In our ongoing commitment to provide residents confidence in their drinking water, Wolverine Worldwide has been providing whole house filters to residents in the MDEQ-defined House Street, Jewell, and Wolven Study Areas that have confirmed test results with any detection of PFOA or PFOS. While the extent of any impacted area has not been determined, and sources are still being identified, we remain committed to the community and doing what we believe to be the right thing for our friends, family and neighbors.
To date, Wolverine has paid for the installation, testing, and maintenance of approximately 460 whole house filters, and additional installations are taking place every week. Last year, Wolverine selected the Culligan/Calgon filtration system, which relies on dual canister granular activated carbon (“GAC”) adsorption. This system has been demonstrated to effectively remove PFOA, PFOS, and other PFAS, and ensures that these compounds are not returned to the environment. The Culligan/Calgon filtration system has been used to treat water for PFAS in over 1,000 homes around the country. More information on the Culligan/Calgon filtration system can be found here.
In late November, Wolverine provided details about the operations and maintenance of the whole house filters, including the timing and process for sampling water after the installation of whole house filters.
We have now received retesting data from over 280 homes, which demonstrates that the whole house filters effectively reduce PFOA/PFOS to levels far below the EPA’s very conservative lifetime health advisory level of 70 ppt. More information about PFOA, PFOS, and this advisory level can be found in our blog post.
In our continuing efforts to share information and be transparent with the community, we wanted to provide some highlights of the retesting results:
- Homes with the highest concentrations of PFOA/PFOS (over 7,500 ppt), are tested weekly after the whole house filters are installed. As a result, we have the most data for these homes, and after a brief break-in period, all results for the filtered water are less than 3 ppt for PFOA/PFOS.
- Homes with PFOA/PFOS concentrations of 1,000-7,499 ppt are tested monthly after the whole house filters are installed, and for these homes the filtered water after the brief break-in period are less than 3 ppt for PFOA/PFOS.
- Homes with PFOA/PFOS concentrations of 71-1,000 ppt are tested quarterly after the whole house filters are installed, and for these homes the water between the two carbon canisters ranges from non-detect to less than 10 ppt for PFOA/PFOS. The water continues through the second carbon canister of the system for further reduction.
- Homes with PFOA/PFOS concentrations at or lower than 70 ppt continue to be monitored, and for these homes the water between the two carbon canisters has remained well below 70 ppt for PFOA/PFOS.
All retesting results either have been or are in the process of being communicated to homeowners and the MDEQ. For those who have not yet received retesting results, it can take up to five weeks to receive them from the laboratory, so we appreciate the community’s patience during this process.
We will continue to keep the community updated about these results and this issue through our blog at WeAreWolverine.com. Any residents with questions are encouraged to contact us directly at (616) 866-5627 of HouseStreet@wwwinc.com