Despite the many obituaries for British elms, their death has been greatly exaggerated, as Mark Twain might have said. North Derbyshire is full of them, despite elm disease. There are superb centurion elms in Buxton’s town centre, but my favourite is here on the path to Errwood Hall.

I confess that I’ve walked past it many times over the last half-century and hadn’t previously noticed it. That inattention speaks of the tree’s deepest and – if it’s not too contradictory – grandest quality: its ability to stand to one side, to live unseen in full view, to flourish outside our ken. It is all the more magnificent for living so truly unto itself.

Not to suggest for a second that this wych elm is a solitary organism. It is itself entangled among taller oak and chestnut woodland, but every part of it is further smothered in other organisms. Fountain sprays of polypody (fern) erupt from several parts and all the branches, even some twigs, are engorged by mosses, including (I suspect) the appropriately named mamillate plait-moss. These also drip down from their tree anchor in long stalactitic hanks.

This overcoat bulks it up and gives it a green-furred, almost animate character. Add in the tentacular sway of its upper body and an arachnid droop in one half of the limbs, and you have some primordial, eldritch beast. In his monumental work The Matter With Things, Iain McGilchrist summarises the latest research on the cognitive capabilities of plants. You have only to look at this tree to know it also “knows” things.

There is a further defining quality in elms that this one illustrates perfectly. The tree’s outer surface is often dense, matted and gnarly with rootlets, and on other elms I’ve seen these excrescences swell into enormously thick, cankerous bosses. Elms literally bristle with extra vitality, the very bark seems prolific and promiscuous. The Goyt elm is one of the only trees I know where the leaves – and such lovely rough-crinkled leaves – sheath around the trunk itself. Come here in April and the thickness of that foliage flushes this part of the path in a green light so dense you could swim in it.

It’s known as living apart, together. Being in a serious relationship while remaining at separate addresses has long been a lifestyle more associated with people starting out in life.

But those aged 60 and above who date like people in their 20s enjoy better mental wellbeing, the largest study of its kind has found.

Couples who meet in later life and decide against moving in together experience mental health benefits comparable to marriage or cohabiting – but without the “frictions”, “intense day-to-day interactions” and care commitments that come with those relationships, the research showed.

They also avoid the “legal obligations and institutional binding” that make it harder to get out of an unhappy marriage, according to the study from Prof Yang Hu at Lancaster University and Dr Rory Coulter at University College London.

Challenging the perception that older people prefer more “conventional” arrangements involving marriage and cohabitation, the research found that when the over-60s form a new relationship, “living apart, together” is the most popular option: 10 times more probable than marriage.

The actor Helena Bonham Carter and the director Tim Burton lived separately – next door to one another – during their 13-year relationship. They first met when Burton, 56, directed Carter, 48, in 2001’s Planet of the Apes.

Miriam Margolyes has lived apart from her partner Heather Sutherland for more than 50 years, though last year the Blackadder and Harry Potter star said the pair wanted to move in together.

The new research relied on data from the UK Household Longitudinal Study, tracking the over-60s, their relationships and their mental health between 2011 and 2023 – the first time the subject has been looked at on a national scale.

It follows earlier research that looked at living apart, together across the whole population and revealed it was a more “durable kind of relationship form” among the over-60s in particular, Hu said.

“If you look at younger people they are LAT [living apart, together] because they couldn’t afford a house … but for older people the picture is very different – it’s a long-term arrangement rather than transitory,” he said.

While the study found marriage and its protections offered marginally greater mental health benefits for the over-60s, they found there was less of a risk to mental health with LAT break-ups than there was with a marriage or cohabitation ending.

Previous research has shown mental health benefits for marriage and cohabitation are greater for men than women and that “older women typically undertake a larger share of domestic and care tasks” in such relationships.

In contrast, older women and men enjoy similar mental health benefits from LAT, according to the study, soon to be published in the Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences.

However, Hu said they “didn’t find evidence LAT is on the rise” among the over-60s. “It’s not new, it’s new in terms of the attention being paid to it,” he said.

“We need to acknowledge the strength of these ties stretching across households, they are really important in sustaining individuals’ wellbeing. What’s also interesting is that among older people who LAT, 64% were living within 30 minutes of each other – and [they were] more gender egalitarian.

“LAT is a sort of fine balance between intimate union and individual autonomy. It allows individuals to still keep their commitments to existing family relationships, while leaving a space for them to have an intimate partner at a late stage in life.

