Health-based guidance for water is a concentration of a chemical (or a mixture of chemicals) in drinking water that is likely to pose little or no health risk to humans. Health Risk Limits (HRLs), a type of health-based guidance, are adopted through a formal rulemaking process authorized in statute, as referenced below.

MDH conducts rulemaking for HRLs on a periodic cycle in order to allow new or updated water guidance to be considered for adoption into rule.

There is currently one rulemaking project for HRLs in progress, shown below.

General information about rulemaking and a summary of the current rules amendments project are provided through the links below. Information on previous rulemaking projects can be found at Rulemaking & Guidance History. For questions or more information, please contact us.

Rules status

Session Law HRL rulemaking project (estimated timeframe: 2023-2025)

This rulemaking project was recently required by Session Law of the 2023 Minnesota Legislature. This rulemaking began in August 2023.

The comment period for the Dual Notice of Intent to Adopt Rules for the Proposed Health Risk Limits Rules Amendments is now closed. One comment was received from the American Chemistry Council. See Comments Received to view a copy of the comment. MDH will submit the comment received, MDH's response (when available), and additional rule documents to the Office of Administrative Hearings for review.
The time for requesting a hearing on the Health Risk Limits Rules Amendments closed on December 4, 2024. There were no requests for a hearing. The hearing scheduled for February 18, 2024, has been cancelled.
A Dual Notice of Intent to Adopt Rules was published in the Minnesota State Register (PDF) on November 4, 2024 on pages 457-460. Comments on the proposed rules will be accepted from November 4, 2024, to 4:30 p.m. on December 4, 2024, through the Office of Administrative Hearings eComments site. See the Health Risk Limits Dual Notice for more information.
Please also see the associated Errata (PDF) that notes an error in the Dual Notice. In the “Subject of Rules and Statutory Authority,” section, the fourth (last) sentence of the first paragraph incorrectly states the units of PFOS referenced in Laws of Minnesota 2023, Chapter 60, Article 3, Section 34 as “ppm,” rather than “ppb” or “parts per billion” as shown in the Session Law.
The Statement of Need and Reasonableness (SONAR) is now available.
The proposed rules are now available for review. Comments will be accepted from November 4, 2024, to December 4, 2024.
A Request for Comments on Possible Amendments to Rules Governing Health Risk Limits (PDF), Minnesota Rules, Parts 4717.7500 and 4717.7860 was published in the Minnesota State Register on August 7, 2023.
See Health Risk Limits Rules for Groundwater Rules Amendments - PFOS Update.
This comment period opened on August 7, 2023, and closed on November 4, 2024, when the Dual Notice was published. No comments related to Health Risk Limits Rules Amendments were received during the Request for Comments period.