On October 26, the Environmental Protection Agency unveiled its first agency-wide plan for tackling PFAS - the "forever chemicals" that have turned up in drinking water systems across the country. Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the strategy, called PFAS TECH, at a water treatment facility in Commerce City, Colorado - a fitting backdrop, since the surrounding community spent $86 million on an ion-exchange plant capable of treating up to 18 million gallons a day.
If you own a water filter, or you're thinking about one, here's the honest read on what this announcement changes for your kitchen - and what it doesn't.
What the strategy actually does
PFAS TECH is best understood as a technology and funding push rather than a new rule. Its main pieces:
- Pilot projects at Superfund sites, military bases, wastewater plants and drinking-water systems, testing treatment and destruction methods at real-world scale.
- Research funding routed through existing programs - the Science to Achieve Results (STAR) grants and Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR).
- A "Break the Bond Navigator" - a hub of information on treatment methods, funding and technical assistance for local utilities.
- Partnerships with states, universities and private companies, rather than new mandates.
Two technologies get particular attention: foam fractionation, which uses rising bubbles to separate PFAS from water, and supercritical water oxidation, which uses extreme heat and pressure to break the chemicals apart rather than just concentrating them.
What it doesn't do
This is the part worth being precise about, because headlines tend to blur it:
- Your legal limits didn't change. The enforceable drinking-water limits for PFOA and PFOS remain at 4 parts per trillion, and utilities generally have until 2029 to comply. The administration has separately signaled it may revisit parts of that 2024 rule, but the PFOA and PFOS numbers have stayed in place.
- It doesn't treat a single gallon of water. The pilots will take years to produce results, and those results will land at utilities, not in home filters.
- It doesn't mean your water is PFAS-free. Monitoring under the EPA's unregulated contaminant program has already found PFAS at hundreds of systems nationwide. If you're on a small system or a private well, nobody is testing for you.
Why your utility is the frontline
The Colorado story shows how this plays out in practice. PFAS traced to firefighting foam used at Peterson Air Force Base reached the Widefield aquifer and wells serving communities south of Colorado Springs. Utilities shut wells and switched sources; one installed ion-exchange treatment in 2017. Roughly 80,000 residents were affected. The fix worked - but it took years, tens of millions of dollars and permanent infrastructure. That is the work PFAS TECH aims to make cheaper and faster.
What you can actually do at home
- Find out what's in your water. If you're on city water, your utility's annual Consumer Confidence Report lists detected contaminants. Many states also publish PFAS-specific sampling results by system. On a private well, a lab test is the only answer - usually $50-150.
- Match the treatment to the finding. If your system reports PFAS detections, point-of-use treatment can reduce what reaches your glass, but it doesn't replace the utility's obligation or fix your whole house.
- Read filter claims carefully. More on that below, because the labeling is genuinely confusing.
How to read PFAS filter claims without getting fooled
Three different things get marketed as "PFAS tested," and they are not equals:
- NSF/ANSI 42 covers aesthetic claims - chlorine, taste and odor. Useful, but it is not a PFAS certification.
- NSF/ANSI/CAN 372 certifies that the product's own materials are lead-free. It is about the filter, not your water.
- Independent lab testing is where PFAS reduction numbers come from. Ask for the lab name, the report number, the challenge level and how many liters the test ran. Real results survive that scrutiny.
For transparency about our own products: Berkey Phoenix elements are certified to NSF/ANSI 42 and NSF/ANSI/CAN 372. The PFAS reduction figures come from independent accredited lab reports, not from an NSF PFAS certification. In testing with spiked water, PFOA (0.5 µg/L challenge) and PFOS (1.0 µg/L challenge) were reduced below 0.005 µg/L at every checkpoint through 1,500 liters - reductions above 99 percent. Full reports, with lab names and report numbers, are published on our comparison pages and in our test-results resources.
What we won't claim
Lab results are measured under controlled conditions with deliberately spiked water at 125-250 times the federal limit. They are not a promise about your tap. Results vary with your water chemistry, how much you filter, flow rate and maintenance. And no countertop filter is a cure-all: if your utility reports a serious PFAS finding, that's a conversation with your water provider first.
What the EPA's announcement signals is encouraging: the federal government is putting money behind making PFAS treatment cheaper and more effective. What it doesn't signal is that the problem is solved. Until it is, knowing what's in your water - and what your filter can honestly do about it - is the part you control.
Full disclosure: we're a Berkey dealer, so take our product claims with that in mind. Every figure above links back to a named lab report.
