Return to
Class
Action Lawsui
Adverse
Effects
PFOS - PFOA Index Page
Abstracts
•
Note:
The spate of reporting on Teflon chemicals is directly related
to the Class Action lawsuit filed by the users of the PFOA (commonly
known as C8 or C-8) contaminated drinking water supplied by the
Little Hocking Water Association. It was the chemicals produced
by DuPont's facility in West Virginia to make Teflon and related
products that was the source of this contamination. On
February 28, 2005, DuPont settled this Class Action lawsuit.
•
See
brief
introduction to PFOA and PFOS
New
as of January 2006 - The
C8 Science Panel Website
Panel
Members: chosen to determine whether a probable link exists
between C-8 and human disease, will be in Parkersburg, WV,
to announce the onset of their research on Wednesday,
January 25 at 8:30 am at the Wingate
Inn.
Dr.
Fletcher
is an environmental epidemiologist at the London School
of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, in the Public and Environmental
Health Research Unit, and serves as President of the International
Society for Environmental Epidemiology.
Dr.
Steenland
is Professor at the School of Public Health at Emory University
in Atlanta, Georgia. Prior to coming to Emory, he worked
for 20 years at the National Institute for Occupational
Safety and Health (NIOSH), which is part of CDC.
Dr.
Savitz
recently joined the Mount Sinai School of Medicine as
Professor of Community and Preventive Medicine and as
the Director of the Center of Excellence in Epidemiology,
Biostatistics, and Disease Prevention.
The
court also approved Plaintiffs' decision to use settlement
funds for a separate C-8 Health Project, under the direction
of Brookmar, Inc.
The Project involves collection of data from class members
including C-8 blood levels, clinical blood tests, as well
as medical and demographic history. This data set represents
a portion of what the Science Panel will evaluate to answer
the question of whether a probable link exists between C-8
and human disease. The C-8 Health Project is not the Science
Panel's community study.
Reference
|
C-8
Health Project
http://www.c8healthproject.org/
This
website provides information to individuals in the Class
Action lawsuit whose drinking water was contaminated with
PFOA, commonly known as C8, from DuPont's facility in West
Virginia.
"The
sole purpose of the Health Project is to gather data from
the members of the class participants so that a science
panel can determine if there is a link between C-8 exposure
and human diseases."
Those
eligible to be in the Class Action:
"Anyone who for the period of one year up to and including
December 3, 2004 consumed water that has tested for C-8
levels of .05 ppb (parts per billion) or greater.
These include the public water districts listed below as
well as private water sources within the geographic boundaries
of the public water districts. Any private water source
must also have been tested for C-8 levels of .05 ppb."
•
Lubeck Public Service District
• Mason County Public Service District
• Little Hocking Water Association
• City of Belpre Water Department
• Tuppers Plains-Chester Water District
• Village of Pomeroy Water Department Office
|
•
Concern has been triggered
in other communities where PFOA and PFOS chemicals were manufactured
and disposed (either by landfill or incineration). Reports and
documents related to them are included.
•
See
also:
•
2005:
Newspaper articles and Documents
•
2004: Newspaper articles and Documents
•
2003:
Newspaper articles and Documents
•
2001
- 2002: Various related documents
•
December 14, 2005: $16.5 million fine EPA levied against DuPont
-- The
settlement
-- EPA's
Press Release
-- EPA's
memo to Environmental Appeals Board for DuPont PFOA Settlement
•
"Mysterious
wasting disease" and death of 260 cattle in West Virginia.
Linked
to exposure to DuPont's landfilling of PFOA Ammonium perfluorooctanoate
(C8) wastes in landfill near farm.
•
"We thought her teeth came
in without enamel," Cochran said. Lauren had to have her
teeth removed after they failed to develop properly. Recently
Cochran has discovered that several
other families in her area have experienced the same problem ..."
Ref:
Examining the water we drink: Concerns about C8 linger. By
Callie Lyons. The Marietta Times (Ohio).
2006:
Newspaper
articles and reports
|
March
20, 2006 |
DuPont
Grapples With Legacy of Benlate.
...
Legal maneuvering also continues in Hawaii, where plant
growers who settled product liability cases against DuPont
in 1994 before
learning that the company withheld evidence of widespread
contamination of Benlate have brought racketeering and fraud
charges against DuPont.
...
Drawing on its experience in the Benlate cases, DuPont has
adopted a more deliberate approach to multiple lawsuits.
The company now uses a holistic strategy that attacks litigation
by broadening its legal approach to include such factors
as the science involved, the cost to the company, and internal
and external communications. The new method is expected
to influence how DuPont confronts the rest of the Benlate
cases and its Teflon litigation.
...
