Three chemical giants agree to pay more than $1 billion to settle 'forever chemical' claims
Source: CNN Business
New York CNN The companies Chemours, DuPont and Corteva announced on Friday they have agreed to pay more than $1 billion to settle claims that forever chemicals contaminated public US water systems.
The family of ubiquitous synthetic chemicals per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as PFAS linger in the environment and the human body, where they can cause serious health problems, and are found in everyday products including fast-food wrappers, makeup and carpeting.
In June, based on the latest science, the EPA issued health advisories that said the chemicals are much more hazardous to human health than scientists originally thought and are probably more dangerous even at levels thousands of times lower than previously believed. The three chemical giants are facing thousands of lawsuits from across the country alleging the toxic chemicals were utilized in manufacturing and then polluted the environment.
In a statement, Dupont said it has never manufactured PFOA or PFOS. CNN has reached out to the other companies for comment on the allegations, which they denied in a press release Friday. The three companies said they have agreed to contribute a total of $1.185 billion to a settlement fund. Chemours will contribute 50 percent (about $592 million), and DuPont and Corteva will together contribute the remaining 50 percent, at about $400 million and $193 million, respectively.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/03/business/pfas-chemours-dupont-corteva-settlement/index.html
Marthe48
(16,953 posts)but a billion from each company is still not enough.
Magoo48
(4,709 posts)Thy should also be shut down until they can prove to a board of neutral scientists that theyre fixes are workable and in place.
Warpy
(111,256 posts)reducing the nutritive value of the entire food chain. There are several simple processes to start cleaning the damned shit up. One hopes this trillion would go toward building facilities do accomplish making a dent in it, at least here in the US.
I know, fat chance, ha ha ha.
Hekate
(90,681 posts)What a legacy for our children and further descendents
OnlinePoker
(5,719 posts)So...forever.
Talitha
(6,587 posts)Evolve Dammit
(16,728 posts)EarthFirst
(2,900 posts)Business as usual.
WestMichRad
(1,321 posts)PlutosHeart
(1,275 posts)what actually happens with these teenie fines?
I know it is meant as a deterrent even though too low but seriously, the garbage remains in the system. So who is actually benefitting? The planet is not it seems.
I think a more suitable outcome would have been for a strictly monitored shutdown of making them and demands that they work with scientists to enact as much cleanup (good luck with that) as possible. Let them go broke.
BumRushDaShow
(128,964 posts)Some stuff I found from AP -
By JOHN FLESHER yesterday
(snip)
The agreement would settle a case that was scheduled for trial Monday involving a claim by Stuart, Florida, one of about 300 communities that have filed similar suits since 2018 against companies that produced firefighting foam or the PFAS it contained. They are pending in U.S. District Court in Charleston, South Carolina, where Judge Richard Gergel is overseeing thousands of complaints alleging PFAS damages. Among the plaintiffs are water providers, airports, and a number of states and private well owners.
This agreement represents the first of many steps to begin to redress the harms of PFAS contamination in Americas drinking water supplies, law firms representing plaintiffs said in a statement.
(snip)
If Judge Gergel approves the deal, he will set a timetable for notifying water providers who might stake claims. They are free to opt out and pursue separate cases, but participants will get funds to address PFAS contamination right now, said Carla Pickrel, an attorney whose firm represents about 200 plaintiffs including California Water Service; Sioux Falls, South Dakota; and Yarmouth, Massachusetts.
The agreement excludes systems owned by states or the U.S. government and small systems that havent detected PFAS and arent legally required to monitor for it. It doesnt settle thousands of cases against other PFAS makers and dealers. Among them are 3M, the primary manufacturer of firefighting foam containing the compounds; Tyco Fire Products; and Chemguard. A trial in Stuart, Floridas, case against 3M begins Monday.
(snip)
https://apnews.com/article/pfas-forever-chemicals-dupont-drinking-water-82516dfef51da45b389e00fa956cf8c5
PlutosHeart
(1,275 posts)Damage is done. Like my uncle who was near 3M and got sick and then eventually died. Or my BIL who has C from pesticides and did not go into a lawsuit since it would take too long and he was battling a bone transplant in hopes of saving him.