“In terms of numbers there are many more younger people living apart together, but they do that under completely different circumstances … for younger adults living apart together, seven out of 10 are saying they want to move in together in three years’ time, in contrast to just one in four older adults.”

Adding that the research aims to deepen knowledge of an “important, previously overlooked aspect of older people’s intimate life”, Hu said it also has implications for policymakers concerning care, mental health and lockdown-type policies.

“Household-centered governance has its limitations,” he said. “During the [Covid-19] pandemic the whole LAT population was cut off.”

Full-size replica swords sold as souvenirs at a popular Harry Potter exhibition in Tokyo have fallen foul of Japan’s strict weapons control law and been recalled.

The 86cm stainless steel blade, which comes mounted on a wooden plaque, is described on the Warner Bros website that promotes the event as an “authentic recreation of Godric Gryffindor’s sword”.

But the tip of the blade was found to be sharp enough for the police to inform Warner Bros in November that possession without a special licence was illegal under Japan’s 1958 firearms and sword control law.

More than 350 replica swords were sold – at 30,000 yen (US$200) – between May 2023 and April 2024 but the police appear to have only recently become aware of its potential illegality.

The company is asking buyers to return the sword for a refund due to what it calls a “distribution issue”, with notices in Japanese and English posted on its website.

A number of the swords were available on online marketplaces in Japan but appear to have been removed.

In Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the fictional sword is said to be 1,000 years old and commissioned by the founder of the Hogwarts school for wizards.

Tight restrictions on weapons contribute to keeping violent crime rates in Japan very low, with the annual number of shooting incidents, which usually involve yakuza gangsters, rarely breaching double figures.

A television reporter received a police caution for holding a gun without a licence during a sequence on hunting, while even ceremonial swords need to be registered with authorities.

Crimes involving weapons do occur occasionally. A 78-year-old man was arrested in July 2023 in Yokohama, south of Tokyo, for attacking his septuagenarian neighbour with a ceremonial samurai sword during an argument over noise in their apartment block.

The Warner Bros tour opened in 2023 on the site of the former Toshimaen amusement park. The facility features sets from the hit films, such as the London Ministry of Magic, and is billed as the largest indoor Harry Potter attraction in the world.

Australia has been accused of undermining its Pacific neighbours in a landmark international legal case after it argued that high-emitting countries are not obliged to act on the climate crisis beyond their non-binding commitments to the 2015 Paris agreement.

In the case before the UN’s international court of justice (ICJ), Vanuatu is leading an argument brought by several Pacific nations and developing states – including Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu – that developed countries have a legal responsibility beyond existing UN frameworks. The case does not specify the names of countries that would fall under the definition of high emitters.

The hearing, which began on Monday, follows years of campaigning by a group of law students from Pacific island countries and a unanimous UN general assembly resolution calling on the ICJ to provide an advisory opinion on what obligations states have to tackle climate change and what the legal consequences could be if they don’t.

Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu’s special envoy for climate change and environment, told the Peace Palace in The Hague, that responsibility for the climate crisis lay with “a handful of readily identifiable states” that had produced the majority of greenhouse gas emissions, but stood to lose the least from rising sea levels and extreme weather events.

In its submissions, the Australian government said it was “resolutely committed” to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Paris agreement, which set a goal of trying to keep global heating since preindustrial times well below 2C and as close as possible to 1.5C. The goal is non-binding.

It said the agreements were the “central instruments” for global cooperation “to tackle the grave challenge of climate change”, and international legal requirements had already been considered when they were negotiated.

Most states recognised a responsibility to prevent “transboundary harm” – damage from pollution that crosses international borders – but Australia and other parties did not agree that the principle applied to damage caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

The country’s solicitor-general, Stephen Donaghue, said Australia’s view was that the UNFCCC and the Paris agreement had been widely adopted, and that customary international law should not extend beyond those frameworks.

Despite this, the general counsel for the Australian attorney general, Jesse Clarke, said the country applauded Vanuatu’s leadership in “driving forward” on the climate crisis.

“Climate change poses the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security, and wellbeing of the peoples of small island states, including Pacific island states,” Clarke said. “Australia acknowledges the extent of the challenge posed by climate change, and recognises that ambitious individual and collective action must be undertaken urgently.”

