Forever chemicals: Brussels' mission to clean up Europe's water

euronews (in English)

Forever chemicals: Brussels' mission to clean up Europe's water  The European Commission plans to support water treatment to eliminate forever chemicals (PFAS), according to the European Water Resilience Strategy, adopted in Brussels on Wednesday.    READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/06/05/forever-chemicals-brussels-mission-to-clean-up-europes-water  Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages

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00:00The European Commission is planning to launch a vast operation to clean up PFAS in water.

00:10The European Water Resilience Strategy concluded in Brussels on Wednesday.

00:15Environmental associations, which are campaigning for a ban on PFAS at the source, denounce it as a missed opportunity.

00:22We were expecting to see more ambition to cut the pollution at source,

00:25and especially when it comes to pesticides, we see that although it is mentioned,

00:31like we need to cut the pesticide pollution at source,

00:33then let's say the measures that they're taking in order to do that, they're really falling really short.

00:41PFAS are dubbed forever chemicals because they don't easily break down in the environment.

00:46Health costs are estimated at 52 to 84 billion euros a year.

00:51These chemical compounds are anti-adhesive, waterproof, and heat-resistant.

00:56They're also present in many everyday objects, such as nonstick pans, firefighting foams, and medical devices.

01:03The European Commissioner for the Environment and Water Resilience said she was in favor of a ban on PFAS

01:09in certain products, such as cosmetics and food packaging.

01:12However, she points out that it would be difficult to ban all PFAS,

01:16as some of them currently have no effective alternatives.

01:19The problem is that we need PFAS in a lot of different products.

01:26For example, medical products like inhalators, things that you use when you go to a surgery,

01:32or a lot of things that we are, there is no substitution.

01:37Also when it comes to green transition, there is, or semiconductors, or digitalization, or defense industry.

01:43There is a lot of industry that we don't have the substitutions.

01:47The Commission wants to apply the polluter-pays principle for PFAS decontamination

01:52and reserve public funding for sites where it has not been possible to identify who is responsible.

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