briefly what is going on to make sure
that we are--the DOD's PFOS activities are integrated with
other agencies and if there are any challenges that you have
encountered coordinating those activities.
Dr. Nelson. I don't think we have encountered any
challenges. My colleague, Andrea Leeson, who is the program
manager for this particular area, convenes a periodic call with
the people and all the other agencies that are supporting PFAS
remediation. So we are talking about the remediation now. And
they kick around what they are doing, what are the big problems
that come up, and of course we invite them to all of our
workshops.
The outputs of our workshops are generally a short-,
medium-, and long-term research plan so everybody gets to be
involved in that and we publish those on our website so that
every agency can take a look at what we are going to do in the
short, medium, and long term. So I think it is going on. It
will be more formalized after this, you know, if the provisions
in the NDAA pass that there will be maybe a more structured
approach, but it is going on informally.
I think the same thing in AFFF. It is a pretty small
community. There was this talk about communicating with FAA.
One of our big investigators helped the FAA design their test
facility at the Atlantic City Technical Center, so they are all
really interconnected. FAA is just getting back to work from
their COVID break. We have set up a call once a month with our
two testing places at Tyndall Air Force Base and at the Naval
Research Lab with the FAA Technical Center people so that
everybody knows what they are doing, what they are getting
ready to do. So I think at a working level it is well-
coordinated.
Ms. Houlahan. Okay. And I look forward to seeing when it is
more formalized what----
Dr. Nelson. Absolutely. And then it will be a higher level
and--yeah.
Ms. Houlahan. And with the last minute of my time, I
believe my questions are, as I mentioned, for Dr. Rauch, but I
will put them out there in case you guys have something to add
to them.
I am looking to understand what sort of measures--and this
piggybacks on what Representative Horn was talking about--that
we are doing to make sure that our military members both
existing and veterans are continuing to have good health, and I
am specifically wanting to understand if there is any ongoing
blood testing for military firefighters. Have you begun that
testing? Will this testing include civilians as well as DOD
firefighters?
Ms. Sullivan. It is Dr. Rauch's area, but I will answer.
Yes, we will be starting in October to test all of the
firefighters that work for DOD both military and civilian. We
have got all the protocols in place, the labs all certified,
the fact sheets for both the clinicians and the firefighters,
and so we are doing the final dotting the i's and crossing the
t's to get all the instructions out, but it will start October
1st.
Ms. Houlahan. Thank you. And I yield back.
Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Ms. Houlahan.
I believe it is time for a Republican question. Mo, do you
have another question, series of questions?
Mr. Brooks. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman, I have just been handed
one. This question is for both Dr. Nelson and Ms. Sullivan, so
whoever wants to take it on, please feel free.
My understanding is that incineration is the primary method
used to dispose of PFAS materials during remediation and
removal. Are you aware of any alternative methods that are
mature enough and scalable enough to provide a viable
alternative to incineration?
Dr. Nelson. Sorry. I didn't know that was going to end up
being for me. So no, I am not aware of anything that meets the
criteria you just outlined currently available. There are
certainly things in the research program. The EPA though is
conducting a study of all available destruction methods and are
looking to provide some guidance by the end of the year, I
believe. Don't maybe hold the EPA to my deadline, but shortly
they are going to do that. So I think we in DOD will take
guidance from this EPA study.
Ms. Sullivan. I am sorry.
Yes, Dr. Nelson is right. We are looking for EPA to issue
their guidance which is due out by the end of this year in this
area. But I will say that we have an ongoing need to dispose of
streams coming from AFFF replacement, from the cleanup
activities that we do have going on, from water treatment
practices--that there is an ongoing stream of materials that
has to be disposed of, just day-to-day operations that we need
alternatives available to us.
Mr. Brooks. Would the Department have any concerns if it
was required to stockpile PFAS?
Ms. Sullivan. This would be a significant challenge for the
Department. We do not have the space to store large amounts
because we are generating--we are in the process of changing
out the legacy AFFF to the newer versions which is a safer,
more environmentally, solution. And we would have to stockpile
all of that material, take up valuable storage space, plus we
have ongoing waste that is being generated associated with
these remedial actions that we are taking, you know, soils,
waters from dewatering at construction sites.
