The Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) has set a five-year deadline to largely phase out use of damaging types of firefighting foam.
(File image). Photo: 123RF
Foams containing chemicals in the PFAS (perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances) group have caused longlasting pollution worldwide and at multiple sites around New Zealand, including of water supplies, and the chemicals have featured in lawsuits for hundreds of millions of dollars in the US.
The new move requires that any use of PFAS foams from the end of 2025 gets case-by-case approval from the EPA.
A subgroup of foams that are the most widely studied and were most common until about 2010, containing PFOA (perfluorooctanoic acid), is getting stricter treatment.
PFOA foams' uncontained use, for example at a car crash, must be phased out by the end of 2022; and contained use, such as at a fuel tank farm that has a bund system, by the end of 2025.
Many countries and industries are trying to shift to fluorine-free foams.
Investigations that began in late 2017 showed airports, petrochemical plants and other operators in New Zealand had kept stocks of PFAS foams for years after they were banned or restricted.
However, doubts remained in New Zealand that the new foams - which are marketed as being less toxic - could cope with large fires at the likes of fuel refineries or airports.
The EPA said submitters on the changes to the firefighting chemicals Group Standard told it that PFAS foams worked better, and this should be a priority - and also questioned just how safe fluorine-free foams were.
"The lack of efficacy testing of fluorine-free foams for certain uses was a key theme from many presenters," the EPA said in its document discussing the Group Standard changes.
"In particular, sites with large amounts of potentially mixed solvents such as large fuel tanks, terminals for flammable liquids, ships, aircraft, and large chemical plants/storage facilities were cited as places where there is insufficient evidence of the efficacy of fluorine-free foams for firefighting."
"Some presenters also considered that quick control of large fires should be paramount for safety reasons" and PFAS foams were best at this.
Some PFAS foams contain shorter chains of carbon (called C6 foams) than the PFOA and PFOS foams, and these are considered less persistent, though they are also more mobile in water once released.
The PFAS group contains several thousand chemicals created in labs since the 1940s, and little is known about most of them - or about their replacements for firefighting.
"Some presenters raised concerns about possible ecotoxic properties of the fluorine-free fire fighting foams," the EPA said.
Submitters noted "the likely need to apply fluorine-free fire fighting foams at a higher rate increases the risk of foam not being fully contained".
The new foams would require big changes to firefighting systems, some said.
Many submitters argued for an exemptions system to let them carry on using PFAS foams, and the EPA's approach today adopts that.
The Fire Protection Association warned the industry might take a 'wait and see' approach, then flood the EPA with requests for exemptions if effective fluorine-free foams did not materialise.
The EPA changes also set out the requirements for removing and disposing of firefighting foam waste.
The costs worried submitters to the agency, especially as New Zealand has no facilities to dispose of the PFAS foams themselves, which must be exported for destruction.
The most widely used firefighting foam in this country, called Class A, does not contain PFAS chemicals, but only wetting agents.
Class Bs either do contain it, or it's not known if they do, and the use of these has been restricted by Fire and Emergency since 2017.
EPA regulatory systems group manager Siobhan Quayle said the ultimate goal of the tighter restrictions was to get rid of PFAS foams.
The industry's concerns about the effectiveness of fluorine-free foams had been taken into account.
"Obviously we've decided that the 2025 deadline is a reasonable target to date," Quayle said.
"It is a fairly small industry so we will be working closely with the players concerned."