"If you look at the company's stance around Benlate,
for years they asserted that this doesn't cause any harm
... but yet they've paid $1.9 billion dollars in litigation
costs," said Sanford Lewis, an
attorney representing DuPont Shareholders for Fair Value,
an investors coalition critical of the handling of concerns
about PFOA.
..
During the course of the Benlate litigation, at least three
judges took the company to task for withholding evidence
from plaintiffs. One
judge called the practice "willful, deliberate, conscious,
purposeful, deceitful, and in bad faith," and DuPont
was ordered to pay millions in court sanctions.
Note
from FAN Pesticide Project:
Flusilazole
(flusilazol), a highly persistent toxic fluorinated pesticide,
was an "undisclosed ingredient in some lots of Benlate
50 DF" (1). According to animal studies (2) and allegations
by parents exposed to flusilazole (3), this pesticide
induces microphthalmia (undersized eyes) and coloboma,
a defect in the structure of the eye. Eye defects were
some of the major effects of children born to benlate
workers in Florida. Flusilazole
is made by DuPont.
(1)
Hollingsworth J (1995). Fungicide studies offer little
comfort. Memo: BURIED SECRETS PURSUING A MEDICAL MYSTERY.
December 18. Tampa Tribune (Florida). page 4.
(2)
Health
Effects
(3)
Leaked
letter from DuPont Researcher proves DuPont knew pesticide
put babies at risk
|
By Randall
Chase.
Associated Press.
Houston
Chronicle (Texas) |
March 19, 2006 |
Another
polluter not needed.
On March
7, First Chemical of Pascagoula issued a press release announcing
a new manufacturing line that will add five to 10 jobs.
It turns out that this "new" manufacturing line
is a process that is used to "destroy trace amounts
of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and direct precursors at
a key intermediate step." What First Chemical,
recently purchased by DuPont, fails to tell you is that
this process was in fact being used by another of DuPont's
plants...
|
By Dave Winter.
Mississippi Free Press. |
March
14, 2006
(Translation
of press release of February 21, 2006) |
Efficient
Decomposition of Environmentally Persistent and Bioaccumulative
Organofluorine Compound "PFOS" by Use of Sub-Critical
Water with Iron.
Details published in Environmental Science
& Technology, 2006, 40, 1049-1054.
Key Points
1.
Perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS), a highly bioaccumulative
organofluorine compound, can be effectively
decomposed to fluoride ions by use of water and iron.
2.
The high stability (difficulty of decomposition) of organofluorine
compounds hinders their waste treatment. In particular, PFOS
is highly stable and there have been
no effective methods for its decomposition, except for incinerating
at high temperature.
3.
Further studies will be conducted to the decomposition and
recycling of organofluorine compounds of larger molecular
weights.
•
NOTE: Also see:
US EPA's July 8, 2005, approval for
experimental incinerator tests
"to
determine whether municipal and/or medical waste incineration
of FPs is a potential source and/or pathway of environmental
and human exposure to perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA)."
Final
Enforceable Consent Agreement and Testing Consent Order
for Four Formulated Composites of Fluoropolymer Chemicals.
Federal Register.
|
Press
Release
Japan:
National Institute for Advanced Industrial Science and Technology
|
March 11,
2006 |
3M
releases findings on PFCs. Some fish taken from river near
plant have high levels of industrial chemicals that were
once dumped in river.
...
The findings represent the broadest look so far into PFC
levels in whole bodies or fillets, which wildlife
and people are most likely to consume. Earlier
lab samples showing high levels of PFCs focused mainly on
liver and blood... In
a stretch just upriver from the plant, PFOS concentrations
in a smallmouth bass were as high as 178 parts per billion;
in a stretch adjacent to the plant, a smallmouth had 1,320
ppb of PFOS and a bluegill was determined to have a level
of 9,000 ppb. Immediately downriver from the plant, a smallmouth
had 5,150 ppb of PFOS.
|
By Dennis
Lien.
Pioneer Press
(St. Paul, Minnesota) |
March 11,
2006 |
Our Opinion:
C8 filters needed for local water association.
|
Editorial.
The Marietta Times (Ohio). |
March 10,
2006 |
Little
Hocking system still not filtered.
...
the design will incorporate four vessels, each holding 20,000
pounds of activated carbon, that will remove C8 and other
chemicals from the system’s water..
|
By Brad
Bauer.
The Marietta Times (Ohio) |
March
10, 2006 |
Group
seeks details on C8.
An environmental
group Thursday cited rising levels of C8 in blood samples
from DuPont workers near Fayetteville and asked the company
to release detailed information that could indicate whether
residents around the plant are in danger.... The Working
Group sent letters Thursday to Hudson and DuPont chairman
and chief executive officer Charles Holliday Jr. in Wilmington,
Del., where the company is based. The letters asked DuPont
to publicize annual reports from 2002 through 2005 that
show levels of ammonium perfluorooctanoate, also called
C8, in air and blood samples. The environmental groups cited
a news report in which information provided by DuPont
said the average concentration of C8 in 37 employees was
450 parts per billion in 2005. The amount found in most
people is about 5 ppb...
|
By John
Fuquay.