There are a lot of day-to-day waste streams that are being
generated just to meet what we have today. We don't have the
space on military installations to store all that material. It
would require us to stop certain activities.
Mr. Brooks. Dr. Nelson, do you have anything to add?
Dr. Nelson. No, sir. I think that covered it.
Mr. Brooks. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Mr. Brooks.
My understanding is our remaining Republican colleagues
will be here in a few minutes and so we are going to keep this
rolling along until they come because I know that they also
have questions and we would like to have their questions on the
record and the information available.
In the meantime, it is my turn for questions. First of all,
I want to thank our colleagues and the witnesses for the
questions and the answers that we have received thus far. There
are just an overarching strategy that this committee is
employing and has employed for the last 3 to 4 years, and that
is we don't know the answers but we are going to get the
answers. We don't know exactly what PFOS and PFOA does to the
human body and to the ecosystem. We don't know exactly what the
toxicity to the ecosystem is and, therefore, we are going to
keep the pressure on until the answers are forthcoming.
We do know that there is contamination. We don't know what
the appropriate maximum level of exposure is or the longevity
in which that exposure would take place. However, we are going
to do everything we can to find out those answers, which means
keeping the pressure on the Department to search for the
answers.
Within the Congress and the Senate, we have our own
problem; there is a jurisdictional issue, and what this
committee wanted to do we have not been able to do in the NDAA
for jurisdictional issues with other committees. However, we
will work our way through that problem, but I want to note that
is a problem, one that has retarded much of what we would want
to do in the NDAA. Nevertheless, we do expect to continue
process.
So my first question goes to the overall intensity and way
in which the Department is addressing the issue. Do you have
the necessary authorities and money to carry out the tasks that
have presently been assigned to you? I will start with Ms.
Sullivan and then Dr. Nelson.
Ms. Sullivan. I would say the Department is really focused
on this. We are putting all of the attention, you know, we have
the task force that is chaired by the Assistant Secretary of
Defense for Sustainment and includes the three assistant
secretaries of the military departments. They meet every other
week to go through all the things that are on the list that we
have to address.
We have issued multiple policies and directions. We are
collecting tremendous amount of data and setting the standards
pretty high for our folks to address. They range everything
from drinking water, to firefighter testing blood, to
wastewater, to cleanup standards, to AFFF replacement. We are
covering the whole gamut including what we are doing overseas.
So I think there is a lot of attention being focused on this.
I will say, to me, the biggest challenge is going to be the
resources that we need to do the AFFF replacement. To fully
understand where we have--it is not just the air rescue
firefighting vehicles that are on the flight line which we have
a lot of, but it is all the facilities, all the hangars, all
the fuel infrastructure, all of the hazardous storage
facilities where we have AFFF systems installed, fully
understanding the scope of that and what it is going to take to
actually change out those systems.
In addition to the cleanup, we have to be able to grapple
with that. That is a--the cost and the workload of that is an
unknown that we really have to understand and fully be prepared
to deal with.
Mr. Garamendi. Given that problem, in your research for a
replacement are you taking into account and directing that
research in a way that could utilize the existing
infrastructure? Is that your priority or are you just searching
the world and all the encyclopedias to figure it out?
Ms. Sullivan. So let me--there are multiple responses to
that. We are looking at not just AFFF replacement for
facilities, that there are other firefighting solutions that
don't involve foam and so we have a pretty wide aperture of
solution sets that we are looking at. But as Dr. Nelson
mentioned, one of the big things is if we can clean the insides
of the equipment, we won't have to replace it.
And so that is why we are doing that parallel investment in
cleaning the equipment so it won't require us to replace large
infrastructure with facilities or with the trucks, the inside,
what I call the guts of the truck, in order to provide. So to
try and get ahead of this problem so that when we do have a
solution that comes forward that we can do a drop-in and
minimize the disruption in the process.
Mr. Garamendi. Dr. Nelson, would you like to expand on
those?
Dr. Nelson. I think Ms. Sullivan covered it pretty
completely. Obviously, it is--the big unknown is how much we
have to replace in equipment, and a lot of our work is trying
to get some numbers next to that so we can write down on a
piece of paper what it is going to actually cost to do this
changeover.
As to this, you sort of brought up a drop-in replacement,
you know, where you trying to find something to just go in the
current equipment and, of course, that is the gold standard. If
we could find something that we take out the old, wash it, put
in the new, we are all in good shape. That may not happen.
