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author: fu pingfan

in 1998, famous lawyer robert bilott urgently put aside his work and drove back to his hometown in west virginia.

the person who made the series of fatal calls to him was tanan, a farmer at the cattle farm in the village.

tannen said the farm's 190-plus cows have been behaving abnormally in recent years.their eyes were cloudy, their teeth were black, their gallbladders were swollen, and they grew huge tumors; sometimes they would suddenly rush towards tanan like crazy, and he could only kill the cows on the spot to save his life.

the land of the cattle farm is piled up with small hills, which are all graves for the cattle. and tannan's family is also buried because of this.difficulty breathing and chemical burnsand hospitalized.

image source: screenshot from the movie "dark water"

tannen felt that the culprit behind all this was dupont chemical company.this is because the various diseases of the cattle occurred after the farm was dug by the company and filled with chemical waste.

lawyer bilott had worked for big companies for eight years, but at this moment, he was shocked by the scene before him and decided to speak for the villagers and sue dupont chemical company.

this tug-of-war between scientific development and public health, business and ethics was made into a movie called black water in 2019, and the individual's resistance to huge capital continues to this day.

image source: "dark waters" movie poster

a half-century-long chemical scam

the "strange things" began in the 1980s. tannen's brother jim was suffering from a mysterious disease and was in urgent need of money, so he sold 66 acres of land on the farm to dupont. dupont named the land "dry run landfill" to process chemical waste generated by nearby chemical plants.

as a prestigious chemical giant, dupont guarantees that no chemical pollution will be generated.

however, cattle on ranches downstream from the landfill began to become restless.

tannen's autopsy video showed that these cows had cloudy eyes, black teeth, deformed hooves that curved outwards, swollen gall bladders, and huge tumors.

image source: screenshot from the movie "dark water"

bilott is a member of the environmental protection team at taft law firm, helping chemical companies adapt to various environmental regulations. but this time, he stood on the opposite side of his employer. "this is an opportunity to apply my background to people who really need it."

no one knew what had happened to the cattle until the trial approached, when bilott stumbled upon a letter from dupont to the u.s. environmental protection agency (epa) that mentioned a substance called "pfoa."

bilot has been working with chemical companies for many years and has never heard of pfoa, nor does it appear on the environmental control list.

at first, dupont refused to release any relevant material.

in 2000, bilott asked the court to force dupont to share the documents, which resulted in the delivery of thousands of boxes of documents totaling more than 110,000 pages.

through these documents, an astonishing chemical scam began to surface.

in 1951, dupont purchased pfoa (perfluorooctanoic acid, known as c8 within dupont) from 3m. it was used as an emulsifier to manufacture a specific fluorinated compound, polytetrafluoroethylene (ptfe, trade name teflon), to prevent agglomeration during the production process.

although the government has not classified pfoa as a hazardous substance, 3m recommends that dupont incinerate it or send it to a chemical waste treatment facility. dupont also has internal regulations prohibiting pfoa from being flushed down the drain.

however, in the following decades, dupont injected hundreds of thousands of pounds of pfoa powder into the ohio river through sewage pipes and dumped 7,100 tons of pfoa-containing sludge into the dry run landfill in west virginia.

pfoa seeped into groundwater and flowed into the drinking water of several nearby communities, totaling 100,000 people.

dupont has long known about the hazards of pfoa. in 1961, dupont discovered that pfoa would increase the liver size of mice and rabbits; in 1970, dupont found high concentrations of pfoa in the blood of its employees; and in 1981, 3m discovered that ingesting pfoa would cause birth defects in test mice.

at this time, two female workers at dupont had given birth to deformed babies, one of whom had only one nostril. however, dupont never made this information public.

deformed baby born to dupont female worker source: huffington post

dupont once found a pfoa substitute, but teflon products brought in $1 billion in annual profits. they believed that the profit risk was too great and opposed the replacement, and continued to use pfoa.

among them, food processing equipment such as the "happy pan" non-stick pan launched in 1961 brought huge profits to dupont.