The Fayetteville Observer (North Carolina) |
March 9,
2006 |
Cancer
by ethnic lines?
A
suspected carcinogen used to make nonstick and stain- and
water-resistant products contaminates
white Americans at three times the rate of Mexican Americans
and nearly twice that of blacks, according
to new data from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention...
non-Hispanic whites somehow absorb more of the contaminant.
White males averaged 7 parts per billion PFOA in their blood,
while white women averaged 4 ppb...
Mexican
Americans tested had levels one-third what CDC researchers
found in whites. Blacks were about half, or 3.6 ppb for
black males and 2.8 ppb for black females...
|
By Douglas
Fischer.
Inside Bay Area. The San Mateo County Times (Calif.) |
March 9,
2006 |
EPA
admits C8 may be unsafe for humans. Agency says chemical
used by DuPont also poses a risk to the environment.
Federal
officials have quietly admitted that chemicals used to make
popular nonstick, nonstain products may be unsafe to humans
and the environment. The acknowledgement came in a proposed
requirement to test any new products that rely on controversial
chemicals already used in materials like DuPont's flagship
"Teflon" coating. "Based
on recent information, EPA can no longer conclude that these
polymers will not present an unreasonable risk to human
health or the environment," the
Environmental Protection Agency said in the proposal --
published without fanfare in a federal legal register Tuesday...
•
See Federal Register
cited in article: March 7, 2006: Proposed Rule: Premanufacture
Notification Exemption for Polymers; Amendment of Polymer
Exemption Rule to Exclude Certain Perfluorinated Polymers
|
By Jeff
Montgomery.
The News Journal (Delaware). |
March 4,
2006 |
Belpre’s
C8 filtration system in use.
Belpre
Public Works Superintendent Mike Betz said, "It is
operating, but not fully operational. We could be going
back to the regular system at any time, if needed, but right
now it’s running." The
filters are being constructed by DuPont Washington, W.Va.,
Works as part of the year-old settlement... The
GAC (granular activated carbon) treatment facility in Pomeroy
was brought on line Feb. 8 ...
|
By Pamela
Brust.
The Marietta Times (Ohio) |
March 2,
2006 |
100%
Participation and Commitment in EPA's PFOA Stewardship Program.
...
The eight companies are: Arkema, Asahi,
Ciba, Clariant, Daikin, DuPont, 3M/Dyneon, and Solvay Solexis.
They are agreeing to reduce PFOA releases and levels in
products by 95 percent by no later than 2010, and to work
toward elimination of these sources of PFOA exposure five
years after that, but no later than 2015. Companies are
being asked to meet these commitments in the United States
as well as in their global operations. ...
|
Press
Release
US EPA. |
Feb 28,
2006 |
Scientist
issues PFC report. Former MPCA employee details research
into 3M chemical.
Fardin
Oliaei gave Minnesota a parting gift Monday — a
79-page report that outlines contamination from a troublesome
family of chemicals once manufactured by 3M Co. and recommends
ways to research it further... Oliaei's
report documented exceptionally high levels of PFCs, predominately
perfluorooctane sulfonate, in Mississippi River fish livers
and blood. She said one fish, a white bass, had the highest
level of PFOS blood contamination ever found. The collective
concentrations, she said, indicate contamination from the
3M plant.
"For
someone of her expertise to be doing this on her own time
for an agency that kicked her in her teeth is amazing,''
committee chairman Sen. John Marty,
DFL-Roseville, said after the hearing...
|
By Dennis
Lien
Pioneer
Press
(St. Paul, Minnesota). |
Feb 27,
2006 |
3M
Chemical Contamination Widespread In Minnesota. New Report
Finds Worst PFC Pollution in Nation around Twin Cities.
...Dr.
Oliaei’s report
finds significant soil and groundwater contamination in
several sites where PFCs were dumped, as well as in nearby
lakes, water treatment plants and the Mississippi River
where 3M discharged as much as 50,000 pounds of the chemical
per year. In addition, PFCs are evident in the livers, blood
and flesh of fish in state waters, some of which register
the highest PFC levels ever recorded....
|
Press Release
Environmental Working Group |
Feb 22,
2006 |
A fascinating
article in Environmental Science & Technology
titled The
Weinberg Proposal, discusses tactics used by an international
consulting firm (The Weinberg Group) to help corporate polluters.