But we are looking at and as part of our demonstration
program we are really trying to expand the horizon of
variables. What happens if you up the pressure a little bit in
the tanks? What happens if you use a different nozzle? And then
we will present all that to the fire protection people and then
they will make their decision on what they need, knowing what
is the impact of higher temperature, higher pressure, bigger
nozzles, whatever.
Mr. Garamendi. In the current legislation, the current
NDAA, we are providing more money and a prize for some
brilliant person or group out there that can figure this out.
What do you make of that?
Dr. Nelson. I am quite hopeful of that. You may know that
right now the EPA is running a prize for PFAS destruction. We
are co-sponsoring that with them. And the way I think of it is
there are a lot of clever people in this country. We know a lot
of them, but we don't know them all. So this is a way to get
some people that we are not--that aren't familiar with our
problems and that we are not familiar with their work, to get
involved in this. So I think it is a good idea.
Mr. Garamendi. There is a series of questions that have
already been asked. I want to go into them a little further,
and that has to do with exposure, existing and past exposure
that firefighters and others have had to the AFFF chemicals. We
required last year that blood testing take place. What else is
the Department doing to protect first responders from ongoing
exposure?
Ms. Sullivan. Actually, sir, I am going to have to defer to
Dr. Rauch's organization. They have occupational health and
exposure. I don't have that in my portfolio any longer, sir.
Mr. Garamendi. We note that Dr. Rauch in his written
testimony he speaks to this generally. Unfortunately, and I am
going to go back and beat this drum one more time, I think it
is extremely foolish for the administration to prohibit
testimony in formal hearings from witnesses that cannot or
should not appear in person. So we will have to ask a written
question of Dr. Rauch about that issue.
Dr. Nelson, if you would like to expand on that you are
welcome to do so.
Dr. Nelson. No, that is really outside of my area of
expertise. It would not make much sense for me to discuss that.
Mr. Garamendi. I thought it might be, but one never knows
what might be hidden somewhere in your brain.
Dr. Nelson. Well, good try, but different kind of doctor.
Mr. Garamendi. One of the purposes for the blood testing is
to establish a foundation of data and information. That fits
with another law that is in last year's NDAA and expanded this
year, that the military keep records, personnel records and
health records of every individual who is exposed to known
chemical contaminants from the firepits in Iraq to PFOS going
forward.
All right. So that probably fits in with--and I understand
Mr. Lamborn is on his way.
I do have another set of questions. I mentioned that this
committee has jurisdictional issues with other committees, at
least two, Transportation and Infrastructure, specifically the
FAA, and the Commerce Committee who has EPA. We have our own
issues. I want to question both of you about the ongoing work
within the administration, the coordination, you have spoken to
coordination with EPA and FAA.
What I am interested in are problems. Stop signs or other
kinds of problems that may exist as a result of authorities,
that is the laws and the regulations that exist. Your ability
to work with them, is it in any way retarded by a lack of
authority to allow for the coordination?
Ms. Sullivan.
Ms. Sullivan. I think right now we are closely coordinated
with EPA. We are waiting on several things from them that they
are required to provide, such as the disposal guidance document
that they need to get out, which would help us tremendously in
our disposal guidance that we are required to get out. I think
the challenge is continuing to make sure that we all stay
current on everything that is going on.
I think--we defer to EPA on a number of things and we look
to them to be a source, where look to be a source on toxicity
values, on guidance on discharge standards and things like
that, test methods. Right now, the only approved EPA-approved
test methodology is for drinking water. We don't have approved
test methods that EPA has sanctioned for groundwater, for soil,
for stormwater.
These present challenges to us while we move forward, and
we continue to work with them to come up with--support them to
come up with these standards so they can in fact help us as we
proceed through our cleanup program.
Mr. Garamendi. Dr. Nelson.
Dr. Nelson. So I would echo that. I don't think we have
much coordination issues. We fund some projects at the EPA
working on these kinds of issues. All of our projects that I
talked about earlier are selected and managed by what we call a
technical committee, and since EPA is one of the partner
agencies, EPA has representatives on these.
