CASCADE CHAPTER OF SOCIETY OF FIRE PROTECTION ENGINEERS
Differentiating PFAS – Paul Rivers, PE FSFPE
Biography:
Paul Rivers is (mostly) retired and enjoying grandbabies with his wife Nancy after 45 years in the fire protection industry, working in fire insurance, fire protection consulting, and fire sprinkler contracting for 15 years, and, for three decades at 3M Company in product development.
Paul is a Past President and Board member of SFPE International, a Past President and a current member of the SFPE Minnesota Chapter, a past Board member of the US based Fire Suppression Systems Association (FSSA) and is currently serving on FSSA’s Global Outreach Committee and the Association’s PFAS Task Force. Paul is delighted in being here today to participate in today’s Chapter Seminar.
Abstract:
Per and polyfluoro alkyl compounds (PFAS) in end use are ubiquitous in society today. PFAS are essential for modern life to which we are accustomed. From semiconductors, computers, smart phones, pharmaceuticals, to BESS systems, refrigerants, fire protection foams and clean agents, pipe thread tape, dental floss, our car engines to even the plane that SFPE’s Technical Director Chris Jelenewicz boards to fly to Minneapolis for the Minnesota Chapter Conference, it is hard to imagine life without PFAS.
But, like good and bad cholesterol, there are good and bad PFAS. Unfortunately, ‘good’ PFAS, comprising the vast majority of the estimated 7,500 to 15,000 materials meeting the PFAS definition depending on the reference, are conflated with the minimal number of ‘bad’ PFAS. Thus, people mistakenly label the good as the same as the bad. Most notably in our industry, ‘bad’ PFAS are the PFOS and PFOA contained in aqueous film forming foam, or AFFF, heretofore in general use.
This presentation will give a technical discussion of how to identify differences of the ‘good’ and the ‘bad’ PFAS used in fire protection, how to characterize them in their end use and current and proposed regulation.
