The nation’s trash incinerators are largely failing to remove Pfas, a “forever chemical” air pollution, putting people primarily in low-income communities at risk, public health advocates and independent experts have warned.
The powerful waste management industry is increasingly promoting incinerators as a solution to virtually indestructible Pfas waste, with a new industry group report claiming that Minnesota’s incinerators permanently reduce chemical emissions by 99.6%. Other incinerator operators are advocating similar cuts.
The report also comes amid fights to shut down incinerators in Miami, Philadelphia and Baltimore, as well as a lawsuit filed against the Environmental Protection Agency for failing to update emissions standards for facilities that do not include Pfas. Nearly 100 municipal or hazardous waste incinerators operate across the country, including seven in Minnesota.
Minnesota’s new report is full of false assumptions, incomplete data, misleading statements and has not been properly tested, according to an analysis by the Zero Burn Coalition advocacy group and a review by independent incineration experts.
Instead, advocates argue, the Minnesota facility is likely contaminating the surrounding area with Pfas and a cocktail of other dangerous pollutants often emitted by trash incineration.
Nazir Khan, executive director of the Minnesota Environmental Justice Table, said the report “deceives the public that (incineration) is safe.”
“This waste has become a problem for the poor, who are left out to deal with it themselves,” he added.
The Minnesota Resource Recovery Association (MRRA) trade group, which prepared the report, said in a statement that Zero Burn’s analysis made some valid points, but “does not support the conclusion that Pfas emissions (from Minnesota incinerators) are likely to be unsafe.”
Pfas is a class of at least 16,000 compounds most frequently used to make products water, stain, and oil resistant. They are thought to be linked to cancer, birth defects, weakened immunity, high cholesterol, kidney disease, and a variety of other serious health problems. These are called “eternal chemicals” because they do not break down naturally in the environment.
Because PFA is so widely used throughout the economy and in consumer products, it is concentrated in municipal landfills. Incineration of waste can release chemicals into the air. This compound is designed to withstand heat and destruction and is extremely difficult to destroy on an industrial scale.
“I don’t know of any industrial-scale commercial incinerators that solve this problem,” said Michael Youhana, an attorney with Earthjustice, a nonprofit that has litigated other incinerator issues.
Recent research shows that exposure to chemicals through the air is riskier than previously thought, but regulators are just beginning to establish health standards.
The MRRA report was prepared in response to requests from state regulators for information on Pfas emissions. The authors write that their findings suggest that “the six released Pfas compounds regulated in Minnesota are associated with little or no inhalation health risk.”
But opponents say people are exposed to more than just the six regulated compounds and that the report’s findings appear aimed at blocking new regulations. Dennis Travik Poynter, a former DuPont Pfas scientist who now consults on incineration issues, characterized the MRRA report as “pretty poor research.”
“I don’t know why you can say ‘99% reduction,’ because there’s too much missing data to make that claim,” Travik Pointer said.
Industry reports indicate that incinerators burn at temperatures above 850 degrees Celsius (1,562 degrees Fahrenheit), which is hot enough to “initiate” or “accelerate” Pfas, but there is scientific consensus that much higher temperatures are needed for the chemical to be destroyed, Travik-Pointer said. She added that the use of words such as “promoting degradation” does not mean destroying Pfas completely.
“We can’t just ‘accelerate’ the degradation of Pfas. We need to fully mineralize Pfas and prove we’ve done it,” Travik-Pointer said. “I’m sure this headline grabs people’s attention and makes them think, ‘Wow,’ but the health threat still exists,” she added.
Incineration often breaks down Pfas compounds into small but toxic byproducts that are not measured in tests or cannot be measured in most tests. The MRRA has only checked about 50 Pfas compounds, even though at least 16,000 Pfas compounds exist and hundreds are regularly used commercially.
The issue was brought to light in 2023 when the Guardian conducted tests of Pfas air emissions with academic experts near the factory. It found a test like the one used in Minnesota’s undervalued Pfas. Guardian’s tests detected up to 76 times more Pfas markers in the air than more restrictive tests used in the industry.
Zero Burn notes that the EPA even questioned the use of incineration for Pfas in 2024, and “due to insufficient data available, there is low confidence in the reliability of this technology to control Pfas emissions,” the agency wrote.
Zero Burn wrote that there were also “major holes” in the toxicity assessment, as health information was missing for 16 of the 22 PFAs found in the incinerator’s emissions.
Zeroburn further argues that the state’s advisory health standards for inhalation are too low, far below the EPA’s standard for drinking water when converted to air. When EPA limits are applied in Minnesota, air levels exceed standards by up to 17 times.
Industrial science also does not take into account the health risks of simultaneous exposure to multiple PFAs, along with other dangerous chemicals released at alarming levels from incinerators, Zeroburn said.
MRRA said Zero Burn could not conversely conclude that the levels were unsafe and questioned the proponent’s calculations. “A (zero-burn) analysis that estimates risk from the proposed drinking water standard is also not a risk assessment,” the report said. The MRRA added that the levels measured in the chimney were no higher than those near the fence line where people would be exposed.
Still, advocates say people living around the facilities are exposed to dangerous chemicals. The state of Minnesota and local governments have not committed to addressing the issue or closing the facility. The report will almost certainly be used in the ongoing fight, supporters added.
“This is part of a broader history of deception and an attempt to mislead the public and elected officials,” said Doug Gurian Sherman, lead author of the Zero Burn analysis and a former EPA official. “This is a clear example of environmental injustice.”