The strategies for salvaging DuPont from the maelstrom of
PFOA are laid bare in
an April 2003 letter to DuPont from P. Terrence Gaffney,
Esq., VP of Product Defense for The Weinberg
Group Inc. For example, Gaffney writes:
I
am preparing this letter in anticipation of our meeting
on April 29, 2003 in Washington, DC. This piece is intended
to describe the services THE WEINBERG GROUP INC. can provide
regarding issues related to perfluorochemicals generally
and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) in particular. Please
note that this has been prepared pnor to our initial meeting.
I will most certainly follow up after our meeting with
more specific ideas and recommendations after we have
had the opportunity to discuss DuPont's concerns in greater
detail.
The
constant theme which pemeates our recommendations on the
issues faced by DuPont is that DUPONT
MUST SHAPE THE DEBATE AT ALL LEVELS. We must implement
a strategy at the outset which discourages governmental
agencies, the plantiff's bar, and misguided environmental
groups from pursuing this matter any further than the
current risk assessment contemplated by the Envlronmetal
Protection Agency (EPA) and the matter pending in West
Virginia. We strive to end this now.
For
23 years, THE WEINBERG GROUP has helped numerous companies
manage issues allegedly related to environmental exposures.
Beginning with Agent Orange
in 1983, we have successfully guided clients through myriad
regulatory, litigation, and public relations challenges
posed by those whose agenda is to grossly over regulate,
extract settlements from, or otherwise darmage the chemical
manufactunng industry...
For
over two decades, clients have repeatedly communicated
to us that of all the services we provide, the most valued
is our ability to provide an overall science-based defense
strategy. This strategy can be applied to litigatlon,
regulatory, or legislative problems that cause a particular
product to be under pressure. Specifically,
during the initial phase of our engagement by a client,
we will hamess, focus, and involve the scientific and
intellectual capital of our company with one goal in mind
-creating the outcome our client desires...
Read
full letter.
|
Environmental
Science & Technology
The Weinberg
Group Inc.
|
Feb
22, 2006 |
Groups
seek warning Prop. 65 label for non-stick products. Citing
federal inaction, environmentalists and labor unions ask
the state to warn public about dangers of PFOA.
Non-stick
pans, wind-proof coats, even that 40-pound sack of dogfood
hauled home from Costco the other day all need a state Proposition
65 warning because they conceal a potential human carcinogen,
a coalition of labor and environmental groups said Wednesday.
The
culprit is PFOA, a long-living chemical necessary for modern
wonders such as Gore-Tex and Teflon but suspected of contaminating
the blood of everyone on the globe. Earlier this month,
a federal scientific advisory panel concluded that PFOA,
or perfluorooctanoic acid, likely causes cancer in humans.
On
Wednesday, seven groups - including United Steelworkers,
the Sierra Club, and the Environmental Working Group - asked
state Attorney General Bill Lockyer to force manufacturers
to warn customers under the 1986 consumer protection law
known as Proposition 65. The
law requires warning labels on products known to contain
carcinogens or reproductive toxins. Most manufacturers faced
with a Proposition 65 requirement retool their products
to remove the problematic chemical."When
you think of PFOA, you should think of it as one of the
nastiest, most toxic, environmentally unfriendly chemicals,"
said Richard Wiles, senior vice president
of Environmental Working Group. "Citizens should
have the right to shop their way around this chemical and
make decisions to reduce their exposure." ...
|
By Douglas
Fischer.
Mercury-Register (Oroville, California). |
Feb 16,
2006 |
PFOA
called likely cancer cause.
...
3M manufactured perfluorochemicals at its Cottage
Grove plant for decades. Last year, 3M provided a $3.3 million
grant to the city of Lake Elmo for public water extensions
to neighborhoods where PFCs were found in private wells.
3M also announced it would put a filter on a city of Oakdale
well to keep contaminants at a safe level. 3M also is being
sued in Alabama, where it had a plant that made the chemical...
|
By John
Welbes.
Pioneer
Press
(St. Paul, Minnesota). |
Feb 16,
2006 |
C8
rated a ‘likely carcinogen’
A group
of scientific advisers to the Environmental Protection Agency
voted unanimously Wednesday
to approve a recommendation that C8, a chemical used in
the manufacture of Teflon and other nonstick and stain-resistant
products, should be considered a likely carcinogen.
|
Associated
Press
The Charleston
Gazette (West Virginia). |
Feb 7,
2006 |
Buncefield
explosion. Toxic
legacy poses a giant problem. Officials ponder what to do
with huge quantity of contaminated water.
In
a corner of Maple Cross sewage treatment works near Rickmansworth
in Hertfordshire lies a 12m-litre problem that fails to
go away. It is the
forgotten legacy of the inferno at Buncefield oil depot
in December - six giant settlement tanks full of spent firefighting
foam, black water and a long list of toxic contamination...
