Published in The Fayetteville Observer on Monday, February 20, 2006

By Nomee Landis, Staff writer

6 Photos, Staff photo by David Smith

Glenda Minges, who lives near DuPont's Fayetteville Works plant, questions the company's contention that C8 is not harmful. Traces of the chemical have been found near her house, which uses well water.

Glenda Minges still drinks water from the well at her house off Marshwood Lake Road. But she has begun to worry whether the water is safe.

Minges has concerns, as many of her neighbors do, about a chemical that DuPont manufactures less than a mile from her home. It is a chemical that DuPont calls APFO, or ammonium perfluorooctanoate. It is known mostly as C8.

DuPont's Fayetteville Works is the only site in the United States where C8 is manufactured. Traces of the chemical have been found in groundwater around the plant, in Marshwood Lake, in a private well near the lake and in the Cape Fear River.

C8 has contaminated drinking water supplies near another DuPont facility, the Washington Works near Parkersburg, W.Va. DuPont has for decades used the chemical there to make Teflon. Many people in West Virginia and Ohio are angry that DuPont knew as early as the 1980s that C8 was seeping into their groundwater, into the Ohio River and running through their taps - and never told them.

An advisory group to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recommended last week that C8 be considered a likely carcinogen, but there is disagreement about whether the chemical poses health risks.

Some environmentalists and residents worry that the widespread contamination that occurred along the Ohio River could happen here.

Rick Dove, a member of the Waterkeeper Alliance, said the problems at DuPont's Fayetteville Works are troubling now, but future C8 contamination could be even more disturbing.

"We don't want to end up in the Cape Fear like they did in West Virginia," he said.

Dove is a member of the North Carolina C8 Working Group, a coalition of environmental organizations formed to monitor C8 issues.

Larry Stanley, a hydrogeologist with the N.C. Division of Waste Management, has been working with DuPont since 2003, when the company informed the state that C8 had been found in the groundwater at the Fayetteville Works.

The plant is off N.C. 87 on the Cumberland-Bladen county line. It is in a rural area along the banks of the Cape Fear River.

Stanley has said the state began to take more interest in C8 after the Working Group organized and demanded that state environmental employees get involved.

Stanley said he does not believe that the problems that occurred in West Virginia will happen again.

"It is a preventable situation," he said, "and DuPont has said they are willing to invest in more advanced technology to prevent what you saw in West Virginia."

State and federal regulators and scientists are scrutinizing C8 and its chemical relatives, making a repeat of the circumstances in West Virginia much less likely, Stanley said. DuPont has shared its monitoring results with the state in a timely manner, he said.

In January, DuPont joined with other chemical makers in an agreement with the EPA to dramatically cut the amount of C8 that is released into the environment during manufacture. The company also has agreed to virtually eliminate the amount of the chemical that remains in finished products.

Barry Hudson, manager at the Fayetteville Works, said DuPont has committed to reducing worldwide emissions of the chemical by 98 percent by the end of next year.

Hudson said the problems in West Virginia will not happen here for several reasons. First, the plant produces APFO, unlike the West Virginia site that uses it in manufacturing, Hudson said. DuPont makes Teflon at its Fayetteville Works but uses a process that does not involve APFO.

Hudson said the $23 million facility where the chemical is made is state of the art and emissions are extremely low, less than 1 percent of the total that the 3M company emitted each year when it made the chemical in Minnesota.

More than 30 monitoring wells around the Fayetteville Works will alert company officials to potential problems, Hudson said. With one exception, he added, sampling has shown C8 levels well below drinking water standards that have been established in other states, including West Virginia, where the standard is 150 parts per billion.

Last year, though, DuPont agreed to pay $107 million to settle a class-action lawsuit involving people near its West Virginia plant who were exposed to C8 at levels far below the state drinking water standard.

One well at the Fayetteville Works, just north of the APFO building, has shown C8 levels higher than standards set by other states. Tests from that well showed C8 at 765 parts per billion in the latest sampling. DuPont's own standard is 1 part per billion.

Hudson said the problem is an isolated one.

"I'm confident we're not posing any risk to our employees, our environment or our neighbors," he said.

Rick Abraham, a member of the North Carolina C8 Working Group, said contamination at the Fayetteville Works could grow if the community does not remain vigilant about C8 and how much of it is escaping into the air, water and soil.

"I believe it could, and the other members of the Working Group believe it could," he said. "But it can only happen if we don't learn from the lessons learned in West Virginia."

Regulatory response

What are the lessons learned? Abraham said the first is acting early to stop the spread of C8 contamination.

Abraham also works as an advocate for the United Steelworkers of America Union, the organization that represents DuPont employees at other plants. He described himself as an advocate for responsible corporate environmental action, his focus for more than 20 years.

He said this issue is playing out just as countless similar situations have done in other communities: Residents here have expressed concern about a chemical in their environment, the company has tried to downplay the concerns and government regulators have been slow to react.

DuPont has criticized the union and blamed it for stirring up trouble in North Carolina on the subject of C8. The union looks for leverage any way it can, company officials say.