But Greenpeace Australia Pacific’s general counsel, Katrina Bullock, said Australia’s submissions “completely undermined its Pacific neighbours” and its position was “fundamentally flawed”.

“The UNFCCC and the Paris agreement were created to protect people, not to shield states like Australia from accountability. Compliance with these treaties is necessary, but not sufficient to safeguard human rights and the environment,” she said.

“The global annual conference of the parties, Cop, has shown us negotiation spaces where wealthy developed countries can call the shots have not led to the ambition we need to secure a safe climate for humanity.

“Where political negotiations have failed, the court must not.”

The Australia Institute’s strategic director, Leanne Minshull, said the UN general assembly request for the ICJ to give its opinion on countries’ climate obligations showed a significant number of nations were not satisfied with the existing multi-lateral agreements.

“Listening to the oral pleadings of Australia, and it’s consistent referral to existing multilateral agreements, it felt as though they were saying to the court ‘relax, we already have this under control’,” she said.

“Whether it’s Australians facing a climate-fuelled cost-of-living crisis or a Pacific islander watching their country be washed away, ordinary people understand we don’t have this under control.

“As an Australian, I would have liked to hear our government plead a case that looked for global solutions rather than rely on sophistry to limit our legal obligations to ourselves and others.”

The ICJ hearing runs for two weeks, with a judgment expected next year. The court’s advisory opinions are not binding, but experts say its assessment in this case will be referred to as authoritative document in future climate litigation and during international climate negotiations.

A woman who admitted to drinking and who was driving well over twice the speed limit when she smashed into a golf cart, killing a bride who had just got married at a South Carolina beach, was sentenced on Monday to 25 years in prison.

Jamie Lee Komoroski, 27, pleaded guilty at the Charleston county courthouse to reckless homicide, felony DUI causing death and two counts of felony DUI causing great bodily injury before her sentencing.

Police said she drank in several bars on 28 April 2023 and was driving 65mph on a narrow Folly Beach road with a speed limit of 25mph when she slammed into the golf cart, which was leaving a wedding.

The bride, 34-year-old Samantha Miller, died still wearing her wedding dress. The groom suffered a brain injury and numerous broken bones. The cart was thrown 100 yards (91 meters) by the crash.

The groom, Aric Hutchinson, will receive $863,300 in a financial settlement connected to the wreck, according to reports from June. Hutchinson has spoken about losing his wife, describing her as an “amazing human being who should never have been taken”.

In an interview with ABC, he broke down as he struggled to recall the incident. “The last thing I remember her saying is she wanted the night to never end,” Hutchinson told Good Morning America (GMA).

“I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. That night going from an all-time high to an all-time low, it’s pretty tough to try to comprehend,” said Hutchinson on GMA, but declined to comment on Komoroski.

After pleading guilty, Komoroski said she realized now she was addicted to alcohol and did not care how her actions affected others. She promised to spend the rest of her life helping addicts and warning of the dangers of drinking and driving. She said she was “devastated, deeply ashamed and sorry” for what she did.

“I wish I could go back and undo this terrible tragedy. But I cannot. I will live the rest of my life with intense regret for what happened that night,” she said.

Before the sentencing, Miller’s father told Komoroski he was disgusted that she appeared to never take responsibility. He told her she could apologize, but he would not listen to a word.

“The rest of my life I’m going to hate you and when I arrive in hell and you come there, I will open the door for you,” Brad Warner said. “You have ruined so many people’s lives.”

Komoroski, 27, pleaded guilty at the Charleston county courthouse to reckless homicide, felony DUI causing death and two counts of felony DUI causing great bodily injury.

The bride’s mother had previously lashed out at Komoroski, saying she made “a conscious choice” that turned deadly.

“It wasn’t an accident,” Lisa Miller said to Fox News. “This person chose to drink, get behind the wheel and plow down my daughter. This is a conscious choice that a young lady made.”

The Guardian contributed reporting

A judge ruled on Monday that Tesla CEO Elon Musk is still not entitled to receive a $56bn compensation package even though shareholders of the electric vehicle company had voted to reinstate it six months ago.

The ruling by the Delaware judge, Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick of the court of chancery, follows her January decision that called the pay package excessive and rescinded it, surprising investors. The decision cast uncertainty over Musk’s future at the world’s most valuable carmaker. Tesla’s board argued the enormous payment scheme was necessary to keep Musk involved in the company, an argument that the billionaire, already the world’s richest man, echoed.

