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Chemical found in DuPont workers

Controversial PFOA was in blood of employees at Chesterfield plant

BY JOHN REID BLACKWELL

TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Sep 30, 2006

A controversial man-made chemical has been found in blood samples taken from some employees of a DuPont Co. plant in Chesterfield County.The substance, known as PFOA, was detected at varying levels in blood samples taken in May and June from workers at the company’s Spruance plant, a union representing workers there said. The company confirmed the results.

The company offered the blood tests, and 89 employees accepted, after a union that represents many DuPont workers raised concerns about the chemical. The substance has been found in the blood of workers at other DuPont sites such as a plant in Fayetteville, N.C.

PFOA, short for perfluorooctanoic acid, is used in the production process for Teflon, an ingredient in nonstick cookware and all-weather clothing.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency says PFOA does not pose a concern to consumers using those products, but the potential health effects on people exposed to higher levels of the chemical are still being investigated and are disputed.

Some studies have indicated it can cause liver, developmental and reproductive problems in laboratory animals, the EPA said.

DuPont said it believes PFOA does not pose a health risk to the general public. The company said a health study it is conducting on more than 1,000 workers at a plant near Parkersburg, W.Va., has indicated no association between exposure to PFOA and health problems.

The company hired an independent laboratory to analyze the Spruance employees’ blood samples.

Because the results of individual tests are confidential, neither the company nor the union said how many of the 89 employees tested positive for PFOA.

Those who did test positive had PFOA in their blood ranging from 0.5 parts per billion to 800 parts per billion, the union said. The average of those tested was 66 parts per billion.

Because PFOA is a persistent chemical that does not break down in the environment, it has been found at low levels in the blood of the general U.S. population, at a mean level of about 5.6 parts per billion, but it has been found in much higher levels in workers, the EPA said.

Jay Palmore, president of Ampthill Rayon Workers, a union that represents about 1,200 local DuPont employees, said the highest PFOA level at the plant — 800 parts per billion — was detected in a female employee, but he declined to offer specifics.

Palmore said he was one of the employees who took a blood test and that his results showed a PFOA level of 8 parts per billion.

“I haven’t worked in Teflon since 1976,” he said. Now a technical assistant in the research department, Palmore said he has worked in almost every part of the plant in his 33 years there.

“We don’t know for sure what it is going to do to humans,” Palmore said. “To me, it would be a good idea to keep track of it. I don’t want to put DuPont out of business. No one wants to do that. I really think it should be a regulated material. The government needs to step in and do that.”

An EPA science advisory board said this year that PFOA should be considered a “likely carcinogen.”

DuPont disputes that.

“To date, there are no human health effects known to be caused by PFOA,” the company said in a statement. “Based on health and toxicological studies conducted by DuPont and other researchers, DuPont believes the weight of evidence indicates that PFOA exposure does not pose a health risk to the general public.”

PFOA was not manufactured at the Spruance plant, and DuPont says only small amounts of it were present in the Teflon production line that operated there from 1953 to 2004.

The PFOA controversy has been a repeated source of tension between DuPont and the United Steelworkers Union, which represents 1,800 DuPont employees at other plants, but none at Spruance.

That union claims DuPont has failed to protect workers from the potential hazards of PFOA, while DuPont says the union is engaged in a campaign to make the company look bad.

Several times this year, the Steelworkers Union and the Virginia Chapter of the Sierra Club, an environmental-protection group, have collected water samples from sites nearby the plant and its discharge site into the James River. Those samples, the groups said, have shown PFOA contamination in trace amounts in ground and surface water around the plant.

After those concerns were raised, DuPont agreed to collect water samples from wells on plant property and the James River in cooperation with the EPA. The results from those tests are pending.

Last year, DuPont agreed to pay a $16.5 million penalty to the EPA for allegedly withholding information about the potential health and environmental risks posed by PFOA after the chemical was found in the blood of workers and in groundwater around the plant in Parkersburg.

The company also agreed last year to pay $107 million to settle a lawsuit filed by residents near the plant.

Contact staff writer John Reid Blackwell at John Reid Blackwell or (804) 775-8123.

For immediate release: Cape Fear River Watch, an enviromental education, action and advocacy non-profit corporation has just inked two contracts. One contract is with City of Wilmington, the other with the Town of Carolina Beach. Both contracts have engaged River Watch for the years 2006-07 to provide a broad range of services for the City and Town.

While the scope of services are too numerous to include here, the list below is a small sampling of the services River Watch will perform:

* Serve in an advisory role to Water Conservation Working Groups
* Work with middle schools to present water conservation lessons to students
* Present enviroscape programs to middle school children
* Assist in devloping and presenting education to City and Town employees on the best storm water practices and help develop programs about BMP’s (Best Management Practices) both to Town and City employees and to the public.
* Assist the Town in solving the problem of litter and pet waste.

This is a short list of the services Cape Fear River Watch will be providing to the City and Town. For more information contact Business Manager