The airports across the United States have been using aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF), the premier firefighting foam in the United States for several decades. AFFF contains per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFASs), which are a large family of man-made fluorinated chemicals with thermal stability that enhances its ability to rapidly extinguish hazardous fires. Though the PFASs increase the principal efficacy of AFFF as a fire suppressant for extinguishing fuel-based fires, the discharge of these agents into the environment poses potentially unacceptable health as well as ecological risk.
PFAS-based AFFF was developed for use on class B fires