By Greg Barnes
During a tour of Chemours last week, plant manager Brian Long stopped near a maze of pipes to explain new carbon adsorption systems that the company says are reducing airborne emissions of GenX and other potentially harmful fluorochemicals by 92 percent from 2017 levels.
A few minutes later, Long stopped again, this time at a construction site surrounding a giant metal tower of pipes, chambers and supports that, by year’s end, is anticipated to become an operable, $100 million thermal oxidizer. Long said the oxidizer will destroy 99 percent of all per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances — or PFAS — keeping them from becoming airborne and leaving the plant’s boundaries.
Chemours has no choice but to meet the Dec. 31 deadline. It’s specified in a consent order entered in February between the company, the state and the environmental group Cape Fear River Watch. Construction crews are now working in two shifts to meet the deadline, Long said.
Chemours has been under fire since June 2017, when the Wilmington Star-News reported that a potentially cancer-causing PFAS chemical called GenX had fouled the drinking water for an estimated 250,000 people who draw their water from the Cape Fear River downstream of the Chemours plant in Bladen County.
Shortly afterward, the state Department of Environmental Quality learned that DuPont and Chemours, a new company spun off from DuPont in 2015, had been discharging GenXx and other PFAS chemicals into the river for three decades.
The DEQ’s Division of Air Quality also soon discovered that the chemicals were not only in high concentrations in the river, they were also being emitted into the air, falling with the rain, and contaminating hundreds of private drinking wells surrounding the plant.
Chemours says it is now providing bottled water to more than 600 households whose wells contain PFAS. More than 200 of those wells have levels of GenX measuring more than 140 parts per trillion. That’s the health guideline for drinking water the state set shortly after the contamination was found in the Cape Fear River.
Long doesn’t deny or sugarcoat his company’s past, but he says Chemours is now doing everything in its power to stop the pollution and clean up the plant site.
People living nearby say they have heard it all before.
Last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s internal watchdog announced that it is investigating the EPA’s oversight of a 2009 consent order that allowed DuPont and Chemours to produce GenX in the first place.
‘Best in world’
As he toured the plant, Long tried to put the company’s best face forward.
Long seems like a likeable guy, one quick to smile. He appears to be passionate about the efforts Chemours is taking to protect human health and the environment — an estimated $200 million investment that he believes will reduce PFAS contamination from the site to less than a trickle in the years ahead.
“I don’t know of anybody that’s working harder to reduce emissions than the Chemours’ company,” he said. “We intend to be the best in the world at PFAS emissions.”
Long has been the plant manager since February 2018, coming to North Carolina from Chemours’ Louisville Works site in Kentucky.
He said he understands the fear, anger and frustration felt by people living downstream of the plant or surrounding it. People who may have been drinking contaminated water for nearly 30 years. People who wonder whether the disease that killed their loved ones or their pets could have been caused by Chemours. People who still wonder whether it’s safe to eat the vegetables they grow in their gardens.
“I get it,” Long said.
The residential wells were contaminated by PFAS that came out of the vent stacks at Chemours, and DuPont before it. The contaminants were blown with the wind and fell with the rain.
As part of the consent order with the state, Chemours is installing granular-activated carbon or reverse osmosis filtration systems in homes where wells have the highest levels of contamination. The order also calls for public water lines to be extended to homes where economically practicable.
Except for a few spikes, GenX in the Cape Fear River is now well below the state’s health advisory for drinking water.
But the DEQ is investigating high levels of GenX that is still showing up in rainwater, and work has only just begun on removing extremely high concentrations of GenX in the groundwater at the plant itself. Tests of one monitoring well detected GenX there at 61,300 parts per trillion. Documents show another well at the site measuring GenX at 2.9 million parts per trillion.
DEQ holds Chemours accountable
During the tour, Long was quick to point out that Chemours spent around $100 million to install three carbon adsorption systems and make other emissions improvements without being told to do so by the state.
