DETROIT — PFAS pollutants ride rivers across the Midwest and Canada to get to the Great Lakes. But not in the way a pair of University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers studying the forever chemicals expected, and that could impact how environmental officials regulate the chemicals.
Christy Remucal, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Sarah Balgooyen, a postdoctoral researcher, expected to find the most PFAS in waterways that run through heavily polluted places, like small streams that travel through Marinette where PFAS used at Tyco's Fire Technology Center contaminated groundwater, ponds and ditches.
The streams flowing through well-known polluted sites did carry PFAS, but Remucal and Balgooyen were surprised to find a concerning amount of PFAS in the samples they took from big rivers: specifically the Fox, Peshtigo and Menominee.
