PFAS in the process industry, where is it found and what can we do now?

On June 25th, members of FHI, the WIB, MKB-Nederland, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management, and the RIVM (National Institute for Public Health and the Environment) gathered to be updated on PFAS legislation and regulations and to share knowledge. It was a very valuable afternoon, and the discussions continued for a long time.

RIVM and the current state of affairs

Thijs de Kort The RIVM (National Institute for Public Health and the Environment) will update the audience on the current state of the restriction policy, why PFAS is so harmful, what the upcoming PFAS legislation does and does not entail, and the expectations for the coming years.

The RIVM (National Institute for Public Health and the Environment) has received over 5,600 responses (totaling over 100,000 pages!) from a research project in preparation for a PFAS restriction proposal. This restriction proposal is currently being developed based on these documents.

Did you know, for example, that there are over 10,000 types of PFAS? And that between 2020 and 2030, we could see a potential increase from 75,000 tons to 4.7 million tons of PFAS-containing emissions, out of a total of 27 million tons of related substances? These figures speak for themselves.

The industrial end user, how does this affect the process industry?

The WIB is an end-user association, representing more than 40 of the largest industrial end-users in the Netherlands. Dick Horstman, serves on the Final Elements working group at the WIB (Dutch Institute for Public Health and the Environment), and gave us a scenario of what a large installation actually looks like. Which components actually contain PFAS, how many parts are we talking about, and what is the potential impact of replacement?

A real eye-opener, which made the (potential) impact on the process industry very concrete. After all, the process industry operates 24/7, and you can't just stop it to replace all the sealing rings, valves, or coatings. Some installations have an economic lifespan of up to 40 years, so replacing components also has a direct financial impact. And what about equipment certification if components suddenly have a different composition? There are also questions about the reliability and quality of the production itself, because do PFAS replacements actually have the same properties and tolerances that a (petro)chemical process is subject to?

Product development, what is possible and what is not?

Peter de Putter and Jan Fokkens took the group on an interactive session on product development. They challenged the audience to share experiences and think about what steps are already being taken.

Some nice take-outs from this afternoon:

1. Some sectors are already actively working to replace PFAS. For example, DOW Chemicals is replacing all fire-fighting equipment in 87 factories worldwide. The Ministry of Defence is currently replacing all PFAS-based coatings applied to naval vessels.
2. Grants are in the making to help businesses with the upcoming restrictions!
3. The EU's restriction policy also offers opportunities, because if sectors in the EU embrace the new restriction, this will also create an incentive for innovation and appropriate solutions among suppliers in the chain.
4. PFAS-free products and components initially appear to yield lower ISO certification, but this also offers commercial opportunities, precisely because these new products are completely PFAS-free.

A fun and educational afternoon, and a prime example of collaboration between FHI members, government, semi-government organizations, and industrial end users. But of course, even after today, not everything is clear to everyone. There's a need for more knowledge sharing and understanding of how and where this impacts organizations in the supply chain, and how we can get this topic on the boardroom agenda.

Next steps

The next steps for FHI: we will now continue to explore who we need to bring together to further raise awareness and strengthen collaboration. Stay tuned for the next steps!