That may be true, but DEQ documents show that the state was applying enormous pressure on Chemours to eliminate airborne emissions.
For example, in April 2018 the Division of Air Quality sent a notice addressed to Long saying it intended to modify Chemours’ air quality permit if the company didn’t eliminate all emissions of GenX compounds.
According to that notice, Chemours initially claimed it had released only 66.6 pounds of GenX into the air in the prior year. Months later, the company revised that assessment upward, saying it had released 594 pounds of the compound.
The division then did its own studies and came to a far different conclusion.
“DAQ’s own calculations indicate that Chemours’ annual emissions of GenX compounds at the Fayetteville Works could exceed 2,700 pounds per year,” according to the notice signed by division Director Mike Abraczinskas.
The notice said the DAQ planned to modify Chemours’ permit within 60 days if the company did not respond in writing and demonstrate that current or alternate conditions do not violate the state’s groundwater rules.
On May 29, 2018, two of the three carbon adsorption systems came online with the expectation that they would reduce PFAS air emissions by 40 percent. The third system became operational in June of this year. Combined, Chemours said as recently as last week, the systems are reducing airborne emissions of PFAS by 92 percent from 2017 levels.
But records from the Division of Air Quality appear to show that that has not always been the case.
The records show a rainwater sample for GenX tested as high as 1,580 parts per trillion at the end of April 2018. That was a month before the first two carbon adsorption systems went online.
Since then, weekly monitoring reports show, rainwater samples have found concentrations of GenX exceeding the state’s health guideline for drinking water 10 times. The highest concentration of GenX was found in a sample at 750 parts per trillion last February.
One sample has tested above the health guideline since Chemours added the third carbon adsorption system. In tests dated July 16-23, the level of GenX in that sample measured 240 parts per trillion, nearly double the guideline.
Long acknowledged the spikes of GenX in rainwater and said Chemours is working with DEQ to understand what is causing them and what can be done to stop them.
The DEQ had a slightly different take.
Sharon Martin, a DEQ spokeswoman, said in an email that the department is “reviewing the emissions tests to verify compliance” and “we are currently investigating the rainwater data.”
History lesson
A little history is necessary to begin to understand the anguish and anger felt by people living near the plant, which DuPont opened in the early 1970s.
By 1980, DuPont was discharging GenX into the Cape Fear River. The compound wasn’t intentionally made back then, it formed as a byproduct of DuPont’s vinyl ether product line.
Around 2000, the 3M Co. decided for environmental and human health reasons to phase out production of PFOA, a key ingredient in the production of Teflon and a multitude of other nonstick and water-resistant consumer goods.
About 2001, DuPont bought the rights to manufacture PFOA from 3M and began to make it at its Fayetteville Works plant. DuPont became the only company in the country to make PFOA, which is now listed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as a suspected carcinogen. Studies also show it can also cause colitis, high cholesterol and adverse liver, kidney, thyroid and immunological health effects in laboratory animals.
The PFOA issue flew under the radar in North Carolina until about 2005. That year, The Fayetteville Observer published an editorial about the contamination found in groundwater at the Fayetteville Works site. The newspaper said PFOA was coming under increased scrutiny as a potential carcinogen and called on the state to closely monitor it in the environment. Little was done back then.
By 2009, DuPont, at the request of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, had begun to phase out PFOA, substituting it for a chemical cousin with a shorter carbon chain that was thought to be safer — Genx.
That year, DuPont entered into a consent order with the EPA that governed the manufacture, processing, distribution, release and disposal of GenX. It allowed DuPont, and later Chemours, to produce GenX provided it recovered and destroyed or recycled 99 percent of the waste and that it tested the substance for potential health and environmental effects..
After receiving complaints about GenX in the Cape Fear River in 2017, the EPA began a compliance monitoring inspection of Chemours under the Toxic Substances Control Act.
The EPA announced partial findings of the inspection in a heavily redacted document dated April 24, 2018.
