News Coverage
Regulators challenge safety of chemical used to make Teflon
Published April 14, 2003
Environmental regulators say they need more information on the potential human hazards associated with the use of a chemical DuPont uses to make Teflon in North Carolina and other states.
As part of an ongoing review of ammonium perfluorooctanoate, known as C8, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released a draft study on Monday that said humans are exposed to low levels of the chemical nationwide.
The study is based on tests with laboratory animals and reviews of health screening of workers who handled the chemical, which is released into water and air during the manufacturing process.
DuPont began using C8 in 1951 at its Washington Works facility on the Ohio River near Parkersburg, W.Va. The company has released waste containing the chemical into the air and river.
Records show DuPont also dumped some C8 waste into landfills for years, and at least 30,000 households are served by utilities whose water contained C8. Residents of the Lubeck Public Service District in West Virginia have sued DuPont charging C8 has contaminated their drinking water wells.
DuPont stands by C8, however, saying the chemical does not harm human beings. The company dismisses studies by 3M Co., the original manufacturer of the chemical, that found it causes cancers and liver damage in rats.
It also discounts early observations of birth defects in children of its own employees. DuPont said the EPA's draft evaluation of C8 had resulted in "an inappropriate risk assessment."
The Washington, D.C.-based Environmental Working Group asked the EPA on Friday to investigate whether DuPont withheld an internal study that showed health risks associated with C8.
3M Co. began to phase out the chemical in 2000 and stopped selling it last year, citing its "principles of responsible environmental management."
DuPont started manufacturing C8 last October at a plant in Fayetteville, N.C., for its own use and for sale. DuPont also has begun to dispose of C8 waste along the Delaware River as part of its efforts to control the pollution problem on the Ohio River.
The company ships C8 contaminated wastewater by train from West Virginia to its Chambers Works plant in Deepwater, N.J.
In 1999, the most recent year for which information was available, the company released treated wastewater containing nearly 10,000 pounds of the chemical into the river.
DuPont has been manufacturing limited amounts of Teflon without C8 for more than a year. But DuPont officials said there is no "safe, technically sound and environmentally protective" way to make Teflon without C8.
Although DuPont would not discuss profits from Teflon, company executive Richard J. Angiullo said in a November deposition that products made using C8 accounted for $200 million in after-tax profits in 2000.
"There is no evidence or data that demonstrates C8 causes adverse harm"