On the outskirts of Bangor, Maine, the hometown of famed horror creator Stephen King, greater than 500 students, faculty and staff attend Hermon High School day-after-day.
But since November they will now not drink water. All fountains are sealed with plastic bags. There are water bottles nearby. A water filtration system is to be installed in the summer.
A fountain at Hermon High School in Maine was taped over after water tested exceeded the state’s safety limit for PFAS chemicals.
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“We’re very concerned,” Micah Grant, superintendent of the Hermon School District, told CNBC.
Reason? School water was recently tested above the state safety limit for PFAS or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as “ceaselessly chemicals.”
In line with the Environmental Protection Agency, even minor exposure to PFAS in drinking water can pose a serious health risk.
“We do not fully understand why it’s in our water and it’s at the extent we’re at,” Grant said.
In line with Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey, Hermon High School is only one example of PFAS contamination currently affecting the community. In line with Frey, the chemicals have also been identified in groundwater in cities and municipalities across the state, including several military facilities and farms.
“There are farmers who’ve needed to euthanize their livestock due to chemical contamination,” Frey told CNBC.
Farmer Adam Nordell looks on the remnants of his once thriving songbird farm, which has now closed down after its soil and crops tested positive for toxic ‘ceaselessly chemicals’.
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Maine recently joined the growing list of states – which now includes Latest Mexico, MarylandAND Rhode Island – IN initiation of legal proceedings against several chemical producers claiming that they’ve caused significant damage to the state’s residents and natural resources.
“We allege that 3M and DuPont [and other manufacturers] he created these chemicals … he had science that showed how dangerous they’re, how toxic, how they may last ceaselessly,” Frey said. “It is my responsibility to do all the pieces in my power to carry accountable those corporations that benefited from this chemical.”
Greater than a dozen other states – including Alaska, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Latest Hampshire, Latest Jersey, Latest York, North Carolina, Ohio, Vermont and Wisconsin – have filed lawsuits against PFAS manufacturers over the years .
Some have already reached settlements. Minnesota, e.g. settled with 3M for $850 millionand Delaware settled with DuPont and its $50 million spin-offssettling the liability of corporations for damages in these countries.
Wall Street is now awaiting a federal court hearing, set to start Monday, in which town of Stuart, Florida alleges that fire-fighting chemicals manufactured by 3M were polluting the water.
What are PFASs?
In line with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, PFAS is a bunch of chemicals used to make coatings and products which are proof against heat, oil, stains, grease, and water.
The man-made substances come from a Nineteen Forties process center in Stuart.
Nonetheless, over time, concerns began to grow. CDC officials say it’s synthetic chemicals they don’t decompose in the environment and are related to serious health risks.
“We have seen correlations with thyroid disease, certain varieties of cancer, kidney disease, liver dysfunction that concentrate in the liver … they’re called ‘ceaselessly chemicals’ because they stay in your body,” former FDA Commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC. “I feel the federal government must step up testing, make certain we now have a greater picture of where these chemicals are stepping into food sources.” [and] in the water supply.”
While PFAS testing is expected to turn into more common in the approaching years, Gottlieb said there are steps consumers can take now to evaluate their exposure. He said residents living near a military base or an industrial plant known to provide these chemicals should ask their local water company in the event that they tested PFAS levels.
“A few years ago, there was a big evaluation of assorted water municipalities that showed that about 1% of all municipal water sources contained some level of PFAS,” Gottlieb said.
In line with an EPA report published in March, greater than 64 million individuals are affected by PFAS-contaminated drinking water – the equivalent of a reading of 4 parts per trillion or more.
Producers are responding
Several manufacturers have announced plans to cut back or discontinue PFAS production in the approaching years.
“Because the science and technology of PFAS have evolved, societal and regulatory expectations and our expectations of ourselves have evolved, and so has the best way we manage PFAS” – 3M a spokesperson said in a press release to CNBC, adding that the corporate plans to finish production of the chemical by 2025.
The company has also expressed commitment to removing PFAS contaminants, investing in water treatment and working with communities.
DuPontalternatively, it said it had “never manufactured” the harmful chemicals and believed the legal complaints were “baseless”.
The company, formerly EI du Pont de Nemours, spun off its chemical business in 2015 to form the Chemours Company. It then merged with Dow in 2017 to form DowDuPont, then split into three separate entities in 2019: Corteva Agriscience, Dow and a latest DuPont.
All of those corporations, together with others, are named as defendants in the Maine lawsuit. DuPont and Chemours have been cut off from the lawsuit, with town of Stuart, Florida being the first plaintiff.