So they help us select projects. They help us put together
our call for proposals, identify the issues, so I think we are
quite well coordinated with them. We have sort of made the FAA
people sort of an ad hoc member of those committees for the
purposes of this problem, so at the technical level we work
quite well with the FAA people also, so I don't see any
barriers.
Mr. Garamendi. My questions, this particular set of
questions is driving at the authorities that exist.
Ms. Sullivan, you mentioned four, three of them just a
moment ago, having to do with drinking water of which there is
a standard, and for contamination for which there is not a
standard. This is less for the administration, but rather for
us in Congress that we work amongst ourselves and the
committees to close authority gaps, for example, where the EPA
may not have the authority to do something that is necessary to
deal with the AFFF or the PFOS/PFOA.
So that is what I am looking at is how--information we need
to work with our committee, our other committees to carry it
out. You spoke to EPA, Ms. Sullivan. How about the FAA?
Ms. Sullivan. Well, let me--can I touch EPA first?
Mr. Garamendi. I would simply say as a member of the T and
I, the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the FAA,
the subcommittee, there is a problem.
Ms. Sullivan. So FAA's deadline, their requirements are
different than ours. They have a 2021 deadline and so that is a
challenge. We are working very closely together because right
now for an airport to be certified--I have learned this so much
I can't tell you--they have to have right now it requires them
to use the MIL-SPEC [military specification] in order to meet
the certification.
That requirement will go away come October 2021, so it
won't be mandated. That leaves a free-for-all on types of what
foams these airports are going to do. We are mutually concerned
about that and we are actually actively talking about well,
what is, you know, what is the standard? What level of support?
There is a lot of work to be done there. I can say one of the
EPA things that I want to make sure that we understand, there
seems to be some confusion or common belief that because EPA
has not declared PFOS or PFOA a hazardous substance under
CERCLA that Federal agencies can't do anything. Because of the
separate section 104 under CERCLA, Federal agencies already
have an affirmative responsibility to move forward unlike
anybody else across the Nation. So we, the Federal family, are
already proceeding under CERCLA where nobody else is across the
Nation.
These are the challenges that we have to say. You mentioned
drinking water; it is a non-enforceable standard. We are
testing all of our drinking water on our bases because we are
concerned citizens for our service members, their families, our
civilian workforce. Again, we look to EPA to what that standard
should be across the Nation.
Mr. Garamendi. This set of issues is really important in
that the solutions are going to be difficult to find and to
certainly enforce if there is this ambiguity that you have
described in at least two different places.
I am asking our staffs--Doug, your staff, my staff--to go
into this in detail. We have known from our previous efforts on
this area that there is this jurisdictional issue within our
domain and we are going to need to work our way through that so
that the administration is required by law to coordinate and to
have a similar standard across the in this case FAA, EPA, and
the Department of Defense.
So I have taken up well more than 5 minutes of Ms.
Slotkin's time awaiting your arrival, Doug. I know that you
were over at the White House for a very important event and so
if you would like to take your 5 minutes to talk about the
event you are welcome to do so or you can go to your questions.
Thank you for coming back to join us.
Mr. Lamborn. Well, I will go to the questions. Thank you,
Mr. Chairman, for having this hearing, for keeping things
moving along. I want to thank Representative Brooks for sitting
in until I got here. I want to thank the witnesses for their
testimony, and I do have a little bit of follow-up.
Representative Brooks asked some of what was concerning me,
but just a little bit more follow-up and then I will turn the
time back. And thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your dedication on
this and the other logistical and environmental and readiness
issues that we get to work on.
Mr. Garamendi. No, we don't do that by ourselves, do we? We
do it across the aisle.
Mr. Lamborn. That is right. We work together and we have
got great staff who help us in so many ways.
Thinking about the CERCLA standards and what would happen
if States stepped in and had a more stringent, I won't say
higher or lower, but a more stringent, a stricter standard, are
there risks if DOD had to comply with a State standard that was
out of sync with the other 49 States, is there any kind of risk
where that State standard may not be relevant or appropriate?
Just a little more detail. I know we have touched on this
earlier but, Ms. Sullivan, if we could start with you on this.
Ms. Sullivan. Sure. So the CERCLA process, the cleanup
process has been long established. We have been working under
this law for decades now. State standards come in. This is
something we do day to day whether it be PFOS, PFOA, arsenic,
trichloroethylene, we are used to dealing with a State
standard, so it does come in.
