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Can we have drinking water without PFAS?

Research
Sustainability and environment

Contaminants in aquatic systems are an increasing concern with PFAS gaining a lot of public attention with stories from Kallinge, Tulling and Uppsala, where firefighting foam has been identified as the source of contamination. From January 2026, new limit values and rules to monitor PFAS levels in drinking water have come into effect within the European Union. For municipalities and water treatment plants, who are tasked with supplying clean drinking water, this may lead to upgrades in technology and use of new methods to meet the demands of the new legislation. For individuals outside of the municipal water supply, the responsibility to maintain a good water quality often rests on the well owners. This can be a quite costly enterprise, and it also highlights the topic of the right to clean drinking water.

Seminar,
Webinar
Date
20 May 2026
Time
10:30 - 11:45
Location
Korallrevet, Natrium and online
Participants
Philip McCleaf, Uppsala Vatten och Avfall "Uppsala's Experience - a Strategy for PFAS reduction to meet 2026's new PFAS regulation of 4 ng/L PFAS4"
Martin Mickelsson, Dept of Eart Sciences, University of Gothenburg "How can we understand and handle PFAS contaminants in groundwater as a matter of health equity and where lie the responsibility in regard to environmental health hazards?"
Jenny Ivarsson, KemI (the Swedish Chemicals Agency) "Status on the proposed universal PFAS restriction under the REACH Regulation"
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Uppsala’s Experience – a strategy for PFAS reduction to meet 2026’s new PFAS regulation of 4 ng/L PFAS4
Uppsala Vatten has been forced to face the presence of PFAS  in the City’s raw water source since the contamination’s detection in 2012 and has forged a strategy to meet the new PFAS regulatory requirement of 4 ng/l PFAS4 for drinking water. Uppsala Vatten’s strategy incorporates alternative treatment solutions for PFAS that consider not only present PFAS goals but even other water quality goals and possible future PFAS regulations. A pragmatic approach to operational decisions has evolved intended to lessen the impact of PFAS on the treatment processes already from the point of extraction from the groundwater aquifer. 

How can we understand and handle PFAS contaminants in groundwater as a matter of health equity and where lie the responsibility in regard to environmental health hazards?
The Swedish food agency points to drinking water as our most important food stuff. But responsibility for the quality of this water including its potential health risks end up on an individual level.
How do the different actors; well owners, municipalities and government agencies perceive health risk, communicate and assign responsibility?
This is not always defined, but negotiated, which affect trust, ability to act and secure safe drinking water and good health.
Questions that arise concern health equity, management and  responsibility regarding slow, cumulative and complex challenges for health as well as the environment.

Status on the proposed universal PFAS restriction under the REACH Regulation
National authorites of five countries – Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Norway compiled a report for wide restrictions of PFAS in 2023. It states, among others, that humans and other organisms will be exposed to progressively increasing amounts of PFASs if releases are not minimized as PFAS are very persistent in the environment. The damage to human health and the environment is therefor expected to last for decades or even centuries. The report is being evaluated by the European Chemicals Agency’s scientific committees for Risk Assessment and Socio-Economic Analysis. The European Commission and EU member states will use the report, and opinions from these committees, to make a decision on the future of PFAS.

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