PFAS results from Ireland
Notes to Irish activists
By Pat Elder
September 26, 2024
Dr. Ed Horgan, on the banks of the River Shannon near Shannon Airport, holds a small cage containing a sampling cup. PFOS was found to be draining into the river.
We sampled for per-and poly fluoroalkyl substances, (PFAS) from surface waters at 14 locations in Ireland and Northern Ireland. The concentrations in Ireland are low compared to our testing performed in the U.S., and Japan.
For some background, see the two prior reports I’ve written on this issue.
Dublin Airport reports high levels of PFAS April 24, 2024 - A new report shows surface water contains dangerous levels of the toxins. Public health is threatened. A waste dump at Castlemoate House at the airport and similar landfills across Ireland poison the land and sea.
And PFAS chemicals threaten public health in Dublin and throughout Ireland – July 22, 2021 - According to a report prepared for the Irish Environmental Protection Agency, surface water at the Dublin Fire Brigade Training Centre and Shannon Airport is heavily contaminated with PFAS chemicals. The seafood in Dublin Bay and the River Shannon is likely to be contaminated.
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a group of 16,000 manmade chemicals that are resistant to oil, water, and heat. They are used in a variety of industrial products, including: firefighting foams, metal plating, microelectronics, and batteries.
Exposure to Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) has been linked to a number of health risks, including: thyroid dysfunction and decreased immune response. PFAS is an endocrine disruptor. A well-established body of scientific research indicates that endocrine-disrupting chemicals that are part of our daily lives are making us more susceptible to reproductive disorders, cancer, diabetes, obesity, heart disease, and other serious health conditions. The state of California has designated two PFAS varieties: Perfluorooctane sulfonate, (PFOS), and Perfluorooctanoic acid, (PFOA) as human carcinogens.
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I will present images from google maps, followed by the data from each location. Then I’ll briefly analyze what we found. We tested three streams flowing near Dublin Airport
Blue X – Public aircraft viewing site
Yellow X - Sluice River, at site adjacent to the airport
Red X - Cuckoo Stream, at site adjacent to the airport
Dublin Airport - all results are in parts per trillion, (ppt)
Blue X - Public aircraft viewing site
PFPeA 3.2
PFHxA 2.7
PFHpA 1.3
PFOA 1
PFOS 3.4
6:2 FTS 1.4
Total PFAS 13 ppt
Yellow X -
Sluice River
PFPeA 4.5
PFHxA 3.5
PFHpA 2.3
PFOA 1.4
PFOS 4.6
6:2 FTS 3.1
PFECHS 4
Total PFAS 23.4 ppt
Red X - Cuckoo Stream
PFPeA 3
PFHxA 2.7
PFHpA 1.4
PFOA 1.1
PFOS 2.9
6:2 FTS 22
8:2 FTS 1.5
PFECHS 36.5
Total PFAS 71.1 ppt
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Things could be a lot worse in Ireland, although a more robust PFAS testing regime from several environmental media may tell a different story. Testing results we already have from the Irish Environmental Protection Agency show higher much levels at the nearby Dublin Fire Brigade station.
See Table 3 - EPA - Water Results Final Report -
Procurement and Processing of Environmental Samples for PFAS
Environmental Protection Agency 15 January 2021
Dublin Fire Brigade – Table 3 - EPA
These chemicals have an amazing propensity to bioaccumulate in aquatic life so that is our greatest concern, in terms of the exposure pathways to human ingestion. PFOS is the greatest culprit because it aggressively bioaccumulates in fish. The U.S. EPA says this compound may bioaccumulate up to 4,000 times the levels in the water. (EPA Technical Fact Sheet.) One sample taken from a flounder in Woolwich in London in London contained 52,100 parts per trillion of PFOS alone.
We reported a total of 9 separate PFAS compounds throughout the island: Here, I will identify them.