The C8 Working Group has called on state and federal environmental agencies to take swifter action to prevent further problems with C8 in North Carolina. It wants DuPont to conduct more intensive monitoring and has called on the company to scale back its production of C8.

That would be an expensive proposition for DuPont. The company recently disclosed that annual revenues from C8 total about $1 billion.

Dove, of the Waterkeeper Alliance and the C8 Working Group, said in a prepared statement released in late January by the Working Group that it would be nearly impossible to reduce worldwide emissions of the chemical in any other way than cutting production.

"So long as these products find their way to consumers, the C8 in these products will end up exposing humans and being discharged to the environment through landfills and other means," Dove said in the statement.

Lasting effects

C8 is a substance that helps in the chemical reaction that must occur to form Teflon. Teflon is useful because it is so chemically stable, said Hudson, manager of DuPont's Fayetteville Works. That is good when eggs don't stick to the frying pan, but there is a down side, too.

Nature has a difficult time breaking down C8. Instead, it accumulates - in the environment and in the blood of people and animals.

DuPont officials have said the ultimate resting place for the chemical - and others in the same family - will be the world's oceans because it is so soluble in water. No one knows how the chemicals will ultimately affect marine life or the ecosystem.

Federal regulators still want to know if an accumulation of C8 harms the human body. So do the people who live close to the Fayetteville Works.

The recommendation by an EPA advisory group last week that C8 be considered a likely carcinogen in humans could trigger a new set of federal regulations.

DuPont has told the neighbors of its Fayetteville Works that they have nothing to worry about. No one has proven that C8 harms people, the company says. Studies conducted by DuPont and independent sources have not definitively answered the questions that Minges and thousands of other people want to know: Does C8 cause cancer or other health problems in people?

Minges does not obsess over her concerns, but she attends the community meetings DuPont hosts to discuss C8 and the water monitoring results.

Company officials cannot explain how the chemical has gotten into the groundwater. The C8 Working Group has conducted its own tests, which revealed traces of C8 in the Cape Fear River, in Marshwood Lake, across a dirt road from the Mingeses' house, and in a private well near the lake.

In late January, the EPA and the N.C. Division of Waste Management took water samples from 10 wells, both on and off DuPont property. The results of those tests are not yet available.

The closest public water system to the DuPont plant is in the town of Tar Heel, 12 miles southeast of the plant. The Working Group tested the tap water in Tar Heel, which comes from a well. No C8 was found.

In West Virginia, C8 has been found in a spring 18 miles northeast of the plant near Parkersburg.

Roger and Eve Ison live on County Line Road, just across N.C. 87 from DuPont's Fayetteville Works property. Their house is one of the closest to the plant.

The EPA and DuPont in January drew a sample from the Isons' 65-foot-deep well to test for C8. They are still waiting for the results.

The family believes the company should also test their neighbors' shallower wells.

The Isons know what happened in West Virginia. They worry about a similar situation in their neighborhood.

"I think it is in the making right now," Roger Ison said. "If it is not that bad already, it will be."

This year, the Isons have started drinking bottled water. A large jug stands in the kitchen.

They attend most of the meetings that DuPont hosts for its neighbors. They are not sure they trust the company. "I don't feel like they're putting everything out on the table," Roger Ison said.

Ison said he also worries about the chemicals that are released from the smokestacks at the DuPont plant. He said he has found dead songbirds in his bird bath. And he has been able to approach and pick up other wild birds. He admits he is not certain if there is a connection between the birds and the plant, but he has his suspicions.

Rural community

The plant's nearest neighbors live around Marshwood Lake, in the Point East subdivision across N.C. 87, and in a few other isolated spots. The closest homes are about a mile from the plant. Most, like Mingeses's, use well water.

Glenda Minges grew up in the area. Forty years ago, her father and her uncle built the dam that forms Marshwood Lake, which served as the high school hangout when Minges was younger and where her three children learned to swim later on.

She lives near the lake, a spring-fed body of water nestled in a pine forest. A few houses are scattered about the lake and the surrounding acreage. You get to them all on dirt roads.

DuPont officials stress that the traces of C8 found should not cause worry.

Michael Johnson is the environmental manager at the plant. "We feel very comfortable that this is safe to drink," Johnson said.

Minges wants to know why DuPont takes the time to conduct all the tests - both on site and off - and share the results with its neighbors if the chemical is harmless.

"If this is so safe, then why did they have a settlement in West Virginia?" Minges asked.

DuPont is to conduct emissions tests in March to determine how much, if any, C8 is escaping from the stacks at the Fayetteville Works, said Hudson, the plant manager. The company plans to adhere to the commitment to reduce emissions in Fayetteville and at DuPont plants worldwide.

The groundwater tests will continue. Even more wells are being drilled on DuPont property to monitor the movement of the chemical.

Hudson said the company will continue to investigate how C8 has gotten into the groundwater and the path it will likely take now that it is there. That will involve learning about the geology of the earth beneath the plant.

Only trace amounts have been found so far. DuPont's neighbors hope the company, the state and the federal government will keep it that way.