There is a whole process of how it comes in to the CERCLA
process when we get to a remedy selection, so we already are
addressing it where it--across the nation. So we will in fact
every situation, every decision is site-specific; that remedy
selection is site-specific. In the cleanup program this is what
we do business day to day.
In drinking water, it is a little bit different. In
drinking water, the standards, first of all, where we are the
purveyor, where the military installation actually provides the
drinking water, yes, we will follow the State standard under
the Safe Drinking Water Act. We again, we have been doing that
across the Nation with all sorts of other presence, all sorts
of other chemicals.
Where it becomes more of a challenge is drinking water off
bases that may have been impacted by the Department of Defense.
Right now, our legal authorities are somewhat confusing. We are
trying to work through them and that is where the biggest
challenge is, in my mind.
Mr. Lamborn. If you had to give--if a State standard was so
stringent that maybe it is out of line with what science has
said or EPA has said is necessary, is there a risk there that
that stringent standard could impose?
Ms. Sullivan. It could be precedence-setting. So part of
the process is there has to be a promulgation process that the
State has to go through in order to be qualified to be
considered, so that is part of the process as well so that if
the process that the State went through to actually issue that
standard is looked at as well as the science behind it to
determine if it is applicable and relevant to be included as a
cleanup standard.
Mr. Lamborn. So it has to be applicable and relevant.
Ms. Sullivan. Yes.
Mr. Lamborn. Okay. So if it is too much of an anomaly there
is a way out?
Ms. Sullivan. It depends on the science and the process
that they used.
Mr. Lamborn. Okay.
And, lastly, Mr. Chairman, thank you for having my opening
statement read into the record by unanimous consent. I will
highlight one thing and that is, the City of Fountain is near
Peterson Air Force Base and is maybe the first or one of the
first communities in the country to be impacted by this and to
realize, hey, we have an issue here we have to work on.
So I want to commend the people of the City of Fountain
that they jumped in and they are doing everything they can, but
they do have limited resources so that is why the Air Force and
the DOD is a necessary partner in making sure that this problem
is resolved and overcome for the people of Fountain. So, Mr.
Chairman, with that I yield back.
Mr. Garamendi. I thank you, Mr. Lamborn.
I note that one of our committee members has joined us. Ms.
Haaland is on remote. And, Ms. Haaland, you had some questions
so it is your turn.
Ms. Haaland. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for
convening today's panel. This issue affects communities across
our country including at Kirtland Air Force Base which is in my
district. And all three bases in New Mexico have to deal with
the consequences of the continued use of PFAS including the
community and farmers surrounding Cannon Air Force Base.
New Mexicans deserve clean water to raise their families,
grow their businesses, and support agriculture, but harmful
chemicals have taken a toll in our communities. I see what
happens to the health of families and friends when toxic sites
are not cleaned up, and it is not something that we should
risk.
PFAS presents a clear and present danger to our children,
to our farmers, and environment as a whole, yet in response to
the requirement in last year's NDAA for the Department of
Defense to provide its plan to clean up PFOS, all that was
produced was an anemic 7-page document explaining the Superfund
cleanup process. The report doesn't help my constituents. It
doesn't help the hardworking farmers in my State worried about
their livestock being contaminated, or struggling New Mexico
families or children growing up with a host of health problems
that we don't even fully understand yet.
You are hoping that by the end of fiscal year 2022, 96
percent of the installations where PFAS was released will have
completed only the first step of the cleanup process, ignoring
the dozen, the two dozen, the two or so dozen--excuse me--
installations that won't even make it that far. You then move
on to the next step that takes anywhere from 3 to 6 years
before even starting to address the contamination.
And Secretary Sullivan--Secretary Sullivan is present; is
that correct?
Ms. Sullivan. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Haaland. Okay. Thank you so much. Secretary Sullivan,
if this committee told you that in anywhere from 3 to 10 years
we will fund or otherwise address concerns that the Pentagon
raised in its appropriations request you sent us in the spring,
would that be helpful?
Ms. Sullivan. I am not sure I understand the question. I
apologize. If you could clarify?
Mr. Garamendi. Ms. Haaland, you are--the sound system is
not particularly good. Please repeat your question and we will
see if we can pick it up here.
