Maine’s Support for Farms With ‘Forever Chemicals’ Seen as Model

It’s been a decade since farmers began to learn that contamination from PFAS unknowingly spread across their property could devastate their lives and livelihoods, but Maine is showing it’s possible to keep farms going despite the problems caused by the “forever chemicals.”

Preventing a death knell from PFAS requires a safety net for the business and the farm family, said Bill Pluecker, an organic vegetable farmer in Warren, Maine, and independent state representative. “Farmers can’t be left holding the bag at the end of the day.”

Maine began to tackle the problems of PFAS on farms after 2016, when farmers couldn’t sell their food due to contamination attributed to fertilizer made from sewage sludge, or biosolids. Now Maine is the only state that’s gone through the widespread panic of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, known as PFAS, being found on farms and come out on the other side, said Sara Kelemen, a soil specialist at the American Farmland Trust.

Farmers and agricultural groups are now looking to the federal government and other states for help.

“Our hope is that the federal government and other states can see they don’t have to reinvent the wheel, but can learn from it, and pick what works for them,” said Emily Liss, the trust’s farm viability policy manager.

“Maine has really helped impacted farmers, so it doesn’t have to be the end of the farm,” said Courtney Briggs, government affairs director at the American Farm Bureau Federation.

As of Jan. 31, Maine’s Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry had worked with 113 farms that exceed the state’s screening levels for PFAS. Of those farms, only seven went out of business, and three significantly curtailed their operations, according to the department.

With technical and financial assistance, land purchase options, mental health support, and other help, most of Maine’s PFAS-impacted farms have continued farming, the department said by email.

No Federal Infrastructure

Dairy farmer Fred Stone was the first Maine farmer to demand help from the state, after he could no longer sell his milk due to contamination. He was soon joined by others, including Adam Nordell of Songbird Farm, who also were driven out of business.

The farmers who went public despite risk to their businesses deserve credit for Maine’s decision to address PFAS problems, said Emily Lad, assistant director of engagement at Maine Farmland Trust.

The state created a $60 million PFAS Fund in 2022, which supports farmers facing PFAS contamination, and a PFAS assistance program, which offers a wide range of support.

That strategy is embodied at the federal level in the Relief for Farmers Hit with PFAS Act (S. 3353; H.R. 6476), which Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) introduced in December.

The bill would fill a critical gap, said Briggs with the Farm Bureau. “As it exists there is no infrastructure at the federal level to support our farmers.”

The House’s version of the Farm Bill (H.R.7567) was advanced by the House Agriculture Committee without that amendment. The Senate has not released its measure.

“The Republican Farm Bill fails farmers” said Pingree by email, and its “willful neglect of the PFAS crisis is a glaring example of that.” She said she’s hopeful the Senate will include the relief bill in its Farm Bill, “so the responsibility for addressing this crisis doesn’t fall solely on states like Maine or on farmers who did nothing wrong.”

The Farm Bureau and Maine Farmland Trust also hope the relief legislation can be added to the Farm Bill, Briggs and Lad said.

Other Federal Actions

Legislation to shield farmers from liability if their property has PFAS also is needed, Briggs said.

Two common types of PFAS are hazardous substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, or Superfund law, which can make property owners liable for the chemicals.

Research also is crucial, said RJ Karney, senior director of public policy at the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture (NASDA).

Questions he and others said need to be investigated include how to remove PFAS from livestock, how the chemicals move from the soil and water into different crops; and ways to remove the chemicals from the soil.

The House’s Farm Bill authorizes federal research, and NASDA aims to secure funding through the appropriations process, Karney said.

Creating a federal interagency workgroup spearheaded by the US Department of Agriculture would also help. That could be a forum for states and federal agencies to share PFAS information to ensure it’s accurate, transparent, and actionable, Karney said.

Included in additional federal policy recommendations farm, conservation, and other groups developed is having the Environmental Protection Agency work with USDA to develop a health-based PFAS threshold for all land-applied biosolids.

Farmers from Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, and South Carolina who say they’ve suffered financial losses and health problems from PFAS in biosolids spread on or near their property filed a brief to support farmers and environmental groups who are suing the EPA. The lawsuit asserts the EPA has failed to properly regulate PFAS in treated sewage sludge.

State Legislation

State legislatures are exploring ways of helping.

Massachusetts is considering companion bills that would require a statewide master plan for sludge processing and disposal; protect farmers from liability; and establish a PFAS Relief Fund.

New Hampshire’s measure would establish a liability shield for farmers and require the state to establish sludge application thresholds.

Virginia’s bill, which was sent to Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D), would require biosolids be tested for PFAS, and base land application on the amount of the chemicals in them.

Dealing with PFAS is urgent; “we can’t lose any more time,” said Laura Robinson, who with her husband Winslow have kept their Fable Farmstead in Freeport, Maine, going through a PFAS soil-remediation research project Yale University designed.

“The way I see it is PFAS is affecting our food supply,” she said. “We need to invest in how to fix this, because we all have to eat.”