McCormick also ordered Tesla to pay the attorneys who brought the case $345m, well short of the billions they initially requested.

Tesla has said in court filings that the judge should recognize a subsequent June vote by its shareholders in favor of the pay package for Musk, the company’s driving force who is responsible for many of its advances, and reinstate his compensation. Tesla and its shareholders argued that Musk had reached the milestones originally stipulated when the pay package was drawn up.

Tesla originally devised Musk’s payment package in 2017, setting conditions for Musk to receive 12 different tranches of stock options depending on whether the company hit certain revenue and market targets. Shareholders approved that package by a wide margin in 2018, but one investor filed a suit claiming that the board had been misleading and the package was unfair. Some prominent shareholders such as Norway’s sovereign wealth fund and the California state teachers’ retirement system voted against the pay package to no avail.

When the pay package was approved in June, Musk said in response on stage at a Tesla event: “I just want to start off by saying, hot damn, I love you guys!” He did not immediately respond to McCormick’s most recent decision, but he has lambasted her in the past and urged other business owners to stay away from Delaware, where most US companies file their incorporation paperwork due to friendly tax policies. Musk moved Tesla’s physical headquarters from California to Texas, though the pay package case continued before the Delaware judge.

McCormick previously ruled that Tesla’s board conducted a “deeply flawed” process to determine Musk’s payment.

McCormick found that the board was rife with personal conflicts and stacked with Musk’s close allies, such as his former divorce attorney.

Leaked images of Jaguar’s much-hyped electric concept car have appeared hours before the model’s official unveiling in Miami – revealing a vehicle that may just about live up to its controversial advertising pledge to be radically new.

Early online reaction suggests that the concept car, a sleek long-bonnet electric model in shocking pink, might indeed appear more familiar to fans of Barbie or the Pink Panther than the traditional owners of a Jag.

The most eye-catching features, bar the colours, include the lack of a rear windscreen, with rear-view cameras instead installed under gold patches behind the front wheel.

Above sizeable wheels and wheel arches, the car’s distinctive front end is capped by a windscreen that appears to meld into the side windows, which taper towards the back of the car, contributing to what Autocar describes as “a wraparound effect reminiscent of a racing helmet”.

It is unclear how the leaked images will exactly correspond to the concept car to be revealed in Miami later (at 8pm EST on Monday, 1am BST on Tuesday). Jaguar Land Rover had previously said that its first electric model would be a four-door saloon, but the leaked images appear to show only two doors.

A spokesperson said the firm was “aware of images circulating online ahead of Jaguar’s official reveal at Miami Art Week”.

The interior shots also show a driver’s seat without any speedometer – required by law in most countries – or in-car touchscreen entertainment systems, which are seen as standard features even in mid-range cars.

However, Jaguar confirmed that the colours at least were accurate. The spokesperson said: “For the design vision, we have chosen Miami pink and London blue. Miami pink celebrates the vibrancy of the city while London blue, a modern take on the opalescent silver blue of the E-Type, is a nod to Jaguar’s British heritage.”

The jettisoning of much of that traditional heritage has been trailed in teaser ads featuring diverse models and no actual cars and the tagline “copy nothing”, a break from advertising tradition that has generated widespread publicity and controversy, including criticism of Jaguar in some quarters for selling “woke” cars.

Jaguar executives said that the carmaker had to target a new generation as it transitioned from selling diesel models. The electric car, which is not planned to go on sale until 2026, is expected to retail at more than £100,000.

The carmaker, which is owned by India’s Tata group, has been slower than many rivals to embrace electric cars, selling only one model, the ageing Jaguar I-Pace. However, it is investing £18bn to produce battery versions of its lineup alongside petrol cars. Deliveries of the electric Range Rover, made in its main factory in Solihull in the West Midlands, will start at the end of next year.

A Delta Air Lines passenger who flew from New York to Paris as a stowaway is remaining in France for now after disrupting the return flight to the US that had been booked for her.

The woman, identified as Svetlana Dali, boarded flight 265 – which was full – without a ticket before it departed from John F Kennedy airport in Queens, according to officials. The US’s transportation security administration (TSA) said that while Dali, 57, went through property security channels, she never had a boarding pass or passport checked.

“TSA can confirm that an individual without a boarding pass was physically screened without any prohibited items. The individual bypassed two identity verification and boarding status stations and boarded the aircraft,” the federal agency said in a statement.