Officials
are most concerned about a toxic substance called PFOS or
perfluorooctane sulphonate, a chemical used in some firefighting
foams that does not break down in the environment.
Instead, it accumulates in organisms and works its way up
the food chain, where it can become a serious problem. Following
an Environment Agency report on PFOS, the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) moved to phase
it out, but so much foam was needed at Buncefield that
fire brigades were forced to bring their old PFOS-containing
stocks as well...
Note
from FAN: See
Material Safty Data Sheet on a fire-fighting foam called
AFFF 3% Foam Concentrate - PN#04426. Manufactured by Amerex
Corporation (Alabama).
|
By Ian
Sample
The Guardian
(UK) |
Feb 2006 |
Report:
Fluorinated pollutants
in all-weather clothing
Excerpt:
Information stated on the garments label was not enough
to find out included substances and therefore laboratory
tests were necessary... Because fluor is a halogen, with
similar chemical properties to the chlor and brom used in
the “legacy” micropollutants, it should not
come as a surprise to anyone that also these synthetically
produced fluorinated substances are hazardous to the environment.
...They
mostly fulfill all the criteria for being considered a classic
group of problematic organic so called PBT
pollutants as is the case for PCB and nowadays also
BFRs, but the biodegrading period for fluorinated compounds
is very much longer...
P
stands for persistent, i.e. resistant to biodegrading,
B is for bioaccumulating, i.e.
collecting in living creatures, and
T stands for toxic, which means
poisonous.
Results
Fluorinated pollutants found in all-weather clothing.
Our investigation shows that in addition to PFOS-related
compounds it was particularly FTOH and PFCA that were found
in all the all-weather clothes examined on the Nordic market.
These substances can thus be spread to the environment during
the lifecycle of these products. As the analysis results
show (Figure 1), there are clear differences between the
various types of textiles in our specific samples, and it
is difficult to explain these variations by maintaining
they are the result of pure chance:
1. Gore-Tex and HellyTech have extremely
high rates of FTOH, and all
the others show substantial amounts.
2. All the textiles, with the exception of TCS Water, also
have considerable amounts of PFCA.
3. In contrast to the others, the cotton anorak contains
a large amount of PFCA and PFOS-related
compounds.
These chemical “fingerprints” indicate that
the fluorochemicals found in the allweather garments are
originating from a suite of very similar commercial products,
most likely the telomer impregnation. The anorak cotton
has been treated with a different, but still hazardous fluorochemical
mix.
Glossary
PFAS: Perfluoroalkyl sulfonates, which consists of:
PFOS: Perfluorooctanyl sulfonate
PFOA: Perfluorooctanoic acid
FTOH: Fluortelomer alcohols,which represent the cornerstones
of commercial products that are often called telomers, fluortelomers,
fluorpolymers or fluortensides.
|
Friends
of the Earth - NORWAY |
Feb 3,
2006 |
MPCA
researcher reports dramatic test results as she's forced
out.
Blood
samples taken from Mississippi River fish near a 3M plant
show high levels of a chemical related to the company's
former Scotchgard operations. The
level of the compound PFOS found in some of the fish is
believed to be the highest found anywhere in the world.
The tests were conducted by a Minnesota Pollution
Control Agency scientist who left the agency this week,
after a long dispute with her bosses over her research...
The
highest level came from a white bass. That sample revealed
a PFOS level of 29,600 parts per billion. The level was
so high, the fish was retested and the retest showed a similar
level...
|
By
Mike Edgerly.
Minnesota
Public Radio. |
Jan 30,
2006 |
Expert
Panel Urges EPA to Strengthen Safety Review of Teflon Chemical.
Majority Calls Widespread Pollutant "Likely Human Carcinogen".
Today,
a panel of outside experts gave draft comments to the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) saying that an indestructible, toxic
chemical that pollutes nearly every American's blood is
a "likely human carcinogen."
... Most of the experts on
the panel called PFOA a "likely human carcinogen,"
not a "suggested human carcinogen," as the EPA
had proposed. Richard
Wiles, EWG's senior vice president, called on the EPA to
bar from any future relationship with any EPA advisory panel
two SAB panel members who are scientific advisors to the
chemical industry front group the American Council on Science
and Health (ACSH) ...
•
See January 20, 2006: US
EPA Science Advisory Board Review of EPA's Draft Risk Assessment
of Potential Human Health Effects Associated with PFOA and
Its Salts
|
Environmental
Working Group Press
Release |
Jan 26,
2006 |
C8
testing to be completed this summer.
Anyone
who resided, or worked full-time, or attended school and
would have obtained drinking water in Ohio from water systems
in Belpre, Little Hocking, Tuppers Plains, or Chester, or
Lubeck, or Mason County in West Virginia for at least a
year before December 2004 is eligible to be tested.
