EPA warns of toxic forever chemicals in sewage sludge used on farmland, including thousands of acres near the Chicago area

Michael Hawthorne, Chicago Tribune on Jan 14, 2025

Published in News & Features

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

CHICAGO — Farmers who use sewage sludge as fertilizer and their neighbors face higher risks of cancer and other diseases, according to a new federal analysis that pins the blame on toxic forever chemicals.

The findings are particularly relevant for northeast Illinois, where more than 777,000 tons of sludge from Chicago and Cook County have been spread on farmland during the past eight years — in many cases near residential areas.

Only the Greater Los Angeles area distributed more sludge to farmers during the same period.

Officials at the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago have known their sludge fertilizer is contaminated with forever chemicals since at least 2011, the Chicago Tribune reported in a 2022 investigation.

Yet the chemicals — also known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS — are not regulated in sludge fertilizer by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA continues to promote the spread of fetid muck on farmland without limiting the amount of PFAS it contains.

That could change as a result of the agency’s new analysis, published Tuesday in what the EPA calls a draft risk assessment.

Forever chemicals have been widely used for decades in firefighting foam and to make products such as nonstick cookware, stain-repellent carpets, waterproof jackets and fast-food wrappers that repel oil and grease.

When human excrement and industrial waste is flushed into sewers, conventional treatment not only fails to screen out PFAS, it concentrates the chemicals in sludge.

Researchers and public health advocates are increasingly concerned because some PFAS build up in human blood, take years to leave the body and don’t break down in the environment. Others transform over time into more hazardous compounds, increasing the risk that grains, beans, hay and produce grown in sludge-amended soil could be tainted for years to come.

Long-term exposure to tiny concentrations of certain PFAS can trigger testicular and kidney cancer, birth defects, liver damage, impaired fertility, immune system disorders, high cholesterol and obesity, studies have found. Links to breast cancer and other diseases are suspected.

____