House and Senate negotiators reach agreement on agricultural PFAS contamination bill

Members of the New Hampshire Senate and House of Representatives found common ground Tuesday on a bill that would establish some civil immunity for farmers affected by PFAS contamination of their land or products.

A committee of conference recommended passage of an amended version of House Bill 1275 on Tuesday afternoon, with the six members present voting in favor of the amended bill. Stratham Sen. Debra Altschiller, the only Senate Democrat on the committee, was absent for the vote, but said earlier in the day she would not support the bill in any form. 

House members on the committee said they saw the bill as a compromise. As recommended, the bill exempts persons “engaged in the practice of farming” from civil liability related to PFAS contamination of their land or products due to “standard agricultural practices.” Those practices include the spreading of treated sewage sludge, or biosolids, on farmlands.

PFAS, or “forever chemicals,” are found in many man-made products and find their way into sewage sludge, in which, experts testified this winter, they are nearly ubiquitous and cannot be removed with standard treatments.

“In my estimation, I don’t know that we should be holding farmers responsible for contamination that’s on their property that they may not have known about,” said Rep. Judy Aron, an Acworth Republican and chair of the House Committee on Environment and Agriculture on Tuesday. 

But some who testified on the bill, including Merrimack Democrat Rep. Wendy Thomas, the prime sponsor of the bill, raised concerns earlier in the session about the Senate’s version. Including civil immunity provisions without requiring farmers to stop using sludge could allow bad actors to apply contaminated fertilizer without repercussions, said Thomas, who originally advocated for a ban on biosolids application and, later, for a moratorium on the practice. Both measures were ultimately removed from the bill. 

On Tuesday, Rep. Nicholas Germana, a Keene Democrat and member of the committee of conference, said that other requirements of the bill — including the requirement that the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services take action by June 30, 2027, to create rules for acceptable levels of PFAS in agricultural soils — would, in time, make the moratorium discussion moot. 

Starting in 2028, the bill would require farmers to test their soils for PFAS before applying biosolids. After that time, and based on the standards for PFAS concentration the bill directs the Department of Environmental Services to enact, farmers would not be able to apply more sludge if their land exceeded safe levels, he said.

“I don’t think it’s going to be an issue going forward. … With those two pieces, I don’t think the moratorium was necessary,” he said. “And I don’t think the civil liability piece is a problem.”

Aron said the state needed time to better understand the effects of biosolids use on PFAS pollution and enact standards. The bill, she said, allowed for that to proceed.

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“I think DES also needs some time to kind of discern whether they’re, number one, whether there’s a problem, what kind of levels might cause a problem, and to come up with some sort of standards,” she said. “So to put any kind of blanket ban right now I don’t think would be prudent.”

In other states, including Maine, land application of biosolids has been associated with high levels of PFAS contamination in agricultural soils and farm products. Farmers and their families who lived and worked on contaminated properties in Maine also discovered high levels of PFAS in their blood, some testified before the House Committee on Environment and Agriculture earlier this year. 

But Aron said land application of biosolids in New Hampshire was not as widespread as it had been in other states, including Maine.

“New Hampshire does not have the problem that Maine had. Maine had a disaster,” she said.

The soil testing data that would allow a direct comparison between the two states has not yet been done. Rep. Barbara Comtois, a Barnstead Republican, said she hoped establishing liability protection would help change that.

“We don’t know of any [farmers] that have actually tested their soil, because, you know, they could be afraid of being shut down or penalized, and that’s why this is so important,” she said. 

Other sections of the bill that were amended by the Senate were also recommended by the committee of conference on Tuesday.

They include an exemption for the U.S. Department of Defense from a ban on PFAS-added products and a change to drinking water standards for grant eligibility. 

The House members of the committee of conference drafted an amendment to refine language that Michael Wimsatt, director of the Department of Environmental Services’ solid waste bureau, said would allow the department to offer drinking water remediation grants to more water systems across the state.