Fellow passengers said Dali managed to evade suspicion for a long time aboard the plane by moving from one bathroom to another, without ever taking a seat – but flight attendants eventually caught on.

A video captured by a passenger on the plane shared on social media showed the pilot making an announcement about the stowaway. “They’ve directed us to keep everyone on the airplane until we sort out the extra passenger that’s on that plane,” the pilot said on the announcement.

Upon arriving to Paris, French officials detained Dali, who did not have a visa for the country. French officials told ABC news that she is a Russian national who is a legal resident of the US.

Dali was put on another Delta flight back to the US from Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport. But she became “unruly”, according to a Delta representative. French authorities removed her from the plane, and she remained in the country.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Delta said they were each investigating the episode.

The TSA added it was independently reviewing “the circumstances of this incident at our travel document checker station at JFK”.

“Nothing is of greater importance than matters of safety and security,” Delta said in a statement. “That’s why Delta is conducting an exhaustive investigation of what may have occurred and will work collaboratively with other aviation stakeholders and law enforcement to that end.”

The port authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates JFK, did not respond to a request for comment.

The anti-whaling activist Paul Watson will learn within 14 days whether he will be extradited to Japan, a court has been told, as his four-month imprisonment in Greenland was extended.

At a hearing in Nuuk, the capital of the autonomous territory of Denmark, the judge Lars-Christian Sinkbæk said that Watson, who turned 74 on Monday, would continue to be detained in a high security prison pending a decision from the Danish government. Watson’s legal team immediately submitted an appeal to Greenland’s high court.

Addressing the hearing, Watson, one of the early pioneers behind the environmental campaign group Greenpeace, said: “In July, I had no idea that I would be sitting here in court in Greenland on my birthday today. It is a political case being run against me. It is a minimal case that has been run up. Denmark is known as a very trustworthy legal society, but look what it has become.”

Watson has been in Greenland’s prison, known as the Anstalten, since his arrest on 21 July by a dozen police officers while refuelling his ship, MV John Paul DeJoria. The police were acting on an Interpol red notice issued by Japan.

Tokyo is seeking his extradition on charges of stopping a lawful business, trespass, damage to property and assault relating to the alleged boarding of the Japanese whaling ship Shonan Maru 2 in the Southern Ocean in February 2010. The charges carry a sentence of up to 15 years in jail.

It is accepted by the prosecution that Watson, who has been involved in thwarting whalers for five decades, was not present at the time of the alleged crime. It is instead claimed that he was party to the decision by the activist Peter Bethune to board the vessel and throw a stink bomb on to its deck.

The bomb’s chemical components allegedly lightly injured a member of crew. Watson’s defence disputes that this would be possible.

Bethune was seized by the whalers at the time and given a two-year sentence, suspended for five years. As part of that sentence, he named Watson as a co-conspirator.

On his release, Bethune signed an affidavit in which he claimed to have named Watson in order to get a reduced sentence. Watson’s legal team argue that their client was not involved in the crime and that the charges are insufficiently serious for him to be extradited.

In response, the prosecution told the court on Monday that the charges would probably lead to a one-year prison sentence under Danish law.

The court was informed by Greenland’s chief prosecutor, Mariam Khalil, that “the ministry of justice is gathering the final information from Japan to be able to make a decision” on extradition.

She added: “The Ministry of Justice has confirmed by email on 30 November 2024 that a final decision is expected within 14 days.”

The prosecution sought an extra 28 days of detention but the court gave leave for Watson to be detained until 18 December.

Should the Danish government grant Japan’s extradition request within the next two weeks, Watson would be able to appeal against that decision, opening up the potential for a lengthy legal tussle and further time in jail.

The defence had also claimed that Watson’s regular travels without disturbance since 2012 when the Interpol red notice was issued, including a visit to Monaco to see Prince Albert, illustrated that the decision to request 14 years after the alleged crime was politically motivated.

Khalil said that the Japanese arrest warrant, on which the Interpol red notice was based, had been renewed 28 times since it was first issued in 2010.

At the time of his arrest in Greenland, Watson had been on his way with a 32-strong crew to practise his decades-long policy of “non-violent aggression” by intercepting a new Japanese whaling “mothership”, the ¥7.5bn (£39.4m) Kangei Maru.

In an interview with the Guardian from a prison cell, Watson, who has two sons, aged three and eight, as well as a 44-year-old daughter, said he did not believe he would survive a spell in a Japanese prison should he be extradited.

