The Department of Defense is assessing 727 military installations for PFAS use or release, according to its progress chart dated June 30, 2026. It has finished the first-phase inspection at 709 of them: 119 needed no further action, and 590 are moving on to a full remedial investigation. The contamination comes mainly from firefighting foam used in training and crash response, and veterans and families who lived on or near these bases may have elevated exposure.
That list covers active bases, closed (BRAC) bases, National Guard facilities and formerly used defense sites. The foam behind it is aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF), a firefighting suppressant the military used for decades at hangars, training pits and crash sites. Nearly every state with a sizable military presence has installations on the list.
This guide covers which bases DoD is spending the most to investigate and clean up, what the science says about health risks for service members and their families, and what you can do if you lived on or near one of these installations.
Being on the DoD list means an installation used or may have released PFAS and is being assessed. It does not by itself mean drinking water there is contaminated. The phases run in order: a preliminary assessment and site inspection (PA/SI) checks for releases, a remedial investigation and feasibility study (RI/FS) measures how far contamination has spread and how to clean it up, and cleanup follows. The compounds DoD tracks include PFOA, PFOS, PFNA and PFHxS, the same PFAS chemicals EPA now regulates in public drinking water.
The money shows how large the problem is. Across the installations on the June 2026 chart, DoD reports more than $3.2 billion obligated for PFAS investigation and cleanup through fiscal 2025, about $384 million planned for fiscal 2026, and more than $10 billion planned after that.
Groundwater at some installations has tested far above the 4 parts per trillion (ppt) limit EPA set for PFOA and PFOS in drinking water. Others have low or no detections, which is why 119 installations were closed out after inspection. Cleanup spending is not a contamination reading, but it tracks the size and complexity of the problem, and it is the one nationwide figure DoD publishes for every installation. The table below ranks installations by what DoD has obligated so far.
| Rank | Installation | State | Branch | Obligated through FY2025 | Investigation (RI/FS) est. finish | |------|-----------|-------|--------|---------------------|--------------------| | 1 | Reese AFB (former) | TX | Air Force | $130.5M | Sep 2028 | | 2 | Wurtsmith AFB (former) | MI | Air Force | $115.5M | Sep 2032 | | 3 | Peterson Space Force Base | CO | Air Force | $113.2M | Dec 2037 | | 4 | Pease AFB (former) | NH | Air Force | $106.1M | Sep 2031 | | 5 | Eielson AFB | AK | Air Force | $101.5M | Mar 2036 | | 6 | Shaw AFB | SC | Air Force | $88.7M | May 2036 | | 7 | NAS JRB Willow Grove (former) | PA | Navy | $79.8M | Dec 2033 | | 8 | Cannon AFB | NM | Air Force | $75.5M | Mar 2037 | | 9 | NAS Whidbey Island | WA | Navy | $64.9M | Feb 2038 | | 10 | Wright-Patterson AFB | OH | Air Force | $60.0M | Jun 2042 | | 11 | Tinker AFB | OK | Air Force | $59.9M | Jun 2038 | | 12 | NAWC Warminster (former) | PA | Navy | $59.6M | Oct 2030 | | 13 | Camp Grayling (cantonment) | MI | Army National Guard | $57.0M | Mar 2041 | | 14 | Ellsworth AFB | SD | Air Force | $49.8M | Mar 2039 | | 15 | Otis ANG Base, Joint Base Cape Cod | MA | Air National Guard | $40.2M | Sep 2035 | | 16 | Biddle ANGB (formerly Horsham/Willow Grove ANG) | PA | Air National Guard | $36.6M | Sep 2049 | | 17 | NAS Brunswick (former) | ME | Navy | $36.1M | Mar 2032 | | 18 | Fairchild AFB | WA | Air Force | $36.0M | Jun 2044 | | 19 | Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst | NJ | Air Force | $34.6M | Mar 2037 | | 20 | Devens (former Fort Devens) | MA | Army | $34.3M | Sep 2041 |
Source: Department of Defense, Progress at the 727 Installations Being Assessed for PFAS Use or Potential Release, status as of June 30, 2026. "Obligated" is actual obligations through fiscal 2025. RI/FS is the remedial investigation and feasibility study; finish dates are DoD estimates. Every installation in this table has finished its preliminary assessment and site inspection.
