{"id":44033,"date":"2021-10-28T23:40:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-29T05:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-fire-protection-district-gets-rid-of-toxic-foam\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:17:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:17:07","slug":"durango-fire-protection-district-gets-rid-of-toxic-foam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-fire-protection-district-gets-rid-of-toxic-foam\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango Fire Protection District gets rid of toxic foam"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Firefighters
Firefighters with Durango Fire Protection District, Upper Pine River Fire Protection District and Los Pinos Fire Protection District responded to a house fire in January 2014 at 517 County Road 230. Foam was used to extinguish the blaze, which was started by faulty installation of a woodstove pipe. (Durango Herald file)<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The Durango Fire Protection District says it will participate in a \u201ctakeback program\u201d to turn over hundreds of gallons of toxic firefighting foam.<\/p>\n

The fire district expects to hand over about 240 gallons of firefighting foam to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, said Deputy Chief Randy Black. CDPHE will store the toxic product until it can be safely disposed. The state will compensate the district at $40 per gallon for the unspent PFAS firefighting foam. The money will go toward the purchase of a safer replacement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe helpful part of this buyback program is it allows us a pot of money to buy the new foam out of because it\u2019s not cheap,\u201d Black said.<\/p>\n

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) have been incorporated into many consumer and industry products since the 1940s \u2013 from food packaging and non-stick cookware to shampoo and dental floss.<\/p>\n

Firefighting foam has been among the most notable products after it was reported that PFAS foam from the U.S. Air Force Academy contaminated private drinking water wells. Other U.S. Air Force bases have also been identified as the sources of PFAS groundwater contamination.<\/p>\n

PFAS firefighting foams were used for liquid-fuel fires like those involving gasoline, Black said. They were often used for training practice, particularly at airports where scenarios would feature hundreds of gallons of foam, he said.<\/p>\n

PFAS chemicals break down slowly over time, building up in humans, animals and the environment. People can ingest the chemicals through contaminated drinking water, some packaging products and foods such as fish.<\/p>\n

\"PFAS,
PFAS, or perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, have been shown to have significant human and environmental health consequences, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The so called \u201cforever chemicals\u201d have been found to contaminate groundwater, often near U.S. military bases. (Jake May\/The Flint Journal via AP file)<\/span>onset<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, PFAS exposure can decrease fertility and interfere with the body\u2019s natural hormones. It can also lead to cancer and developmental delays in children.<\/p>\n

In July 2020, Colorado\u2019s Water Quality Control Commission decided to regulate PFAS chemicals after the Colorado Legislature banned the use of PFAS-containing firefighting foams in 2019.<\/p>\n

CDPHE\u2019s take-back program, which began this fall, allows fire departments across the state to apply for the program until the end of February 2022. Payments began Oct. 1 and will continue through March 31, 2022.<\/p>\n

Black said the fire district has done a complete audit of its PFAS firefighting foam supplies and registered its inventory with CDPHE.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got a complete accounting of where we\u2019re storing all of it,\u201d Black said. \u201cWe\u2019re just waiting to hear back from them on the next steps.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Public
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, an environmental advocacy group, has identified thousands of potential PFAS-handling locations across Colorado using an EPA database. Southwest Colorado has yet to be significantly impacted, but San Juan Basin Public Health is monitoring the situation. (Source: Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility analysis of EPA database)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A
A pack rat emerges covered in foam after Durango Fire Protection District firefighters put out an engine fire in November 2015 on U.S. Highway 160 near the Grandview Interchange. (Courtesy of Durango Fire Protection District)<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

PFAS exposure has been less of a concern in Southwest Colorado than along the Front Range, said San Juan Basin Public Health spokesman Chandler Griffin.<\/p>\n

But according to a PFAS map<\/a> released by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, the EPA has identified dozens of sites in Southwest Colorado that may be handling PFAS chemicals.<\/p>\n

Oil and gas developments make up the majority of those sites, but they also include airports, waste facilities and mining operations.<\/p>\n

Though it hasn\u2019t posed an immediate risk, Griffin said San Juan Basin Public Health is still monitoring PFAS in the region.<\/p>\n

\u201cPFAS can present serious health problems to first responders and to the community immediately surrounding PFAS storage sites,\u201d Griffin said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe buyback policy is a sensible approach to reducing the potential risk to the community,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

ahannon@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Substance will be replaced with a safer alternative<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44034,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[434,1480,1030,738,222,739,350,28,668],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-44033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-chemicals","tag-durango-fire-protection-district","tag-environment","tag-environmental-issue","tag-environmental-pollution","tag-environmental-protection-agency","tag-fire","tag-headlines","tag-public-health"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44033"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85941,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44033\/revisions\/85941"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44033"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=44033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}