"happy pan" non-stick pan poster source: wikipedia

image source: screenshot from the movie "dark water"

after obtaining this evidence, bilott reported dupont to the epa and the department of justice. in 2005, dupont reached a $16.5 million settlement agreement with the epa for violating the toxic substances control act by concealing the toxicity of pfoa and its impact on the environment.

this is the largest fine in the epa's history, but it only accounts for 2% of pfoa's profits that year.

but the trouble with pfoa is not over yet. has the pfoa released by dupont caused health damage to the 100,000 residents whose drinking water was contaminated? if so, how much of the health damage was caused by pfoa? how to conduct effective risk assessment and risk control for new synthetic chemicals? how to formulate relevant policies?

in order to clarify these issues, bilott and dupont fought for nearly 20 years.

99% of people have pfoa in their blood

so, what exactly is pfoa?

during the manhattan project, scientists had already used fluorine to separate uranium to make atomic bombs. after world war ii, several scientists used this method to combine carbon and fluorine atoms to create pfoa.

the chemical backbone of pfoa is composed of 8 carbon atoms, also known as c8.

it is a fluorinated surfactant that reduces the surface tension of water and has excellent stability, which makes pfoa valuable in the manufacturing of carpets, upholstery, clothing, floor wax, textiles, fire-fighting foams and sealants.

however, there are questions about pfoa in terms of health and environmental protection.

in 2004, bilott's legal team decided to take blood tests from 70,000 people in areas of west virginia where drinking water was contaminated, and convened medical researchers to form the c8 scientific group to conduct an analysis to determine the relationship between pfoa levels in the blood and human health.

c8 science group and its research results. image source: c8 science group website

this epidemiological investigation lasted for 7 years and ultimately linked continued exposure to pfoa to kidney cancer, testicular cancer, thyroid disease, high cholesterol, pregnancy-induced hypertension, and ulcerative colitis.

dupont employees involved in teflon production are directly exposed to pfoa and face higher health risks.

a 2012 emory university study showed that pfoa factory workers had three times the risk of dying from mesothelioma or chronic kidney disease, twice the risk of dying from diabetes, and a higher risk of kidney cancer and noncancerous kidney disease.

image source: us nih

additionally, pfoa resists natural degradation and persists in the natural environment.

scientists have found traces of pfoa in many places around the world. it exists in the organs of atlantic salmon, swordfish, gray seals, alaskan polar bears and turtles, california sea lions, albatrosses and other animals.

an analysis of blood banks around the world showed that pfoa was present in almost all human blood.the only exception is a set of archived samples from korean war veterans in 1952.

in response to these allegations, dupont argued that there was no evidence or data showing that pfoa would have a direct adverse effect on human health, and that the pfoa content in human blood was low and would not harm health.

in 2004, at the same time that bilott exposed dupont, chinese media also reported the news. at that time, the most widely used product of pfoa was teflon non-stick pans, which triggered a big discussion on the "poison pan gate".

at that time, teflon non-stick pans had occupied 90% of the market in europe and the united states. since my country introduced the production line in 1980, non-stick pans have also entered thousands of households in china.

since 2021, the ministry of the environment of japan has conducted a survey on the quality of rivers and groundwater across the country. pfos was found in 37 of the 171 test sites.(pfos, a man-made fluorinated surfactant and environmental pollutant) and pfoa seriously exceeded the standard.currently, japan's provisional drinking water pfoa content standard is less than 50 nanograms per liter, and the measurement result is 37 times the standard. according to the latest data, in 2021, osaka's groundwater had the highest concentration among the locations that exceeded the standard, with organic fluorides reaching 110 times the provisional standard.on august 30, 2021, the ministry of economy, trade and industry of japan issued a revised version of the "notice on customs clearance procedures for import of chemical substances under the chemical substances control law", which will ban the import and use of 13 types of pfoa and its salt-related products.

image source: japan ministry of the environment

since pfoa cannot be metabolized, the consequences of its continued accumulation in the human body and nature remain unknown. like an undercurrent spreading everywhere, pfoa carries potential public health risks and spreads to the world.

uncertain pfoa health standards

after the experimental results came out, bilott filed lawsuits against dupont on behalf of each of the victim families, totaling 3,535 cases.

