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Advisen Front Page News - Thursday, October 15, 2020

   
State sues Chemours, alleging its Fayetteville plant contaminated environment
State sues Chemours, alleging its Fayetteville plant contaminated environment
Publication Date 10/14/2020
Source: Fayetteville Observer (NC)

Oct. 14--The North Carolina Attorney General's Office on Tuesday filed a lawsuit in Cumberland County against DuPont, Chemours and related companies to hold them accountable for the alleged environmental damage done by chemicals emitted from the plant.

The GenX chemical that is produced by the plant in south Fayetteville is a suspected carcinogen, and residents who live near the plant have discovered the chemical in their water wells in differing degrees.

The company has been supplying them with water filtration systems and bottled water. And the company also has said it has taken many steps to reduce emissions of the chemical into the air and groundwater.

Chemours officials have said they do not believe people's health is being compromised by the amount of the GenX emissions.

The lawsuit was filed by N.C. Attorney General Josh Stein, a Democrat who is running for reelection against Republican Jim O'Neill.

According to a news release, Stein's lawsuit says that DuPont and Chemours "have contaminated the land, air, water, and other valuable natural resources around their Fayetteville Works Facility, in the Cape Fear River, and in downstream communities with PFAS for decades."

The release says the lawsuit does not ask for specific monetary damages but requests "awarding damages to the state for all costs necessary to investigate, remediate, assess, restore, and remedy the harms."

"This case is brought to hold the defendants accountable for their actions that have severely contaminated North Carolina's environment, causing extensive harm to our state's natural resources and creating significant risks for the people of the state," according to the release.

The lawsuit says the Fayetteville Works facility located in Bladen County and Cumberland County "have contaminated the land, air, and water around that site, as well as the Cape Fear River Watershed, with chemicals known to pose significant risks to human health and the environment."

It adds that these chemicals -- per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances known as PFAS -- are known as "forever chemicals" because they resist biodegradation, persist in the environment, and accumulate in people and other living organisms," the release says.

Chemours reaction

Lisa Randall, a Chemours spokeswoman, said in an emailed statement that the company is "currently reviewing the filing in detail."

She added that Chemours has operated as an independent company since July 1, 2015.

Since that time, Chemours has taken "definitive action to address active emissions and historic deposition at our Fayetteville site, and continues to do so," Randall said.

"Chemours has cooperated with the state of North Carolina to address PFAS concerns and has agreed to a court-approved consent order and its addendum, which was entered by the court yesterday," Randall said in her statement.

She adds that the company's investment in emissions control technology has significantly decreased GenX emissions by 99%, and its thermal oxidizer it installed continues to destroy PFAS with greater than 99.99% efficiency.

Randall said Chemours continues "to decrease PFAS loading to the Cape Fear River" and on Sep. 30 began operating a capture and treatment system for one pathway at the site. She also said Chemours "will take a number of measures to address PFAS loadings from other pathways, including onsite groundwater to the Cape Fear River."

Ongoing investigation

The suit states that private well testing demonstrates that Chemours has contaminated groundwater in Cumberland County.

This is the first case that Stein is bringing as a result of that ongoing investigation, which may result in additional legal action, his news release states.

"DuPont and Chemours have dumped PFAS into North Carolina's drinking water even as they knew these forever chemicals pose threats to human health and our natural resources," Stein said in his release. "These companies maximized their profits at the expense of the people of North Carolina. That's wrong. I am taking DuPont and Chemours to court to make them pay for the mess they made."

In 2017, North Carolina Department of Justice lawyers took Chemours to court on behalf of the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality to stop Chemours from discharging PFAS, including GenX, into the Cape Fear River and emitting those substances into the air.

"As a result of DEQ's successful litigation, a consent order was issued by the court in 2019 and amended (Monday)," Stein's release says.

The order requires Chemours to install air emissions control technology to reduce PFAS emissions by 99.9%; prevent discharge of PFAS to the Cape Fear River; provide clean drinking water to affected private well-users near the Fayetteville Works; assess the extent of existing contamination; and develop a plan to clean up historical contamination of soil and groundwater on an expedited basis, Stein's release says.

The Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, which serves customers in Wilmington, said in a statement that an opportunity to study the lawsuit, "so we cannot comment about it specifically."

"Regardless, (the authority) applauds continued, diligent efforts by the state to hold Chemours and DuPont responsible for their decades of PFAS releases while operating profitably at the Fayetteville Works industrial site, which is about 55 miles up the Cape Fear River from CFPUA's raw water intakes," the statement said.

"Separate from the state's actions, (the authority) has filed a federal civil suit against Chemours and DuPont to recover the costs of the new GAC filters and other damages we and our customers have incurred and will incur as a result of the two companies' pollution," the authority said in its statement.

Mike Watters, who lives near the plant and is a founder of Gray's Creek Residents United Against PFAS, said he gives a lot of the credit to state Sen. Kirk DeViere and state Rep. John Szoka for the lawsuit filing.

"I had been hounding Attorney General Josh Stein for near three years on the need to hire an outside law firm to represent the state," Watters said in an emailed statement. "I can say that both John and Kirk have echoed our comments to our attorney general and governor."

Staff writer John Henderson can be reached at jhenderson@fayobserver.com or at 910-486-3596.

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(c)2020 The Fayetteville Observer (Fayetteville, N.C.)

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