Ms. Haaland. Okay, I apologize. Is that a little better?
Mr. Garamendi. Yes.
Ms. Haaland. Okay. If this committee told you that anywhere
from 3 to 10 years that we would fund or otherwise address
concerns that the Pentagon raised in its appropriations request
that you sent us in the spring, would that be helpful?
Ms. Sullivan. Right now, from my perspective, the money
that Congress has so generously provided us has enabled us to
really make tremendous progress in the cleanup program. Let me
make it perfectly clear that our priority has been drinking
water. If we in fact know that drinking water has been impacted
by Department of Defense activities, we have all the tools in
place, all the funding in place, the authorities in place to be
able to address that immediately and we continue to thank the
members for their support to do that.
The cleanup process is complicated. It takes time to be
able to do all of the analysis and studying really to
understand water flows, to understand the engineering, to
understand how the fate and transport process works to be able
to design the solution. You want to make sure you have all the
information in place, in hand, so that you are designing the
right solution up front and you don't have to go back and
repeat work.
Ms. Haaland. Thank you for that answer. One last question,
Ms. Sullivan, Secretary Sullivan. You previously testified it
can take 30 years to clean up the PFAS that has been confirmed.
If PFAS is also confirmed at the sites where such contamination
is now suspected, how much longer will cleanup take?
Ms. Sullivan. Well, it is really hard to say how long
cleanup will take because it is going to be dependent on a lot
of site-specific circumstances. That is why it is so important
the work that Dr. Nelson and his team is doing to see if there
are alternatives that will actually enable us to work on
addressing the cleanup.
Remember, there is cleanup of groundwater. There is cleanup
of soil. There is all sorts of aspects. We have really good
solutions for drinking water, but we really need to work on
more efficient and effective measures to treat groundwater, to
treat soil, and see if we can accelerate that process in any
way. But again, it is going to be site-specific how long that
solution is going to take and the specific circumstances at
that site.
Ms. Haaland. Chairman, it looks like my time is up and so I
will yield.
Mr. Garamendi. Ms. Haaland, thank you so very much for
joining us remotely. I look forward to additional questions.
The members and Mr. Lamborn and I may have written
questions that we would want to submit for the record and will
do so. There are a couple of things here that I want to just
pick up that we have talked about the disposal and, Ms.
Sullivan, you just spoke to that issue. There are contaminated
soils, water, and so forth.
The use of incineration has been discussed as a way of
dealing with it. There is incineration and then there is
incineration, pyrolysis, for example, of super high
temperatures, other things. With regard to those incineration
very broadly defined, are those, all of those types of
incineration being considered?
Dr. Nelson. Yes, they all are in the research program, so
you completely, correctly, outlined it. There is incineration
and incineration. These are very stable compounds which means
they take higher temperatures and longer time to break down
than many of the contaminants we do.
So we moved a number of projects from the lab to a pilot-
scale work. Among them are things like plasma destruction,
which is higher energy; smoldering combustion, which is pretty
high temperature but longer time. So we are trying to get at
one of those two, either higher temperatures or longer time.
And so we are now testing them at realistic sites to see how
they do.
Of course, one issue in these things is we have to get down
to very, very low levels at the end of this. You know, these
compounds are hazardous at a very low level, so we can't have
99.9 percent destruction. We have got to have five 9s or four
9s or some number like that. So that complicates the issue, but
we have some technologies we have hope for.
Mr. Garamendi. Well, the PFAS and PFOAs are not the only
chemicals.
Dr. Nelson. Exactly. And that is part of what the problem
is. They can break down into something equally hazardous that
is halfway to destruction, so we have to not--and even larger
contaminants can break down to PFAS and PFOA during the
destruction process. So it is this whole cascading chain
through the hundreds or thousands of these compounds.
So yeah, we are definitely alive to that. We don't want to
make PFOS or PFOA go away and something else hazardous show up.
Mr. Garamendi. The chairman of this committee has an
intense interest in these destructive technologies having
worked on it since the 1990s when I suspect Ms. Sullivan and I
were interacting at that time on some of these questions.
Before we adjourn here, just a couple of heads-up to the
Department. This committee and the full committee, in fact the
entire Congress and Senate, have been working on PFAS issues at
least since 2016 legislation. And I suspect before that there
was without specific focus this issue was out and about and
being discussed.
