DuPont Fined by EPA

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reached a settlement with DuPont over the company’s alleged withholding of information about the health risks of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA, also referred to as C8), which is used to make Teflon^® and other products (see

EBN

Vol. 13, No. 3 and

Vol. 13, No. 8). The settlement, which did not require DuPont to admit liability, includes $10.25 million in fines (the largest civil administrative penalty EPA has ever imposed); $5 million to fund a research program to evaluate the potential for nine of DuPont’s fluorotelomer-based products to break down to form PFOA; and $1.25 million to fund the Microscale and Green Chemistry Project in schools near the company’s Parkersburg, West Virginia, plant, where PFOA contaminated drinking water. More information is at www.epa.gov.