Williamtown drinking water standards go under the microscope

The interim standards, set by the Environmental Health Standing Committee (EnHealth) in June, dramatically increased the safe level of perfluorooctane sulfonate and perfluorooctanoic acid in drinking water to more than 78 times the US level. 

The standards were based on European levels from 2008, and a Harvard professor involved in their creation raised doubts about their relevance to the Herald. 

On Thursday, Health Minister Sussan Ley announced a review of the standards had begun that would also “investigate the potential risks to human health” from legacy firefighting foams. 

“The government has appointed Adjunct Professor Andrew Bartholomaeus to conduct an independent evaluation that will consider approaches and assumptions used and relevance of these approaches to the Australian context,” she said. 

Minister Ley said Adjunct Professor Bartholomaeus was an ‘ideal’ person to undertake the review, having held senior roles with Food Standards Australia and New Zealand, the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the Office of Chemical Safety. 

”He has advised World Health Organization expert bodies that provide human safety assessments of chemicals and recommend toxicity values,” she said. 

Member for Paterson Meryl Swanson welcomed the review but criticized its timing, with its findings to be handed down after the release of a human health risk assessment for firefighting contamination from the Williamtown RAAF Base. 

“That assessment has been done using European guidelines, not the much stricter US guidelines,” she said. “The point of the review is to decide which guidelines Australia should be using in such assessments.”

The review will report back to Minister Ley at the end of August.

Ms Swanson said it also needed to explain why EnHealth used standards from eight years ago rather than guidelines released by the United States in May.