According to the document, Chemours argued that the consent order did not pertain to GenX that is created as a byproduct. The company declined to tell the EPA when it became aware of GenX in the river.
In February of this year, the EPA issued a notice of violation against Chemours, saying the company failed to submit a premanufacture notice in violation of the Toxic Substances Control Act and failed to comply with “significant new use” regulations.
Last week, Brandon Wissbaum of WECT TV reported that the EPA’s Office of
Inspector General announced in a letter dated the same day that the OIG was doubtful of the EPA’s actions. The letter said the office was investigating actions the EPA took to verify compliance with the 2009 consent order, which was issued partly to prevent the release of GenX into the Cape Fear River basin.
Seven years after the EPA entered into the consent order, a group of researchers led by N.C. State scientist Detlef Knappe published a report saying GenX had been found in the Cape Fear and in public drinking water. The highest level recorded in the river was 4,500 parts per trillion; the average was 631 parts per trillion.
The DEQ sprung into action shortly after that news was reported in the Wilmington paper in 2017. The department began its efforts by trying to stop the flow of GenX into the Cape Fear and then expanded its work to include air emissions.
Residents are livid
People living around the Chemours Fayetteville Works plant are fearful and furious.
In their view, Long’s contention that Chemours will become the world’s leader in stemming PFAS emissions is just another empty promise in a long history of deceit.
Many residents still await home filtration systems from Chemours, and many have entered class-action lawsuits filed against the company.
They point out that Chemours didn’t start cleaning up its PFAS mess until the DEQ and the consent order forced it to take action.
“The ‘solutions’ they have put forth were forced on them and have been made in a condescending manner,” Randa Dunn, who lives near the plant, said in an email. “No one believes they are sincere in stopping the pollution. The air emissions is only one part of our lives being contaminated by carcinogens.
“Do we think Chemours is doing enough? NO. Will the oxidizer control 99%? Will the alarms go off when it does not work? Do we think the carcinogen contamination of water, ground and air will stop or even be controlled? NO. The answer is that it has not been controlled or stopped for 30 years.”
Beth Markesino is the leader of the activist group North Carolina Stop GenX in our Water. She questions whether Chemours can be trusted to reveal all of the chemicals it is discharging. An estimated 5,000 different types of PFAS are thought to be in existence. Markesino said the group’s records show that the company discharges 50 PFAS chemicals in its wastewater.
“Per our records, DEQ has yet to secure a list of chemicals manufactured or discharged as byproducts,” Markesino said in an email. “How are we to know what list of chemicals will be cut from emissions, if we do not yet know the full equation of their PFAS chemical usage for 99 percent to cut?
“… Our communities suffer while we wait for regulatory actions to catch up. Dupont and Chemours have withheld the health effects of these chemicals from our communities. They have chosen over and over again profit over people.”
Kathleen Gallagher is another leader of North Carolina Stop GenX in our Water who also has serious concerns about Chemours.
“Until Chemours voluntarily steps up and covers medical monitoring, they have not done enough,” Gallagher said in an email. “Chemours should be running water lines to every property and paying water bills as long as (the) owner retains property.
“And, they need to publicly admit they are not heroes for adding thermal oxidizer or delivering water. That is the least they can (do) for breaking the law.”
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Thank you for writing this article. We have been buying our water for 15 months. I have been trying to get Chemours to test my water but to no avail. My well was dug in 1982. One of the older wells in this neighborhood on County Line Road, near the Chemours plant. They say my property is not eligible at this time although my neighbors within 500 feet have been tested.
I got to thinking, “why would I want the Company that contaminated my well be the one to test my water?” I contacted DEQ and they referred me to Gel Laboratory in Charleston, SC to have my water samples tested. We are currently waiting for the results. To me it is worth the money spent to finally know what I am dealing with.
We have needed help in getting Chemours to stop contaminating our water and air. Your article was a much needed step in the right direction and I thank you for taking the time to put pen to paper.