PFPeA - Perfluoropentanoic acid
PFHxA - Perfluorohexanoic acid
PFHpA - Perfluoroheptanoic acid
PFOA - Perfluorooctanoic acid
PFOS - Perfluorooctane sulfonate
6:2 FTS - 6:2-Fluorotelomersulfonic acid
8:2 FTS - 8:2-Fluorotelomersulfonic acid
PFECHS - Perfluoro (4-ethylcyclohexane) sulfonic acid
PFDS - Perfluorodecanesulfonic acid
You can search for each of these chemicals on the Pub Chem website of the National Institutes of Health. Also, search for “associated diseases and disorders.”
These compounds may be expected to bio accumulate in all life forms, starting with invertebrates that make up the ground floor, so to speak, of the food chain.
It has been five years since Sharon Lerner of The Intercept interviewed Dr. Linda Birnbaum, former director of the U.S. National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences. The influential piece quoted Birnbaum saying drinking water levels for PFOA should not exceed .1 part per trillion because of compelling research linking PFOA exposure to pancreatic cancer. It was a wakeup call on the power of these chemicals. For Ireland, PFOS presents the greatest threat. Sorry for all the acronyms. There are 16,000 different kinds of PFAS. PFOS and PFOA are among the most deadly.
The sediment and invertebrates of the streams we tested are likely contaminated with these chemicals. Tiny fish consume the poisoned aquatic life. They swim downstream and may be eaten by larger fish consumed by humans.
It is possible that all Irish babies are born with the carcinogens in their little bodies. Many PFAS compounds are known to accumulate in the human placenta, which can impact placental function and the in-utero environment. PFAS are also transferred through breast milk to infants. PFAS are persistent and accumulate in the bloodstream, and last virtually forever in the environment. It’s really bad.
The relatively low levels are no cause to relax. This is a wakeup call. You can count your blessings if you still do that.
The 14 results from Ireland shown below range from 0 parts per trillion at 5 locations to 71.1 ppt at Cuckoo Stream.
Raw data, total PFAS: 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 2.5, 3.2, 6.9, 13, 17, 23.4, 24.3, 71.1
Mean 11.6 ppt Median 19.9 ppt.
You’re not out of the woods.
Cuckoo Stream had the highest results.
Eight separate PFAS compounds were detected here.
PFPeA, PFHxA, PFHpA, PFOA, PFOS, and 8:2 FTS were all at 3 ppt or below.
6:2 FTS was found at 22 ppt and PFECHS was found at 36.5 ppt.
See more about PFECHS from the state of Michigan. It is probably used in aircraft hydraulic systems at the airport and the chemicals were likely allowed to run off into soils that managed to leach into the surface water. Here's more about PFECHS through the US National Institute of Health. PFECHS has been shown to accumulate in kidney, liver, bladder, blood, muscle, and plasma of fish, in bird eggs, and in human serum. The bioaccumulation process may manifest itself with just a few parts per trillion in surface water. If we found this chemical, a little more testing in other locations on another day with different conditions could present much higher results. It's a crap shoot.
The 22 ppt of 6:2 FTS is also problematic. This compound is used worldwide as a substitute for PFOS in firefighting foams and chrome plating. It may also cause injury to human health and the environment. We often find 6:2 FTS in the effluent of wastewater treatment plants. It is important to track the movement of liquid and solid waste flowing from the airport. Where is it treated and what happens to it?
Levels in surface water are potentially more dangerous at much lower levels than in groundwater, except in cases where people may be drinking from wells or using well water to irrigate vegetable gardens.
Authorities ought to be testing groundwater and surface water all around the airport. They should also be testing for levels of various PFAS compounds in a variety of environmental media like soil, sediment, invertebrates, aquatic life and human blood serum.
River Tolka, Bull Island, and Dublin Harbor
Much of Dublin’s surface water flows into Dublin Bay.
Blue X - River Tolka East Wall Rd
PFOS 1.4
6:2 FTS 1.8
Total PFAS 3.2
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Yellow X – Bull Island
No PFAS detected
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Red X - Dublin Harbor Pigeon House Road
PFDS 1 ppt
Total PFAS 1 ppt
These are exceptionally low numbers. They’re worth a pint at the pub. Good for Ireland! I wasn’t too surprised to see the low levels at Bull Island. The sea has the tendency to wash out the PFAS where the compounds may be expected to gather in the sediment. They don’t go away.
