Assessing and Mitigating Bias in PFAS Concentrations during Groundwater and Surface Water Sampling

Presented on April 28, 2022, by Elizabeth Hawley - Geosyntec Consultants - at the 2022 Emerging Contaminants in the Environment Conference (ECEC22)

Because fluorinated polymers are commonly used in sampling equipment and other materials and some PFAS are known to transform/degrade to form others, there is a concern that PFAS sample results can be inadvertently biased. Even low per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) detections may have implications for site investigation and waste disposal. Therefore, sampling guidance is often cautiously restrictive, increasing the cost and effort associated with sample collection. This presentation will summarize findings from an ongoing SERDP project, including science-based guidelines for practical field sampling equipment and procedures, sample shipping and storage, and research frontiers to improve techniques for surface water PFAS sampling, i.e., surface microlayer sampling methods to assess PFAS stratification and enrichment at the air/water interface and variability in field measurements using different common PFAS sampling methods.

Download slides: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/114124