Camp Lejeune is on the DoD PFAS list too (about $24.5 million obligated through FY2025), but its best-known contamination is a separate story. From 1953 to 1987, as many as one million Marines, family members and civilian workers were exposed to drinking water contaminated with industrial solvents: trichloroethylene (TCE), perchloroethylene (PCE), benzene and vinyl chloride. The Camp Lejeune Justice Act of 2022 opened a path for people harmed by that water to seek compensation.
AFFF became the military's standard firefighting tool in the 1970s. It works by creating a foam blanket that starves fuel fires of oxygen, which is critical for aircraft hangar fires and live-fire training. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps installations used it widely, and training drills meant spraying large volumes of foam onto concrete pads, tarmacs and bare soil.
The problem: AFFF contains PFAS as a key ingredient. The foam soaked into the ground, leached into aquifers, and in some places migrated into drinking water wells serving on-base housing and nearby communities.
Military research flagged AFFF's toxicity decades before civilian regulators acted, but alternatives were costlier and less proven. Congress ordered the military to stop using PFAS-based foam, with an October 2024 deadline and waivers that can run to October 2026.
The science linking PFAS exposure to health effects has gotten stronger each year. EPA's 2024 health assessments for PFOA and PFOS link them to liver effects, thyroid and immune effects, high cholesterol, kidney cancer and testicular cancer. Pregnant women with elevated PFAS show higher rates of low birth weight and preeclampsia.
For veterans who served at affected bases, the exposure window matters. These chemicals have half-lives measured in years, not weeks, so someone who drank contaminated water for several years can carry measurable PFAS long after leaving. We don't know yet whether short-term exposure carries the same long-term risks as chronic exposure; the early data suggests cumulative dose matters more than peak concentration.
The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) measured PFAS in the blood of residents in communities near 10 current and former military installations between 2019 and 2022. Average blood levels of some PFAS, especially PFHxS, were higher than the national average in many of those communities. Those assessments measured exposure; they were not designed to prove which illnesses PFAS caused. The research is still developing, and we are watching it.
Camp Lejeune set the precedent for presumptive benefits. Veterans who served there for at least 30 days between August 1, 1953 and December 31, 1987 are presumed service-connected for eight conditions: adult leukemia, aplastic anemia and other myelodysplastic syndromes, bladder cancer, kidney cancer, liver cancer, multiple myeloma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and Parkinson's disease. Presumptive means you don't have to prove the water caused your illness; if you meet the service requirement and have a covered condition, the VA presumes the connection. Those presumptions cover the solvent contamination, not PFAS.
DoD's cleanup follows the federal Superfund process (CERCLA), installation by installation: inspect, investigate, then clean up. By June 30, 2026 it had finished the inspection phase at 709 of the 727 installations, closed out 119, and moved 590 into remedial investigation.
But the pace is slow. On DoD's own chart, the estimated finish dates for the investigation phase alone run into the 2030s and 2040s at many large installations, as late as 2049 at Biddle Air National Guard Base, and actual cleanup comes after that.
My take: the DoD is moving, but not fast enough. Veterans and military families who lived at these bases during the peak AFFF years are now in their 50s, 60s and 70s. Waiting another two decades for cleanup doesn't help them. Cleanup funding should rise, and Congress should act on presumptive conditions for service members exposed at installations with confirmed releases.
If you or a family member lived on or near a military base, start with our DoD PFAS installation tracker: every one of the 727 installations, searchable by name and state, with its cleanup phase, DoD's estimated investigation finish date, dollars spent, and a link to the water report for the nearest ZIP code. It is built from DoD's June 2026 progress chart, the official record.
You should also check PFAS levels in your current water supply by ZIP code. Even if you no longer live near a military base, some civilian water systems draw from aquifers affected by past military activity. EPA's UCMR 5 data covers about 10,000 public water systems, and our tool makes it searchable in seconds.
If you lived at an affected base and want to know your personal exposure, talk to your doctor about PFAS blood serum testing. The test measures several common PFAS compounds in your bloodstream. Most insurance plans don't cover it and it typically costs $200-400 out of pocket, but it gives you a baseline. CDC's National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) shows typical U.S. adults have a few ng/mL of the main PFAS in their blood. If yours is significantly higher, that's worth discussing with a clinician familiar with environmental medicine.
To check the water coming out of your own tap for the same compounds found at these bases, an at-home kit like the SimpleLab Tap Score PFAS test screens 26 individual PFAS through an EPA-certified lab, with results in 7-10 days. It tells you whether your current water carries the contamination today, not just whether your base is on the DoD list.