We are not going to let it go. We are picking it up again
in this year's NDAA with several advancements in the law as
well as the authorities and the funding. And so we will
continue to press this issue in the conference committee. We
have every reason to believe that the Senate is aligned with us
on these issues, so we will carry out with additional
requirements and as well as funding.
There is an issue within the Congress itself, and I know
this issue exists over in the Senate, and that has to do with
authorities. I have spoken to that Transportation and
Infrastructure FAA, and Energy and Commerce with regard to EPA,
so we are going to--and we also have the Resources Committee
involved in some of these issues also. It is important for us
to know where we bump up against the interagency authorities.
And so a question for the record to all three of our
witnesses is, where are the interagency problems that prevent
appropriate and timely resolution of those problems? They may
very well be law or authorities or funding issues. I would like
to know so that I can work with the other committees to resolve
our side of the issues and align the authorities in such a way
that the administration is able to overcome whatever barriers
may exist. So for the record, please provide us with that
information.
[The information referred to was not available at the time
of printing.]
Mr. Garamendi. We have talked about funding here. We will
plus-up again this year the authorities and I believe the
appropriations committees will follow along to address that. I
think all of us are very concerned about the replacement for
the AFFF. We understand the complexities. We understand the
costs associated with something that is entirely different and
that will come back to roost in this committee, so we will want
to be aware of that.
We do have a problem and that is that, Ms. Sullivan, you
are retiring without permission from this committee. We
recognize that you have been at this some 40 years and we know
that you are just an enormous wealth of information not only
about the details of what these complex issues are--the
science, the chemistry, and the like--but perhaps even more
important the way in which the organizations function
successfully. That is because you know where they function
unsuccessfully and you are able to work your way through that.
That is an incredible resource that we will be losing at least
in your formal role. We do have your identification numbers and
we may use the services of the intelligence, surveillance,
reconnaissance efforts of the Department to reach out to you
and put you on a temporary contract and make use of your
extraordinary knowledge.
We will miss you. We thank you for those 40 years of
service to America and to the world because it has been on the
environment for 40 years. It is an incredible, incredible task
and we thank you for that. Thank you so very much.
[Applause.]
Ms. Sullivan. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Garamendi. With that I think we have completed our
hearing and we are adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 2:26 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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A P P E N D I X
September 15, 2020
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PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
September 15, 2020
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DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
September 15, 2020
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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING
September 15, 2020
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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. HOULAHAN
Ms. Houlahan. Has the Department of Defense assessed and compared
other technologies already being used by the private sector that can
treat PFAS contamination, including any that can treat groundwater
within a contaminated aquifer rather than requiring it to be pumped out
and then treated? What role does cost savings play in DOD decision
making regarding the technologies chosen to mitigate PFAS
contamination?
Ms. Sullivan. [No answer was available at the time of printing.]
Ms. Houlahan. Has the Department of Defense assessed and compared
other technologies already being used by the private sector that can
treat PFAS contamination, including any that can treat groundwater
within a contaminated aquifer rather than requiring it to be pumped out
and then treated? What role does cost savings play in DOD decision
making regarding the technologies chosen to mitigate PFAS
contamination?
Dr. Nelson. [No answer was available at the time of printing.]
______
QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MS. TORRES SMALL
Ms. Torres Small. It has been nearly 2 years since the Air Force
held a town hall to update the surrounding Cannon AFB communities on
the status of the contamination and hear their concerns. This is
unacceptable. Will you commit, today, to holding regular meetings with
local residents and officials?
Ms. Sullivan. [No answer was available at the time of printing.]
Ms. Torres Small. In Curry County, New Mexico, and the surrounding
communities of Cannon AFB, it has been confirmed that the safe drinking
water LHA levels of PFAS have exceeded the EPA's regulated 70 ppt
standard. DOD has offered clean bottled drinking water to some of the
affected farmers, but this does not address water for agricultural
purposes used to produce products destined for human consumption as
described by section 343 of the FY20 NDAA. It appears DOD does not see
this as an unacceptable risk to human health or the environment. How
have you determined that the losses suffered by agriculture assets are
not due to contamination from PFAS as the farmers have themselves
claimed?
Dr. Nelson. [No answer was available at the time of printing.]
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