He said: “I know that if I get sent to Japan, I’m not coming home.”

The Japanese embassy in the UK and the Danish ministry of justice did not respond to a request for comment.

Donald Trump’s allies have fired the opening salvoes of his coming administration’s attack on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the federal agency that enforces and regulates laws on air, soil, and water quality among other crucial environmental and health issues.

In a letter from Republican House leadership to EPA the administrator, Michael Regan, Republicans trained their sites on the agency’s scientific integrity policies that are designed to insulate scientists and research from political interference.

Meanwhile, the incoming chair of the Senate environmental committee in a hearing last week promised to target portions of new PFAS regulations put in place over the last year, a top priority for Trump’s chemical and water utility industry allies.

The Republican House committee on oversight and accountability chair, James Comer, charged in his letter that scientific integrity policies would be used by EPA scientists to “hamstring the incoming Trump administration’s ability to implement their own executive agendas”.

The Republicans promptly moving to shred the integrity policies – which critics say were weak to begin with – demonstrates how party officials are “bending over backwards” to assist Trump in attacking career servants, said Jeff Ruch, a former EPA official now with the Public Employees Environmental Responsibility non-profit.

“They want to clear out all potential obstacles,” Ruch said.

The integrity policies were put in place during Barack Obama’s administration in response to George W Bush political appointees requiring EPA researchers to scrub terms like “climate change” from agency science and reports, and making other politically directed alterations.

The policies include the EPA’s and other administration agencies’ standards for objectivity and accuracy in scientific information, but Ruch said they were too vague under Obama. Among other problems, they didn’t stipulate how investigations would be carried out, or punishments for managers and political appointees who violated the rules.

The policies essentially tasked federal agencies like the EPA “with policing themselves”, Ruch said.

Trump did not attack the policies during his first administration, and his former EPA administrator Scott Pruitt, an industry ally, even used them as cover at times because they were so vague that he could claim to be following the rules, Ruch said.

The Biden administration pledged to strengthen the policies, but failed to produce many substantive changes, Ruch said. Still, Comer stated that the policies exist to stop Trump by “enabling career bureaucrats who favor one set of scientific viewpoints to undermine politically accountable agency leaders who seek to base agency actions on differing science”.

Comer ordered the EPA’s Regan to turn over reams of documents detailing the policies and their application.

Ruch said the attack points to two certainties: a stepped-up attack on agency scientists who contradict Trump in the second administration, and a crackdown on research produced by federal scientists.

“There will be blood,” Ruch added.

Meanwhile, Senator Shelley Moore Capito, the incoming chair of the Senate committee on environment and public works, took aim at strong PFAS limits during a recent hearing. Her comments show how years of industry efforts to cast doubt on science used to establish PFAS regulations are being weaponized with the GOP fully in control.

The EPA earlier this year finalized strong new drinking water limits for some PFAS compounds after the agency found virtually no level of exposure is safe to humans. It also designated two of the most common and dangerous PFAS compounds as hazardous substances under the nation’s Superfund laws, which could force industry to pay to clean up the messes.

Moore Capito repeated claims from many of those polluters, some of whom are among her largest campaign donors, alleging the rules were developed off of bad science, and are too expensive for many water utilities to implement. Documents show trade groups representing water utilities are already lobbying Moore Capito and the incoming Trump team to undo the rules.

While questioning a former EPA official who helped develop the rules, Moore Capito accused the EPA of “inconsistent inclusion and exclusion of epidemiology and animal studies, lack of predefined protocol, insufficient transparency”. She said not all scientists agreed on the low drinking water limits, including those on the EPA’s science advisory board.

However, many scientists who have been calling into question the EPA’s process and limits receive industry funding.

Linda Birnbaum, a former EPA water division manager, said there were some industry-aligned individuals on the EPA board who raised questions about the drinking water limits, but the board’s final report was strongly supportive of them.

The Biden administration has made tens of billions of dollars available for water utilities to implement the rules, and utilities continue winning funding through litigation against chemical makers. Meanwhile, the EPA has pledged not to hold small water systems, such as those run by schools, responsible for PFAS pollution.

Still, Capito Moore’s lines of attack are being used as justification to make broader changes to the rules, Birnbaum said.

“There was no major controversy around the rules,” she added. “She is spouting-industry sponsored lines.”