ultimately, dupont agreed to pay $671 million in class action damages.

as the lawsuit progressed, various countries began to investigate the pfoa drinking water content in relevant areas and take action.

in 2004, australia announced that it would stop producing and importing products containing pfoa polymers, and strictly restricted its use in areas where it could not be replaced. in 2008, the german federal environmental protection agency adjusted the pfoa prevention measure in drinking water to 0.1 parts per billion, and the threshold measure to 0.3 parts per billion. in 2013, pfoa was designated as a substance of high concern under the eu reach regulatory framework. in 2014, the world health organization's international agency for research on cancer classified pfoa as category 2b (suspected human carcinogen).

in china, the state environmental protection administration listed pfoa products in the list of high-pollution products in 2008. in 2019, the ministry of ecology and environment began to publicly solicit, use, and replace pfoa alternatives.

in november 2020, china's ministry of ecology and environment announced that it would issue the second batch of "priority control chemicals list". for the chemicals listed in the list, environmental risk control measures will be taken in accordance with relevant policies and regulations to minimize the impact of the production and use of chemicals on human health and the environment. pfoa is included in the list.

image source: ministry of ecology and environment of the people's republic of china

however, in terms of alternatives, the world has not found a good answer for pfoa. secondly, the chronic toxicity evaluation of new compounds takes a long time and often requires continuous revisions during use, so it is still a difficult point to date, which has also become a major obstacle to the formulation of pfoa health standards.

source: ministry of ecology and environment

among these large and small measures, the healthy pfoa drinking water content standard is still changing. it is adjusted by region and time, involving the game between regional capital, politics, and the public.

in 1991, dupont set an internal standard for pfoa in water at no more than one part per billion. but in 2001, pfoa levels in the stream at tannen ranch soared to more than 80 times the standard, killing cattle.

shockingly, after bilott filed his lawsuit, dupont assembled a team of its own scientists and those from the west virginia epa to announce a new standard for pfoa in drinking water of 150 parts per billion.

that number was far higher than the 0.2 parts per billion assessed by toxicologists hired by bilott, but the west virginia government accepted dupont's new standard.

in 2006, the u.s. epa and dupont renegotiated an agreement to reduce the pfoa content in drinking water to 0.5 parts per billion; in 2009, epa adjusted the health advisory level for drinking water to 0.4 parts per billion; in 2016, epa further lowered the drinking water health advisory standard for pfoa and pfos to 0.07 parts per billion.

no one knows how much pfoa we can safely drink.

chemists have compared drinking pfoa to eating tires, but dupont has made this almost absurd thing as natural as drinking water.

after bilott exposed the pfoa incident, dupont was pressured to stop the production and use of pfoa in 2013. however, they replaced pfoa with a similar fluorine-based compound, which was also not regulated by the epa.

but thanks to bilott's efforts, more and more movements to boycott pfoa have emerged around the world, and more than 600 related "permanent compounds" have been investigated.

bilott is still fighting, writing annual letters to the epa and local environmental groups in west virginia urging regulation of pfoa in drinking water.

bilott, wearing an environmentally friendly suit, stands on tannen's farm

in 2016, the new york times reported on the pfoa incident and called bilott "the lawyer who gave dupont a nightmare."

bilott firmly believes that under the oppression of the power machine wrapped in civilization, only we can protect ourselves, and farmer tannen makes him understand this truth.

image source: screenshot from the movie "dark water"

the oscar-winning film erin, also adapted from a true story, tells a similar story. erin, who was under pressure from two failed marriages and raising three children, and had no legal background, did not remain silent after discovering that the sewage in her residence contained highly toxic substances. instead, she resolutely fought the power company involved in court.

as society's "modernity" continues to deepen, more and more technologies are embedded in people's daily lives without "criticism". capital is obsessed with pursuing profits and keeps silent about the hidden dangers; the public only focuses on the benefits of convenient life and closes their eyes in the face of controversy. when environmental issues evolve into a huge public health crisis and when the heavy consequences weigh on everyone, the curtain of "covering one's ears and stealing the bell" is lifted in a bloody way.