...
"For
a specific in-depth look at one community, this is probably
the largest study ever done. We are
identifying as many other possible risk factors, so we don’t
get misleading results; things like other exposures, diet,
other socioeconomic factors, and by doing so we may
help identify other health issues, and that could be carried
forward and be useful for the health of the community,"
said Dr. Tony Fletcher, one of the members of the C8 science
panel...
|
The Marietta
Times (Ohio). |
Jan 26,
2006 |
Harmful
Teflon Chemical To Be Eliminated by 2015.
Although
the chemical would still be used to
manufacture Teflon and similar products, processes will
be developed to ensure that perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA)
would not be released into the environment from finished
products or manufacturing plants... While not as
sweeping as the federal ban on DDT in 1972, yesterday's
agreement is expected to have profound implications for
public health and the environment. An independent federal
scientific advisory board is expected to recommend soon
whether the government should classify the chemical as a
"likely" or "probable" carcinogen in
humans, which could trigger a new set of federal regulations...
William Bailey III, who was born in 1981 with multiple birth
defects while his mother, Sue, was working with the chemical
at the Parkersburg plant, said he will "be watching"
to see if the chemical giant complies with the new agreement.
"They're trying to save face," said Bailey, who
is suing DuPont over his birth defects.
|
By Juliet
Eilperin.
Washington Post. |
Jan 26,
2006 |
DuPont
to phase out Teflon byproduct.
DuPont
is the nation's only producer of perfluorooctanoic acid
(PFOA), the main chemical targeted
by the EPA proposal...
The
company's Chambers Works plant, in Deepwater, N.J.,
at the foot of the Delaware Memorial Bridge, makes or handles
related compounds also chosen for phaseout. Some are used
in an assortment of consumer goods, including fast-food
packaging, popcorn bags and fabric treatments.
A
commercial wastewater plant at Chambers Works has in the
past discharged PFOA and similar chemicals into the Delaware
River. Company officials shipped some of the compound to
Chambers Works from West Virginia after groundwater contamination
there was traced to the DuPont's Parkersburg, W.Va., Teflon
plant...
|
By Jeff
Montgomery.
The News Journal (Delaware). |
Jan 25,
2006 |
Teflon
chemical to be added to list of toxic substances.
The
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency plans to list a toxic
chemical used to make Teflon alongside such well-known persistent
pollutants as mercury, lead and PCBs, signaling increasing
alarm about its effects on human health. EPA
officials also are increasing pressure on companies to stop
using the chemical, called perfluorooctanoic acid, by asking
DuPont and six other corporations to voluntarily eliminate
PFOA and similar substances from plant emissions and products
by 2015...
|
By Michael
Hawthorne.
Chicago Tribune.
Bradenton
Herald (Florida). |
Jan 25,
2006 |
USEPA:
2010/15
PFOA Stewardship Program also click
here
On January
25, 2006, EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson signed a
letter to fluoropolymer and telomer manufacturers inviting
them to participate in a global stewardship program on PFOA
and related chemicals. The text of the letter appears below.
Corporate commitments to the program and other related information
will be posted to this website.
The
companies receiving this invitation are:
3M/Dyneon
Arkema, Inc.
AGC Chemicals/Asahi Glass
Ciba Specialty Chemicals
Clariant Corporation
Daikin
E.I. duPont de Nemours and Company
Solvay Solexis
See:
Text of letter
Enclosure about commitments
Glossary
of Terms
Higher
homologue chemicals: PFOA is an eight-carbon chain
length chemical. Chemicals similar in structure to PFOA
but with nine or more carbons in the chain would be higher
homologues of PFOA.
Homologue:
One of a series of compounds, each of which has a structure
differing regularly by some increment (number of carbons,
presence of a CH2 group) from adjacent members of the group.
Precursor:
A chemical that can break down to form another chemical,
in this case, PFOA. For example, some residual monomer chemicals
from the telomer manufacturing process such as telomer alcohols
and telomer iodides may remain in the final product and
break down into PFOA.
Telomer
biodegradation testing: Studies to determine whether
fluorotelomers could break down in the environment to release
PFOA from their polymer backbones, not just from contamination
of the polymer with residual monomer chemicals from the
manufacturing process ("PFOA precursors") that
break down to release PFOA.
|
US Environmental
Protection Agency |
Jan 25,
2006 |
EPA
Seeking PFOA Reductions.
EPA
is launching a global stewardship program inviting companies
to reduce PFOA (Perfluorooctanoic acid) releases and its
presence in products by 95 percent by no later than 2010
and to work toward eliminating sources of exposure five
years after that but no later than 2015... Participating
companies will commit to reduce by 95 percent facility emissions
and product content levels of PFOA, PFOA precursors, and
higher homologue chemicals, by no later than 2010, with
the year 2000 as the baseline for measuring reductions.
