New York State Drafts Limits For ‘Unintentionally’ Added PFAS In Apparel

September 19, 2025

New York state environment regulators are seeking public comment on draft limits for “unintentionally” added PFAS in apparel above which the product will be banned, targeting contamination in products that have stemmed unintentionally from the manufacturing process, which one environmentalist says could be what states focus on next.

“That is my hope, that we’re mindful of the PFAS below the surface in terms of what it takes to make products, and looking at how to address that,” Bobbi Wilding, executive director of advocacy group Clean and Healthy New York, told Inside PFAS Policy. “PFAS is used in a lot of manufacturing processes, and so PFAS ends up in products that people don’t expect PFAS to be present in. [Intentionally added] PFAS in products is the tip of the iceberg.”

New York joins only a handful of other states that are attempting to target unintentionally added per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in consumer products in addition to intentionally added PFAS, since most state laws regulate only the latter, which experts say is comparatively easier for manufacturers to mitigate.

For example, California has a law that bans the sale of apparel with intentionally added PFAS as well as PFAS at or above 100 parts per million (ppm) total organic fluorine (TOF) starting Jan. 1, 2025, and 50 ppm starting Jan. 1, 2027.

In New York, as of Jan. 1, the sale of apparel with intentionally added PFAS is banned. The same law adds that “no person shall sell or offer for sale in this state any new, not previously used, apparel containing perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances at or above a level that the department shall establish in regulation” starting Jan. 1, 2027.

New York will also ban starting Jan. 1, 2028, the sale of “outdoor apparel for severe wet conditions” with both intentionally added PFAS as well as PFAS at or above the levels established for the 2027 ban.

“PFAS is intentionally added to some apparel, such as in stain protectors and waterproofing agents,” a spokesperson for the New York Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) told Inside PFAS Policy in an email. “PFAS also may be unintentionally added to some apparel. For example, if PFAS is present in apparel manufacturing equipment as a processing aid, or in recycled materials used to manufacture the apparel, it may be present in finished products.”

“Establishing quantitative restriction levels in regulations would allow DEC to restrict the sale of any article of apparel containing more than the allowable level of PFAS, regardless of if it was added intentionally or unintentionally.”

DEC on Aug. 25 held an informal pre-rulemaking stakeholder meeting to discuss and consider changes to the apparel law. Agency officials also floated the PFAS restrictions DEC is considering, ahead of the proposed rule.

DEC will close its public comment period on the draft limits on Sept. 25, after which officials will evaluate the need for additional stakeholder meetings ahead of developing a proposed rule.

According to slides presented during the meeting, DEC is considering a 50 ppm TOF restriction level for all PFAS testing not specified under a target analyte list as well as a 25 to 1,000 parts per billion (ppb) restriction level for individual PFAS analytes. For example, DEC is weighing a 25 ppb total level for perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) and its salts, as well as a 1,000 ppb level for PFOS-related substances.

‘Each Component’

Moreover, the limits would be for “each component of an article of apparel,” Nicole Orabona, a research scientist with DEC, said during the meeting. “Each component of an article would need to comply with all of the restrictions. Therefore, if one component of a product exceeds any of the restriction levels, the product would be out of compliance.”

And regarding the 50-ppm level, Conor Shea, an engineer with DEC, said 50 ppm is “generally one of the lower levels that a lab -- a consumer product testing lab -- would be capable of achieving.”

“There may be some that can go below this, but this is what we’ve seen as being generally achievable as not a detection level, but a limit of quantitation for total organic fluorine,” Shea said.

Although advocates hope more states will consider regulating unintentionally added PFAS like New York and California, therefore minimizing to a greater extent the PFAS contamination in a product, Wilding noted that “the challenge of identifying the intentional uses of PFAS that are avoidable right now versus ones that are currently unavoidable is technically complex enough that tying in this additional layer would muddy the waters.”

Wilding added that manufacturers are also concerned about regulations targeting PFAS in manufacturing.

“In a lot of cases, they also do have control over their machinery, although, obviously, changing those things can be on a much longer time frame than changing a formulation,” of a product, Wilding said.

“I think that there needs to be a conversation about how PFAS is regulated in the manufacturing setting, and that’s just something that’s a different structure of legislation or policy than restrictions on chemicals and products,” Wilding said. “And so, I think that we have not really yet looked that big, gigantic problem in the eye, quite frankly, as a country, like that is the much more significant challenge.” -- Pavithra Rajesh (prajesh@iwpnews.com)