EPA moves to designate microplastics and pharmaceuticals as contaminants in drinking water

Photo: The interior of a drinking water treatment plant – September 10, 2014. Photo credit: Eric Vance / USEPA via Wikimedia Commons. US government work. Article by Jennifer McDermott and Ali Swenson. AP News – April 2, 2026. Federal Register Notice: Drinking Water Contaminant Candidate List 6 – Draft (pre-publication copy) (pdf). (738.67 KB)

The Environmental Protection Agency proposed Thursday to include microplastics and pharmaceuticals on a list of contaminants in drinking water for the first time, a step that could lead to new limits on those substances for water utilities. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said they are responding to Americans who have worried about plastics and pharmaceuticals in their drinking water. The gesture also aims to hand a win to Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA movement, which for months has pressured Zeldin to further crack down on environmental contaminants. […]

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