NRDC to EPA: Get the Rocket Fuel Out of Our Water Already!

Perchlorate disrupts thyroid function and is particularly harmful to fetuses, infants, and children. Sometimes referred to as the “powerhouse gland,” the thyroid controls the metabolism of virtually every cell in your body. The hormones the thyroid secretes influence the function of every organ system (cardiovascular, nervous, reproductive, digestive, etc.).

Thyroid hormones also play a crucial role in the brain development of children and fetuses. A 2014 study found that mothers with the highest perchlorate levels in their urine during the first trimester of pregnancy were more likely to have toddlers with lower verbal IQs at age three. Additional research has also suggested links between perchlorate and IQ loss, as well as other impacts on brain development.

Due to such concerns, in 2006, Massachusetts set the nation’s first drinking water standard for perchlorate at 2 parts per billion (ppb). Though that may sound like a miniscule amount, scientists have found that certain chemicals in drinking water can harm health even at these seemingly low levels. California followed suit soon after with a contamination limit of 6 ppb; the state has since set a more ambitious “public health goal” of 1 ppb, which is expected to trigger the state’s adoption of a stricter enforceable standard in the future.

Unless you live near military or aerospace facilities, where perchlorate contamination tends to be the heaviest, you might think coming across a rocket fuel ingredient in day-to-day life would be unlikely. That’s not necessarily the case. 

Manufacturers also use perchlorate for more everyday commercial products. Matches, fireworks, signal flares, and airbag initiators for cars can contain the stuff, as do some disinfectants and herbicides. In some locations, perchlorate can be naturally occurring. Perhaps more concerning is that perchlorate is a persistent chemical that can really get around. Highly soluble in water, it moves easily within waterways and groundwater. 

And that leads to the most common ways that people become exposed—through drinking water and food. Perchlorate can not only find its way to your tap but also to your plate; for instance, by irrigating crops with contaminated water. Perchlorate even serves as an antistatic agent for some plastic food packaging. 

The nonprofit Consumer Reports found that nearly 67 percent of the food products it sampled contained perchlorate, with levels ranging from 2 ppb all the way up to 79 ppb. Among those, the fresh produce and products marketed for babies and children ranked at the highest end of the spectrum. 

Once the EPA determines that a contaminant meets certain criteria, the Safe Drinking Water Act requires that the agency take action to limit its levels in drinking water. This is what happened in 2011 when the EPA announced it would be setting a perchlorate standard.

The agency then had two years to propose its standard and then another 18 months to finalize it. But both of those deadlines came and went. So NRDC sued the EPA in 2016 for violating the Safe Drinking Water Act and won, resulting in a federal court ordering the agency to issue a final standard by 2020. 

The agency only got as far as proposing one in 2019. At the time, the EPA suggested two courses of action: It could set weak perchlorate limits of 18 ppb, 56 ppb, or 90 ppb (levels that the EPA estimated were associated with an average of a 1 percent, 2 percent, or 3 percent decrease in IQ for the most vulnerable populations, respectively); or it could not regulate the chemical at all. The EPA took the latter option, claiming that new data showed “perchlorate does not occur at a frequency and at levels of public health concern.”  

In response, NRDC sued the EPA again—and won again. One judge noted that not only would the agency’s inaction harm public health, but it had also manipulated data to support its argument that perchlorate contamination wasn’t prevalent enough to warrant regulating. The EPA did so by adding in contamination data from California and Massachusetts, the only two states already regulating perchlorate, to existing datasets. Utilizing data in this way, the judge said, “had the potential to disproportionately affect the national picture of perchlorate occurrence.” Once again, the EPA found itself under court order to develop a drinking water standard for perchlorate.

Despite securing another long-awaited victory, NRDC can’t rest quite yet. Our litigators and program experts are now acting as watchdogs to ensure the EPA follows through with the rulemaking process. Even at this stage, the agency might try to finagle its way out of passing an effective standard. 

“Relying on bad science, passing a weak regulation that doesn’t actually protect public health, not following the requirements of the statute—there are a lot of ways that they could approach this process that would make it unlawful,” says Sarah Fort, NRDC’s senior director of litigation. 

The agency could also add clauses to the rule that would diminish the overall standard. This could include waivers to allow some water systems to forgo monitoring for up to nine years.

And perhaps not surprisingly, the EPA is currently proposing contaminant limits of 20 ppb, 40 ppb, or 80 ppb, all of which are so weak that they would do little to protect public health. In response, NRDC has filed public comments on the matter this spring and is calling for a limit of 2 ppb, with an ultimate health goal of zero, for perchlorate—levels that would actually result in cleaner, healthier drinking water.

“It’s like setting the speed limit to 150 miles an hour,” says Olson. “If you set the safety standard this ridiculously high, of course most drinking water systems wouldn’t qualify as being contaminated.”