Prosecuted by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection in 2020, Arkema was accused, like Solvay, of being responsible for environmental pollution with PFAS. While the Belgian industrialist agreed to pay $393 million last year, it is the turn of the French group to seek an amicable settlement of the dispute.
Just a few days before his summons to the Lyon judicial court, in the context of a case brought by the Metropolis, France 3 Rhône-Alpes learned that the American branch of the Arkema group had agreed to pay and set aside nearly $109 million to compensate for damages and clean up one of its former sites in New Jersey, in the United States.
In 2014, in West Depford, south of Philadelphia, residents of the area discovered the presence of PFNA in groundwater and drinking water. “Not only did the waters of West Depford contain PFAS, but they were the highest levels in the state of New Jersey, and especially the highest levels of PFNA”, says Tracy Carluccio, director of Delaware Riverkeeper Network, an environmental NGO fighting for the restoration and protection of the Delaware River.
The industrial platform installed nearby is quickly singled out. Solvay manufactures exactly the same fluoropolymer, PVDF, as that produced on the Pierre-Bénite site. But before being bought by the Belgian chemical giant, the American factory was in fact operated by Arkema, from approximately 1975 to 1990.
In the water, air, sediments and soils, fish and plants of West Depford, we therefore find the same molecules as in the south of Lyon (essentially PFNA, PFUnDA and PFTrDA). “We had to close wells, distribute bottled water, it was a real crisis”, the activist still recalls.
In 2019, it is therefore the two industrialists that the New Jersey Department of the Environment (NJDEP) ordered to clean up the environment of the site. When Arkema and Solvay failed to comply, the NJDEP filed a lawsuit a year later.
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In the complaint that they therefore filed in 2020 with the New Jersey court, the lawyers for the Department of Environmental Protection begin by establishing that “Solvay and Arkema, as responsible for the spill of hazardous substances on the site, are liable, jointly and severally, without distinction of fault, for all costs of clean-up and removal as well as direct and indirect damages”.
In the United States, where the PFAS scandal was revealed in the early 2000s by a lawyer whose story inspired the film Dark Waters, dozens of lawsuits against manufacturers producing these molecules are currently underway.
Collective actions brought in particular by drinking water networks have forced many manufacturers in recent years, including Chemours and 3M, to conclude agreements worth billions of dollars to put an end to lawsuits.
To avoid going to trial, the American branch of Arkema also agreed to pay. According to the terms of the agreement, signed at the beginning of May and France 3 Rhône-Alpes was able to consult, the industrialist will have to pay 12.7 million dollars to the NJDEP for “damage to natural resources” and $21 million to finance or compensate “sanitation projects” public and private contaminated with PFAS around the West Deptford site.
The group also agreed to the establishment of a financing fund with $75 million, for at least 18 years, which will serve “additional financial assurance beyond the reclamation funding sources that Solvay is required to maintain to ensure that reclamation activities associated with the site will be completed”, indicates the NJDEP.
The industrialist also undertakes to “conduct investigations and corrective actions with respect to releases (…) for which Arkema may be responsible in any way, resulting from the off-site placement or disposal of waste containing PFAS originating of the site”.
The agreement will be presented to the US court for review and approval later this year, following a two-month public comment period and does not constitute “an acknowledgment of responsibility”, specify the NJDEP lawyers in the letter they sent to the New Jersey court and which we were able to consult.
“A preliminary settlement agreement has been reached with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection regarding this litigation”, recognizes the Arkema group’s communications department, before adding that it “must still be subject to judicial approval before being final”́
At the beginning of March, the agreement accepted by Solvay, amounting to $393 million in total, was ratified by the same court.
Applying the polluter pays principle is exactly what the Métropole de Lyon is asking for, which summoned Arkema and Daikin for summary proceedings on April 9 to obtain a judicial expertise. “We are seeking to establish responsibilities to try to compensate for the damage suffered,” Bruno Bernard, the president of the community, then explained. The cost of the work necessary for the filtration or dilution of water from contaminated catchments, to the south of the city, is estimated between 5 and 10 million euros by the Métropole de Lyon.