PFAS is currently the most significant talking point within the water industry and, with the topic being at the centre of many headlines in mainstream news, amongst the public too. As a result, many offerings to deal with these forever chemicals have been and are being developed. Unfortunately, there is not a one size fits all solution to tackle PFAS, rather there are many factors to be considered. Such a large group of chemicals requires a continually evolving approach that considers scalability, experience, and resources required.
The Analytical Jungle of PFAS Testing
In recent years PFAS have emerged as one of the most complex analytical challenges in environmental and health sciences. With over 10,000 known compounds, including well-known species like PFOA and PFOS, PFAS are chemically diverse, highly persistent, and widely distributed across industrial, consumer, and natural systems.
Testing for PFAS is not straightforward. It’s expensive, time-consuming, and technically demanding. The field is evolving rapidly, with new methods, standards, and regulatory thresholds updating continually. Laboratories must navigate a growing analytical jungle, balancing direct testing of known compounds with derived or indirect methods to detect unknowns or transformation products.
In this article, we explore the evolving landscape of PFAS analytics: the challenges, the tools, and the path forward. When managing compliance understanding the complexity of PFAS testing is essential for making informed decisions in this dynamic field.
Analytical Techniques Used by Jacobi Carbons
PFAS testing generally falls into two categories outlined below:
Targeted Analysis: Focuses on quantifying specific PFAS compounds using LC-MS/MS or GC-MS. This is the most common and precise method for known PFAS.
Widely considered the gold standard of PFAS testing, this method focuses on a predefined list of about 20-40 compounds. In terms of method, it relies on liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry. This particular method allows for specificity and sensitivity, with detection limits in the low parts per trillion range, making it ideal for drinking water where strict limits are required. Such precision, however, comes at a high price, in terms of both money and time, with results taking two to three weeks to prepare.
Adsorbable Organic Fluorine (AOF): This is a broader method that estimates total fluorinated content, rather than for specific compounds, but can be done quickly (within hours) and cost-effectively too.
This is a powerful screening method and a very useful tool. It uses combustion ion chromatography to estimate the total concentration of organofluorine compounds – such as PFAS – in water samples. This involves passing the sample through activated carbon, which can capture the fluorinated organic substances, and then combusting the adsorbed compounds at high temperatures. This converts the fluorine to hydrogen fluoride which is then absorbed in a solution and quantified using ion chromatography. Detection limits sit in the low parts per billion range, depending on the matrix and setup, and the test cannot distinguish between specific PFAS.
PFAS Testing with Jacobi
On first glance, the preferred option for many customers is the targeted PFAS testing, favoured for its accuracy, however, the high price and time spent waiting for results often negates the benefits of its precision. For this reason, many favour the second option, AOF testing.
We understand that speed is everything when it comes to dealing with PFAS material, our team therefore developed AOF testing. We do this in in-house, meaning it is cost efficient for our customers, offers efficient and easy communication, and shortens quarantine times for their filters too. (A filter loaded with carbon to be tested needs to be quarantined whilst the process takes place, then once tests are confirmed the decision on disposal or reactivation can be made.)
Though it does not identify individual compounds, it does offer a broad-spectrum view, including unknown or emerging PFAS. This makes it especially useful for screening, trend monitoring, and evaluating treatment and is frequently used as a signaler to decide whether targeting testing is necessary.
Activated Carbon, the Forever Solution for PFAS Problems
Whether you are a plant operator who has recently discovered PFAS in your water makeup or someone with experience of dealing with PFAS, Jacobi can help. Activated carbon is a proven effective PFAS solution. It is also the only industrial scale technology that is approved for use with drinking and industrial water and that enables in-process PFAS destruction through reactivation, thus avoiding PFAS waste.
Next to this our Jacobi Resins products can be used to boost the performance. When the concentration of low molecular weight PFAS is high, resins are used in conjunction with activated carbon as they are superior when tackling the low molecular weight compounds.
This is all brought together by the Services arm of our business which provides mobile filter units and all the necessary logistics and media handling, plus any testing involved, beginning right at the start of the process.
Whether you are a plant operator who has recently discovered PFAS in your water makeup or someone with experience of dealing with PFAS, Jacobi can help. Activated carbon is a proven effective PFAS solution. It is also the only industrial scale technology that is approved for use with drinking and industrial water and that enables in-process PFAS destruction through reactivation, thus avoiding PFAS waste.
If You’ve Got a PFAS Problem, Get in Touch
As PFAS continues to dominate everything from casual conversation right up to policy agendas, we expect the rise in demand for reliable and scalable analytical solutions to continue.
If you have a PFAS problem where, next to the removal, a fast and reliable analysis and reactivation of your activated carbon is important, get in touch by emailing us at PFAS@jacobi.net. Our experts are on hand to guide you through the analytical jungle.