Or like people like my father who was exposed to benzene which is notorious for causing rare blood cancers which killed him.
I think it is all a joke.
BumRushDaShow
(128,964 posts)like was done with the "Superfund" sites, something like that might happen with those municipalities that had major exposure, and more will be demanded in terms of financial compensation to deal with the problem.
More info on Superfund - https://www.epa.gov/superfund/what-superfund
The acknowledgment of "the (PFAS) problem" is relatively "new" and it will take time to work through what is going to be needed to mitigate it and do detoxification/cleanup.
Look at how long it took to acknowledge the issues of Agent Orange or more recently the "Burn Pits" and finally start to do something about it...
And as a FYI, I am a (retired) ACS-certified chemist so do know about many of these nasty solvents. In fact, some of my older co-workers used to talk about the "old" days when they cleaned their benches with benzene. All of the stuff we did with solvents like that (or ether, etc) was done in a hood.
KS Toronado
(17,234 posts)I've had to use a lot of, should the companies have provided us with rubber gloves?
BumRushDaShow
(128,964 posts)should have gloves and ventilation.
PlutosHeart
(1,275 posts)There is another site in mid-MN that they keep out of the news as well. Totally polluting well waters and the Mississippi River.
SunSeeker
(51,552 posts)As long as we let poisoning our planet be a mere cost of doing business for these companies, they will keep doing it.
Miguelito Loveless
(4,465 posts)hippywife
(22,767 posts)moniss
(4,237 posts)legislature has forbidden our Department of Natural Resources from doing much at all about this and the business lobby has used our GQP controlled state courts to hamstring identifying the areas/companies that have been tested beyond the most well known case in Marinette. I've added a link to a fairly decent article about our problem in Wisconsin.
I would note that in the article the reporters mention some cases where their samples showed contamination in municipal water when the state testing did not. This brings up a well known problem in environmental testing of different results between one testing lab and another. The labs are all supposedly "certified and inspected" but degradation in labs is a well known issue. Many is the time when an atypical substance is found in various environmental samples (air, soil, water) at minute levels and it may not trigger a retest but is simply labeled as a "lab artifact" etc. There have also been cases around the country where a certain lab gets tons of work from the polluters but when community members use a different lab they find problems that the first lab claimed were not detected. Funny how that works isn't it?
The lab issue can be very significant because of the way environmental mitigation/cleanup is addressed in this country. Once EPA etc. identifies a problem the normal way things are done is for the polluter(s) to hire environmental contractors to conduct investigations and formulate a plan to present to regulators for approval. They choose who they hire and which lab will do the testing. A plan is agreed upon and away we go. Unless someone suspects a problem with the testing there is not typically going to be a 2nd lab doing independent verification of the sampling. The regulators are all trusting that everything will be on the up and up. An especially foolish approach since we are talking about companies that are known to lie to their employees about exposure/safety, lie to the communities they operate in and lie in court and when giving testimony in government hearings.
https://www.jsonline.com/in-depth/news/investigations/2022/11/03/testing-for-pfas-in-wisconsin-drinking-water-reveals-forever-chemicals/10523701002/
ProfessorGAC
(65,030 posts)They spun off high volume, low margin product lines several years ago.
But, the spin-off was heavily populated by former Dupont people.
I knew a guy who worked for Chemours who was with Dupont 35 years. When they spun off he took the same gig with Chemours so they wouldn't have to move for the job.
Dupont has long been "big talk, no action" when it came to environmental stewardship.
Apparently, that applies to Health & Safety, as well.
live love laugh
(13,105 posts)2naSalit
(86,604 posts)BumRushDaShow
(128,964 posts)It's to add to a "fund" to settle one class action case. There are many other cases out there too.
I had posted an article from AP upthread that better described what was going on with this - https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=3082697
2naSalit
(86,604 posts)LT Barclay
(2,599 posts)Europe uses.
The companies should have to prove the chemical is safe. Right now citizen groups or the EPA have to prove it is dangerous (over simplified explanation).
Novara
(5,842 posts)Then why did they agree to settle?
BumRushDaShow
(128,964 posts)Novara
(5,842 posts)And you know what? It costs them less to settle now than if they were made to clean up their mess.
BumRushDaShow
(128,964 posts)There are more to come.