First, filter your water. If you're still living near an affected base or if your municipal water shows detectable PFAS, install a filter that actually works. Reverse osmosis systems remove 95-99% of PFAS. Ion exchange and activated carbon filters certified to NSF/ANSI 53 for PFOA/PFOS also work, though they require cartridge replacement every 3-6 months depending on contamination levels. For a no-plumbing starting point, a Clearly Filtered pitcher reports brand-commissioned lab results for the core PFAS group (it is certified only to NSF 42 and 372, not for PFAS), while an under-sink reverse osmosis system is the most reliable long-term fix; our Ninja HydraSense review walks through a certified $199 countertop option for lead and the main PFAS compounds.
Second, if you're a veteran or dependent who lived at an affected base and you have a health condition, consider filing a VA claim. The VA does not yet recognize any presumptive conditions for PFAS, so claims are decided case by case and need evidence linking your condition to your service. The proposed VET PFAS Act (H.R. 3639) would create presumptions for conditions including kidney cancer, testicular cancer, thyroid disease, ulcerative colitis, high cholesterol and pregnancy-induced hypertension, but it has not passed. A Veterans Service Organization (VSO) can help you build the claim for free.
Third, monitor your health. PFAS exposure is associated with specific health markers: elevated cholesterol, liver enzyme abnormalities, thyroid hormone changes and immune function markers. An annual physical with a full lipid panel and liver function test gives you trend data. If your doctor sees changes, mention your potential PFAS exposure; most clinicians don't ask about environmental exposures unless you bring it up.
And if you have kids who grew up on an affected base, talk to their pediatrician about it. Some research suggests childhood PFAS exposure reduces vaccine effectiveness, though we're not sure yet whether that effect is clinically meaningful.
PFAS from military firefighting foam touches service members, veterans, family members and civilians near hundreds of installations. DoD is assessing 727 of them, has finished inspecting 709, and expects investigation work at many large bases to run into the 2040s.
Cleanup is happening, but it's slow. If you lived at one of the bases in the table above, check your current water supply, consider blood testing, and look into VA benefits. The data linking PFAS to serious health conditions is solid. What's still uncertain: how much exposure is too much, and whether short-term exposures carry the same risks as long-term ones.
For now, the best move is to reduce ongoing exposure. Filter your water, stay informed about your base's remediation status, and push your representatives to fund faster cleanup timelines.
How do I know if the military base I lived at is contaminated with PFAS? Check the Department of Defense's PFAS progress chart, which lists all 727 installations being assessed with each one's inspection status, investigation status and cleanup spending (latest update: June 30, 2026). Our DoD PFAS installation tracker makes that list searchable and links each installation to the nearest ZIP code's water report. Being on the list means PFAS use or a possible release is being assessed; 119 installations were closed out with no further action after inspection.
Can I file a VA claim for PFAS exposure at a military base? Yes, but there are no PFAS presumptive conditions yet, so the VA decides each claim case by case and you need evidence connecting your condition to your service. The VET PFAS Act (H.R. 3639), which would create presumptions for conditions such as kidney cancer, testicular cancer and thyroid disease, has not passed. Camp Lejeune's eight presumptive conditions apply to its solvent-contaminated water from 1953 to 1987, not to PFAS. A Veterans Service Organization can help with the paperwork.
What PFAS levels are dangerous in drinking water? EPA's 2024 drinking water standards set legal limits of 4 parts per trillion (ppt) each for PFOA and PFOS. Public water systems have until 2029 to comply, and EPA has said it plans to extend that deadline to 2031. Groundwater at some military installations has tested far above those levels. Health effects depend on how much you were exposed to and for how long.
Does the DoD provide water filters to people living near contaminated bases? It depends on the base. In some communities DoD has provided bottled water, treatment systems or connections to a clean supply where drinking water near a base tested above federal levels. Civilians off base usually don't receive help unless their own well or water system is affected. Check with your water utility, and consider your own reverse osmosis or activated carbon filter.
How long does PFAS stay in your body after exposure? PFOA and PFOS have elimination half-lives of roughly 2-5 years in humans, meaning it takes years for your body to clear half the accumulated amount. PFHxS stays even longer. If you lived at an affected base for several years, measurable PFAS levels can persist in your bloodstream for a decade or more after exposure ends.