PFAS Legal Perspective

• Manufacturers of PFAS and those who utilize PFAS in their products, as well as users of firefighting foams, are liable for the presence of PFAS in the environment and humans.
• This risk derives from regulatory programs and common law, including trespass, nuisance, negligence, and strict responsibility.
• PFAS, a family of several thousand chemicals, does not biodegrade, stays in the environment, and has alarming and poorly understood toxicological effects.

What are the regulatory concerns posed by the manufacture, use, and presence of PFAS? 

• Costs of compliance, including costs associated with the inability to manufacture or use
• Costs of noncompliance-penalties and injunctive relief
• Administrative
• Civil
• criminal
• Costs of investigation and remediation
• Natural resource damages

What are the common law concerns posed by the manufacture, use, and presence of PFAS?

• Damage to people (toxic tort)
• Damage to and diminution in value of property
• Stigma damages

Why should you care about PFAS?

• DuPont’s Washington Works Plant in West Virginia on the Ohio River
• Started PFOA use in the 1950s
• Became aware of possible adverse health effects in 1981

Regulatory action 

• • Safe Drinking Water Act (SWDA): Emergency administrative order based on PFOA screening level of 150 ppb in 2002; eventually reduced to .07 ppb in 2017
  • Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA): $10.25 million in civil penalties; $6.25
  • million in environmental projects

Private litigation 

• Leach v. E.I. Du Pont de Nemours & Co., No. 01-C-608 (W. Cir. Ct.):
• $235 million for health monitoring; $70 million for health & education programs
• Plan to prosecute individual actions In re E. I. Du Pont De Nemours and Company C-8 Personal Injury Litigation, Case No. 2:13-MD-02433-EAS-EPD (S.D. Ohio):
• Bellwether trials
• $671 million settlement; up to $50 million per year to cover additional costs

Midway Environmental Services Underground Injection Well for PFAS Disposal

Midway Environmental Services, Inc. is the only commercial/industrial Class I injection well in Oklahoma. Midway Environmental Services has a state-of-the-art facility capable of handling PFAS waste securely and effectively and can be very effective in the disposal of PFAS waste. We service Oklahoma. Kansas, Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas. Contact us for more information.