Innovation Signal 72 (2026) | 4 November 2026
PFAS captured on activated carbon are becoming easier to destroy
Short note, about 5 minutes to read.
What happened
PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are highly persistent synthetic chemicals used in many industrial and consumer applications.
One way of removing PFAS from contaminated water is to trap them on activated carbon. But capture is not destruction. It leaves behind carbon containing concentrated PFAS that still needs to be treated or disposed of.
Destroying PFAS using mechanical forces generated by grinding or milling (mechanochemical treatment) is not new. What is changing is the ability to apply this approach to PFAS already captured on carbon.
In 2025, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign demonstrated that ball milling with an added boron nitride material could break carbon-fluorine bonds in PFAS held on powdered activated carbon. They reported approximately 90% defluorination of PFOA under their tested conditions.
Independently, researchers at Clarkson University tested PFAS-loaded granular activated carbon (GAC) using stainless-steel balls and containers. The milling process supplied mechanical energy, while the steel and conductive carbon helped transfer electrons needed to break carbon-fluorine bonds.
Unlike the Illinois approach, Clarkson did not add a separate reactive co-milling material. The activated carbon used to capture the PFAS became part of the chemistry used to break them down.
The researchers reported almost complete defluorination of PFOS in laboratory tests. In field-collected carbon, 30 targeted PFAS fell below detection in the reported post-treatment analyses.
Together, these studies suggest that PFAS captured on activated carbon can increasingly be treated through different mechanochemical destruction approaches, including one that uses the capture material itself in the reaction.
Why this matters
Capturing PFAS can clean contaminated water, but it creates another problem: what to do with the chemicals concentrated on the capture material.
If PFAS can be broken down after capture, the gap between removing them from water and treating the resulting waste could become smaller.
Who should care
- Water and wastewater utilities
- Environmental remediation companies
- Activated-carbon and filtration companies
- Industrial water-treatment companies
- Environmental regulators and public authorities
- Investors tracking water and environmental technologies
What could change over the next 2 to 3 years
Larger tests using spent activated carbon from real treatment systems could show whether these approaches work across more PFAS mixtures.
Evidence on energy use, throughput, equipment requirements and the condition of treated carbon will help determine whether laboratory results can translate into practical treatment.
What might block this
The Illinois approach required an added material, while Clarkson used a high mass of stainless-steel balls relative to the carbon treated.
The studies tested different PFAS under different conditions. Clarkson’s field results covered targeted PFAS only. Milling also reduced the carbon to fine particles, and neither study established a practical route for reusing the treated carbon.
Neither approach has yet demonstrated economical treatment at practical scale.
Why I am sharing this
Capturing a persistent chemical is only part of the solution if the material used to capture it then becomes another waste problem.
The next advance in PFAS treatment may be not just capturing these chemicals, but making their destruction easier after they have been captured.
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Archive Tags
PFAS · Water Treatment · Activated Carbon · Mechanochemical Destruction