ROANOKE, Va. – Potential cancer-causing chemicals in our drinking water are what prompted Governor Glenn Youngkin to sign a new bill.
Governor Glenn Youngkin is taking action to clean up Virginia’s drinking water.
He’s doing this by passing a bill dedicated to finding solutions to eliminate PFAS from our water, if levels are high. Delegate Sam Rasoul introduced the bill saying this will be the framework.
“What we are trying to do is find it at its source and then have what we call DEQ, the Department of Environmental Quality, be able to put measures in place to protect our drinking water,” Rasoul said.
It wasn’t too long ago when PFAS, the forever chemicals were found in our backyard, at Spring Hollow Reservoir.
“We said, ‘Yeah, we’ll check all of our reservoirs and share the data with you.’ We happened to find one of these compounds in our Spring Hollow Reservoir,” Sarah Baumgardner, Director of Public Relations for the Western Virginia Water Authority said.
That compound is a part of our daily lives but shouldn’t be in our drinking water.
The Western Virginia Water Authority has been testing waterways and reports that PFAS levels have decreased at Spring Hollow Reservoir over the last several years.
“We are spending a lot of money and a lot of time to treat the water with granular activated carbon so that it is removed we are pleased to say it’s been effective,” Baumgardner said.
The bill focuses on public water systems that could have PFAS to perform testing and report their findings. But Delegate Rasoul said it will also help find ways to eliminate the contaminated source for private wells.
“Try to find ways to find where PFAS is leaching into private wells and any drinking waters and so we are starting to put together those mechanisms where the state can do more to protect our drinking water moving forward,” Rasoul said.
Since the beginning of this year, the Western Virginia Water Authority has reported no detection of PFAS in the spring hollow drinking water, they said it’s because what they did mirrors what this bill is putting in place for all public water systems.