Sen. Tom Bakk, I-Cook, led the Minnesota Senate's bonding committee into Duluth on Thursday, intent to hear more about the $5 billion worth of projects in need of state money.
PFAS are ubiquitous in manufacturing, hard to destroy and known to have harmful effects in humans. 5:49 pm, Feb. 10, 2021 ×
The Lester River empties into Lake Superior in January 2021. The Lester River and other streams can carry contaminants like PFAS from runoff to the lake. (Steve Kuchera / File / News Tribune)
DULUTH Some 20 years after first confronting the contaminating-effects of human-made “forever chemicals,” the state of Minnesota introduced a blueprint Wednesday, Feb. 10, for how to prevent, manage and clean up contamination from those chemicals.
The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency s blueprint seeks legislative solutions, including the designation of PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, as hazardous substances. The blueprint also seeks funding to begin broader sampling for the presence of PFAS in drinking water, fish and places such as Duluth’s Western Lake Superior Sanitary District.