2006: PFOA-PFOS
Newspaper articles and documents related to DuPont's perfluorinated chemicals
and the communities where these chemicals are, or have been, manufactured or disposed.
 
 

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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


Information on free bottled water for residents in the Little Hocking Water Assoc.
1-800-275-6544 or http://www.lhwawaterreimbursement.com/

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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