On Friday, DuPont, Chemours and Corteva announced a $1.19 billion fund that might be used to resolve “PFAS-related drinking water claims.” Nonetheless, an addendum to the joint statement announcing the fund adds that it “doesn’t cover claims for private injury attributable to alleged PFAS exposure or claims by Attorneys General that alleged PFAS contamination has damaged the state’s natural resources.”
Chemours pledged in 2018 to cut back PFAS emissions at its manufacturing facilities by at the least 99% by 2030. The spokesperson said in a press release that it had made significant progress in implementing advanced technologies to reduce emissions of fluorinated organic compounds.
Dow denied manufacturing PFAS and said it was not accused of causing any environmental pollution.
A spokesman for Corteva told CNBC that she “doesn’t comment on pending legal matters.”
Growing liabilities for 3M
RBC Capital Markets managing director Deane Dray sees lawsuits as a selected financial risk for 3M.
“At this stage, based on the valuation and what we all know in regards to the PFAS litigation, we consider it is impossible to speculate in 3M at this point,” Dray told CNBC.
3M Global Headquarters in Maplewood, Minnesota, USA on Thursday, January 26, 2023.
Ben Brewer | Bloomberg | Getty’s paintings
3M’s stock has been under pressure this yr, dropping 20% in the last six months to its lowest level in greater than 10 years.
“I expect PFAS might be headline news for the subsequent few years,” said Dray, adding that the substances at the moment are used in many semiconductor applications and military weapons systems.
In line with RBC Capital, 3M’s liability risk for PFAS is between $20 billion and $25 billion.
3M is showing signs it might be under pressure: in its latest earnings report, it revealed a restructuring plan that included shedding 6,000 employees worldwide, which the corporate says will save as much as $900 million a yr. It also plans to spin off its healthcare business in early 2024, which analysts say will bring in billions of dollars in capital.
The industrial giant is already facing separate lawsuits over Combat Arms military earplugs. Greater than 200,000 military service members and veterans bring these suits, claiming that the 3M earplugs were defective and didn’t protect them from hearing loss during combat and training.
3M Combat Arms CAEv2 earplugs
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3M’s attorney, Eric Rucker, told CNBC in March that the earplugs work when used in accordance with their instructions, and that any liability estimates are “purely speculative.”
PFAS and policy
Last yr, the Biden administration announced that $10 billion from the bipartisan infrastructure bill can be used to tackle PFAS contamination.
In the identical month, the EPA was introduced for the primary time latest drinking water standards which concern the quantity of PFAS acceptable for consumption.
The industry is waiting to listen to whether the EPA will move forward by designating PFAS compounds as hazardous chemicals, which experts say could open the door to further litigation and force water corporations to make essential improvements to their filtration systems.
Although the agency has publicly acknowledged its intention to accomplish that, experts including a security analyst
Kinsman added that the 2024 presidential election could also affect the timeline: “I feel it’s likely that if a Republican takes office, we could see a slowdown in PFAS regulation, while if Biden wins a second term, I think his PFAS regulatory agenda might be equal to more ambitious, potentially addressing PFAS in larger categories relatively than individually”.
RBC’s Dray added that expanding the usage of PFAS is in the interest of national security on account of the shortage of other options available on the market.
“[It will take] a decade to develop the subsequent molecule and then do all of the tests,” he said.
Meanwhile, scientists and industry experts are engaged in an arms race to develop a safer PFAS substitute. Others are exploring technologies that use electrification and heat to interrupt down synthetic chemicals, in addition to treatment options for exposed areas.
Grassroots motion
Nearly 30 miles from Hermon High School, in the agricultural farming town of Unity, Maine, are the stays of the once-thriving Songbird Farm.
Nine years ago, Adam Nordell — who is now an advocate for the non-profit organization Defend Our Health — and his wife, Johanna Davis, got here to this property to grow healthy, fresh produce to sell to their community.
Songbird was thriving and lush on the time, and over the years the couple grew a mixture of grains and vegetables including tomatoes, peppers, garlic, onions, sweet potatoes and cantaloupe.
But that each one modified two years ago when Nordell and Davis tested their soil after a client called about local news she had seen detailing a farm contaminated with PFAS.
When the test results got here back, their worst fears got here true.
“We have learned that our land is severely contaminated with perennial chemicals,” said Nordell. “As soon as we discovered, we shut up.”
The family has since learned that in the early Nineties the realm was planted with sludge from municipal sewage treatment plants. Nordell said on the time it was being sold to farmers as a free or low cost source of fertilizer.
“Farmers were told they were fertilizing their crops. Unfortunately, this wastewater is stuffed with every kind of commercial chemicals which are leached from consumer products,” he said.
The mission of the non-profit organization she currently works for is to cut back people’s exposure to toxic chemicals, raise awareness amongst farmers across the country, and hold chemical producers accountable.
“They must rise to the occasion and pay for the impact they’ve had on the world,” said Nordell.