Michael Clarke takes a sample from a bridge over the River Tolka in Dublin.
The low results we found in the River Tolka along East Wall Rd were a pleasant surprise. It is remarkable to only find 3.2 ppt of total PFAS from an inner-city location like this anywhere in Europe. It’s tough to say where it’s coming from.
The results at the Dublin Pigeon House Road were the biggest shocker. We only found 1 ppt of all 55 compounds tested. I was under the impression we would be picking up the effluent from the Ringsend Wastewater Treatment Plant. We typically find hundreds to thousands of parts per trillion when we test at the outfalls of these treatment plants.
Shannon Airport - Two streams and a lagoon on the River Shannon
Shannon Airport is located on the River Shannon.
Red X - Airport County Clare Lagoon
PFOS 17
Total PFAS 17 ppt
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Yellow X - Stream Draining Shannon Airport
PFOA 11
PFOS 15
Total PFAS 26 ppt
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Blue X - Shannon Clare
PFBA 2.1
PFPeA 3.1
PFHxA 2.3
PFHpA 1
PFOS 18
6:2 FTS 5.2
PFECHS 8.8
Total PFAS 24.3 ppt
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We took three samples at Shannon Airport and the three had remarkably similar results for PFOS, (17, 15, 18 ppt) suggesting that the ground is uniformly saturated and that the contamination is fairly uniform south and east of the runway, the side facing the River Shannon. Fish in the River Shannon close to this location may be expected to contain many thousands of parts per trillion of PFOS.
Firetrucks at Shannon Airport use firefighting foams on a US military aircraft on August 15, 2019. The Standard.
Images obtained from multiple social media sites show the use of fire-fighting foam to extinguish flames that engulfed Omni Air International’s Boeing 767-300. The plane was carrying U.S. troops to war zones in the Middle East on August 15, 2019. We do not have specific evidence that this photo shows the use of the carcinogens, although the Irish EPA’s account of the use of AFFF suggests this foam likely contained PFAS.
24 airports/airport operators have reported using aqueous film-forming foams, (AFFF), containing PFAS. See the SWECO Report “Determining Historic and Current PFAS levels in AFFF in the Republic of Ireland, December, 2020.
A minimum of 20,000 handheld fire extinguishers are placed on the Irish market annually and 25% of an extinguisher is released as part of annual servicing. In the U.S. these personal extinguishers do not contain PFAS. The rationale is that foams containing PFAS are for super-hot petroleum-based fires, not the typical house fire. It’s indefensible.
The hallways of Irish hotels show this sign above the tanks containing deadly foams. The public is directed to use the carcinogens in the case of a fire.
I was shocked to see a fire extinguisher in my hotel in Dublin in 2018 with a sign that said the extinguisher contained PFAS. I took a photo of it and I wrote letters to various officials and newspaper editors. Clare Daly, former member of the European Parliament, understood the danger, but no one else seemed to.
Dean Blackwood with the Environmental Gathering in Derry, Northern Ireland samples the River Faughan for PFAS.
No results from Derry.
We tested water from the Faughan River in Derry, and from an illegal landfill nearby in Derry. We also took two samples from two drinking water intake locations in Lough Neigh.
We didn’t find any PFAS.
A stream in Lough Neagh Play Park had 6.9 ppt of total PFAS
This Google Maps image shows part of the southern shore of Lough Neagh.
Lurgan, Northern Ireland
Red marker - Lough Neagh Play Park
PFHpA 1
PFOA 1.8
PFBS 1.1
PFOS 3
Total PFAS 6.9 ppt
The Downs Law Group helps to make this work possible. Their support allows us to research and write about military contamination around the world. They’ve helped us buy hundreds of PFAS kits and they’ve helped pay for flights and hotels. The firm is working to provide legal representation to individuals in the U.S. and abroad with a high likelihood of exposure to a host of contaminants.
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