The program also calls for companies to commit to work toward
eliminating these sources of PFOA exposure five years after
attaining the 95 percent reduction but no later than 2015.
Companies are being asked to meet these commitments in the
United States as well as in their global operations...
|
Press
Release
US EPA
|
Jan 20,
2006 |
US
EPA Science Advisory Board Review of EPA's Draft Risk Assessment
of Potential Human Health Effects Associated with PFOA and
Its Salts.
Excerpt:
Comment
on the Proposed Descriptor for the Carcinogenic Potential
of PFOA
Most
Panel members concluded that the experimental weight of
evidence with respect to the carcinogenicity of PFOA was
stronger than proposed in the draft document, and suggested
that PFOA cancer data are consistent with the EPA guidelines
descriptor ‘likely to be carcinogenic to humans’.
According
to EPA’s Guidelines for Carcinogen Risk Assessment
1 (also known as EPA’s Cancer Guidelines), this descriptor
is typically applied to agents that have tested positive
in more than one species, sex, strain, site or exposure
route, with or without evidence of carcinogenicity in humans.
Conclusions of these Panel members were based on the following:
•
While human data are ambiguous, two separate feeding studies
in rats demonstrate that PFOA is a
multi-site carcinogen.
•
Uncertainties still exist (see Issue 1 comments) as to whether
PPAR-alpha agonism constitutes the sole MOA for PFOA
effects on liver. This was based on the fact that
PFOA, but not the prototypical PPAR-alpha agonist, WY14,643,
increases liver weights in PPAR-alpha knockout mice, a finding
of uncertain significance in the absence of liver histopathology
and replication of this finding. Further, mitochondrial
proliferation was suggested in the document as a basis of
liver toxicity in monkeys exposed to PFOA.
•
The exclusion of mammary tumors
in the draft document based on comparisons to historical
control levels from other laboratories was deemed inappropriate,
since the most appropriate control group is a concurrent
control group. Using that comparison, increases in both
fibroadenomas (22%, 42% and 48% for rats treated with 0,
30 and 300 ppm APFO (ammonium perfluorooctanoate or C8,
the ammonium salt of PFOA), respectively) and adenocarcinomas
(15, 31% and 11%, respectively) were seen in the Sibinski
et al. (1987) 2 yr PFOA feeding study.
•
Insufficient data are currently available to determine the
MOA for the observed Leydig cell tumors,
pancreatic acinar cell tumors and mammary gland tumors.
In the absence of a defined MOA for these tumor types, they
must be presumed to be relevant to humans, as suggested
by EPA’s Cancer Guidelines.
|
US EPA
Science Advisory Board |
Jan 19,
2006 |
Press
conference January 25, 2006. New C8 Science Panel
to be introduced to Mid-Ohio Valley on January 25.
The
three members of the C-8 Science Panel, chosen to determine
whether a probable link exists between C-8 and human disease,
will be in Parkersburg, WV, to announce the onset of their
research on Wednesday, January 25
at 8:30 am at the Wingate Inn. The Science Panel
is part of a class action settlement of a lawsuit involving
releases of a chemical known as C-8 from DuPont's Washington
Works in Wood County, West Virginia. The Science Panel will
conduct a community epidemiology study and evaluate an ongoing
study of DuPont's workers...
|
Press Release
The C8 Science Panel. |
Jan 18,
2006 |
EPA
urged to monitor DuPont N.C. plant.
Environmental
groups Tuesday said federal agencies should actively guide
monitoring of pollution released at DuPont Co.'s Fayetteville,
N.C., plant where a key chemical in Teflon production is
made.. DuPont's
Fayetteville plant is the only American site now producing
the chemical, known as perfluorooctanoic acid or PFOA...
|
By Jeff
Montgomery.
The News Journal (Delaware). |
Jan 18,
2006 |
Corporate
Watchdog Radio (CWR), a half-hour show broadcast twice
monthly, is a new hybrid radio show and podcast launched
using both platforms simultaneously. Freely accessible on
the internet, on broadcast radio, and through the iTunes
Music Store, Corporate Watchdog Radio is designed for financial
professionals, corporate social responsibility activists,
and investors concerned about the social ethics and environmental
impact of the corporations in their portfolios.
On
the latest show (available January 18)
Lewis interviews Glenn Evers, a former DuPont scientist,
and Attorney Alan Kluger, who is suing DuPont regarding
Teflon. Evers, who worked for DuPont for more than 20 years,
recently flagged concerns regarding health and environmental
impacts of Dupont products used to coat fast food wrappers.
