TEMPORAL AND SPATIAL VARIABILITY OF PFOA IN HOOSICK FALLS, NY

Perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, is an industrial chemical that is used to make everyday products including surfactants and surface protectors in carpets, leather, paper, food containers, fabric, upholstery, fire-fighting foam, floor polishes and shampoos. With a half-life of about 4 years in humans and a very high thermal and chemical stability, PFOA is very persistent in the environment. In addition, PFOA has been reported to cause diverse toxic effects in laboratory animals and primates, as well as to increase the risk of prostate cancer mortality.

My hometown, Hoosick Falls, New York, recently discovered very high concentrations of PFOA in their local water source. The EPA reported values over 400 parts per trillion in Hoosick Falls, which is well over the established health advisory level of 70 parts per trillion. While residents have been protected from further contamination through the installation of filtration systems, little is known about how PFOA and related perfluoroalkyl acids are moving in the aquifer. New York DEC data show a large spatial variation in the PFOA concentrations in Hoosick Falls wells, with neighboring houses showing large differences. However, this spatial variation is at this moment only based on single point measurements.

The purpose of this project is to study the temporal variation of PFOA in the water of three different private wells, as well as to study the spatial variation of PFOA in streams throughout the Hoosick area. In addition, d¹⁸O values allow us to investigate how connected the aquifer is to the surface water, which gives us insight into the residence time of the aquifer. This adds another source of information to explain the variation (or the lack of) in PFOA concentrations over time.