a journalistic investigation reveals the contamination of 17,000 sites with “eternal” pollutants in Europe

A Norwegian lake, the Danube, a Czech river and huge areas surrounding most industrial chemical basins… More than 17,000 sites in Europe are contaminated by pollutants per- and polyfluoroalkyl (PFAS), known as “eternal”, according to the conclusions of a survey of several months carried out by 17 media, including The world (article reserved for subscribers) and the Guardian (article in English) and published Thursday, February 23.

This survey is called Forever Pollution Project, in reference to these almost indestructible synthetic compounds developed since the 1940s to resist water and heat. Its authors rely on expert methodologies, data and “thousands of environmental samples” having made it possible to carry out, according to them, the first European mapping of contaminated sites or sites suspected of being so. The collective of journalists presents its map validated according to “a form of ‘peer-reviewed journalism’, on the model of scientific work validated by peers”.

More than 2,100 sites contaminated at dangerous levels

“According to our conservative estimate, Europe has more than 17,000 contaminated sites at levels that require the attention of public authorities (above 10 nanograms per liter). Contamination there is reaching levels deemed dangerous for the health by the experts we surveyed (more than 100 nanograms per liter) in more than 2,100 hotspots”, writing The world.

The production plants are mainly located in Germany, the cradle of industrial chemistry with the establishment in particular of the Archroma companies and the American group 3M. The journalists also located twenty PFAS production factories in France, and 230 factories identified as PFAS users. The latter are used in industry and present in everyday objects: Teflon products, food packaging, textiles, automobiles.

The German, Danish, Dutch, Norwegian and Swedish health authorities submitted a project to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) in mid-January to ban these components, supported by other countries, including France, which has recently presented its own “action plan”.