Kluger has filed a $5 billion lawsuit against Dupont over
the alleged toxicity of Teflon coated cookware. While the
Wall Street Journal, MSNBC, and other mainstream media outlets
have only skimmed the surface of this story, CWR distinguishes
itself by offering in-depth exploration of impacts and implications--including
the potential public health hazards the chemical PFOA poses
in ubiquitous products such as paper wrapping for microwave
popcorn, fast food, and pizza. Lewis is himself a representative
of DuPont Shareholders for Fair Value, a group of DuPont
shareholders including Amalgamated Bank, United Steelworkers
and others concerned about the financial impacts on DuPont
of PFOA, the controversial chemical believed to be a breakdown
byproduct of Teflon cookware and many DuPont stain- and
grease-repellent treatments.
|
Corporate
Watchdog Radio |
Jan 16,
2006 |
Clean
and Green. Shorter carbon chains make stain beaters safer.
...
Long-chain fluorosurfactants, based on a lineup of eight
carbon atoms (C8), enter the body more readily than shorter
analogues, and they can break down to form PFOA. PFOA and
other related long-chain fluorochemicals
stick to blood proteins and masquerade as digestive acids...
|
By Rebecca
Renner.
Scientific American. |
Jan 10,
2006 |
Traces
of C8 found in spring.
...
It is the first time the chemical has been detected in a
water source this far upstream from DuPont’s Washington,
W. Va., Works plant near Parkersburg..
|
By Brad
Bauer.
The Marietta Times (Ohio). |
Jan 7,
2006 |
Editorial:
DuPont payout should be fair.
|
The Marietta
Times (Ohio). |
Jan 6,
2006 |
DuPont
gives to Wood schools.
|
The Marietta
Times (Ohio). |
Week
of
Jan 6,
2006 |
DuPont
in Sticky Situation Over Teflon Chemical.
YOUNG:
Della and Jim Tenant own these grassy slopes just south
of Parkersburg, West Virginia, where their family has grazed
cattle for decades. In the late 80s the Tenants leased part
of the land to DuPont. The company put in a new landfill
to take non-toxic waste from its nearby facility. Shortly
after the landfill went in, trouble started.
D. TENANT:
The cattle started getting tumors,
going blind, going crazy and acting like a bunch of crazy
cows.
YOUNG:
The cattle drank from a small stream near the foot of the
DuPont landfill. And before long, the cattle were dying.
D. TENANT:
It was awful. I saw a cow die one time. It had the most
terrifying bawl, and every time it would open its mouth
and bawl, blood would gush from its mouth. And there was
nothing you could do. It was suffering and there was nothing
you could do. And whenever you think about feeding all those
animals to your children, all the time they were growing
up, it's something that puts a lump in your throat you can't
take away.
YOUNG:
The Tenants would later learn that DuPont had dumped the
chemical C8 in the unlined landfill...
PURDY
[Toxicologist who worked with C8 before retiring from the
3M company in Minnesota] We often remember DDT, we remember
PCBs, we remember the dioxin chemicals. Well, these fluorochemicals
are more persistent than all of those, much more persistent
than those. As far as we can tell,
their half-lives are in thousands of years...
|
By Jeff Young for Living on Earth |
Jan
3, 2006 |
C8
filter to be installed soon for Belpre water system.
...
DuPont has agreed to spend about $10 million dollars in
an effort to reduce the presence of the chemical in the
water supply the six communities, including Belpre. “It’s
designed to reduce C8 to the lowest practical levels,”
Ollis said. Systems are also to be installed in Little Hocking,
Lubeck, W.Va., Pomeroy, Tuppers Plains and Mason County,
W.Va... there are still some long
term ownership and maintenance details to be worked out.
|
By Tim
Brust.
Marietta Times (Ohio). |
Jan
1, 2006 |
CF
demands compensation from DuPont on Teflon.
Taiwan's
private consumer watchdog yesterday demanded DuPont, one
of world's leading chemical companies, offer local consumers
compensation similar to the sum it had recently agreed to
pay to settle a lawsuit in the United States concerning
the danger of Teflon, widely used in kitchen utensils...
The foundation, citing studies conducted
by itself and other experts, claimed that it takes less
than 200 degrees Celsius for Teflon utensils to release
toxic chemicals, including perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA).
|
The
China Post |
See
also:
•
The Environmental
Working Group's comprehensive online report
on Perfluroinated Chemicals
that includes a
searchable
database to hundreds of documents.
•
Adverse
effects identified mainly in animal experiments with PFOS and PFOA
•
Selected Statements, Studies, and Reports
•
Federal
Register Entries
•
PFOS
/ PFOA Index Page
•
Timeline
for PFOS and PFOA chemicals
•
Abstracts
on PFOS and PFOA for the following years: |
2005 |
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