Environment committee  There are two aspects to regulating PFAS as a class of substances. I think the advantage of doing that is the ban on use, as my colleague was saying. PFAS should be regulated as a large group of substances so that they won't be used in everything. Then, from an environmental st

Environment committee  A lot of those communities eat a lot of fish and a lot of sea mammals. The sea mammals, because they're at the top of the food chain, are very contaminated with PFAS. They end up having a higher burden and a higher load of PFAS because of what they eat. It's better for them to

Environment committee  I would just add that there are fluoride-free fire foam formulations. So we could have regulations to ban foams containing PFAS or simpler versions that break down and whose residue is a source of contamination.

Environment committee  Yes, they exist. They're available.

Environment committee  I know that in Quebec, some firefighters use the new formulas and some others prefer the old formulas because they're accustomed to them and don't want to change what they use. There could be stricter regulations to ensure that certain products are no longer used.

Environment committee  No, I'm sorry.

Environment committee  “Absolute necessity” is a relative term. To me, there are probably some medical or hospital applications where PFAS are needed. PFAS are part of the chemicals in some antibiotics. There have to be some exceptions for medical applications. I can live with that. Scientifically, it

Environment committee  Obviously, the precautionary principle is important. The problem right now is that we're trying to remove these substances from our drinking water or our water sources, but it's very difficult. And yet they were put there. Without regulation, their use has been allowed for all k

Environment committee  I took about 500 samples; I took a little less, but I've added more since then. What I can see is that 95% to 98% of all samples had concentrations below the thresholds proposed by Health Canada. In other words, the vast majority of the samples would meet the drinking water stand

Environment committee  Some aspects are specific to the U.S. regulations, but I will try to simplify the concept of the hazard quotient. Often, concentrations in the environment will be measured and compared with known data on thresholds where there is an effect, a toxicity or an impact on health, amo

Environment committee  I will just add quickly that it's not well known, but some of the PFAS are volatile if you eat them up, and some of the degradation by-products can also be released through the air. Some of the contamination in faraway lakes, which should be pristine, by PFAS is from aerial depos

Environment committee  I remember it very well.

Environment committee  I'm not a regulatory expert, but that comment was made to compare with what we know about toxicology for lead, arsenic, and mercury. There are almost no recorded cases where the threshold value has increased; it has always decreased. We've never gathered more data and concluded t

Environment committee  Thank you. In terms of scarcity and PFAS, making the link is not necessarily obvious, but clearly, when there is less water, whatever is left will have a higher concentration. PFAS don't degrade—well, they degrade a bit, but very slowly. There is the potential for the aggravatio

Environment committee  Thank you very much. I'm very pleased to have the opportunity to meet you. I would like to talk to you about perfluoroalkylated and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, also known as “forever chemicals”. It's a family of over 10,000 molecules that are synthesized in labs by chem