What Do The Films Dark Waters, A Civil Action and Erin Brockovich Have In Common?
What do the films Dark Waters, A Civil Action and Erin Brockovich have in common?
They all share with us times when corporations were held to account over their contamination of our water supplies in the 1950’s to 1980’s.
In Dark Waters, it was Dupont disposing of PFOA into the Ohio River poisoning the people in the town of Parkersburg, Ohio. In A Civil Action, it was W. R. Grace and Beatrice Foods disposing trichloroethylene (TCE) into the Aberjona River that the people in the township of Woburn, Massachusetts drank, and in Erin Brockovich it was the Pacific Gas and Electric Company discharging a toxic form of chromium to groundwater supplies in Hinkley California.
And in these cases, a civil lawsuit was launched against each of these corporations, and after lengthy, costly and painful processes, they were found guilty and required to pay compensation.
So, how does that relate to us in 2024?
Logic would tell us that these corporations were required to cease these practices, to stop disposing of their waste in a way that was harming people and the environment. Right?
Well, yes and no. The Woburn plants of Grace and Beatrice Foods and the wells that were fed from the Ohio River were eventually closed. The Pacific Gas and Electric Company lawsuit was for historical contamination of water supplies – between 1952 and 1966.
Dupont, however, continued to dispose of PFOA directly into rivers. In 2019 for example, 323.5 pounds (146.7 kg) of PFOA was discharged from the Parkersburg site into the Ohio River. They were sued again for discharging harmful waste and in February this year (2024), ordered to pay compensation to any US public water providers that detect PFAS in the river or groundwater that provides their drinking water supplies.
When Dupont started using PFOA in 1961, their workers became ill, so they ran tests to determine if the PFOA was the cause. They contaminated cigarettes with PFOA and gave them to their employees. Many were hospitalised. Many of the female employees working with PFOA had miscarriages. DuPont also ran tests on rats. The rats’ organs became enlarged, they developed cancers and birthed deformed babies. In 1979, DuPont ran a study that showed PFOA causes allergic, endocrine and metabolic disorders and liver disease. There were also studies that showed DuPont employees became infertile, developed leukemia and other cancers and experienced birth defects in their babies.
In 2012, the scientific panel established to analyse blood test results from the people of Parkersburg found PFOA links to 6 categories of illness: kidney and testicular cancer, thyroid disease, pre-eclampsia, high cholesterol and ulcerative colitis.
The harms of PFOA have been evident to DuPont since 1962, however, they continued to use it in production and dispose of it to rivers. Rivers that supply drinking water to millions of people. And they continue to this day.
And the regulators allow it.
The regulators are not forcing DuPont to cease PFOA use. They allow discharge of PFOA into our rivers. When DuPont exceed discharge limits, the penalty is to further monitor discharges or submit procedures to show how it plans to comply. At no time, have the regulators required DuPont to find a safe alternative, or to stop the purchase or production of PFOA. And so it continues. DuPont continues to make $12 billion per year, and we continue to have our water supplies poisoned. The government has shown they are unwilling to stop the discharge of PFOA to our rivers.
The initial lawsuit was made more complicated because DuPont had been allowed to self-regulate. They were able to nominate which substances they were willing to be labelled hazardous and thus regulated. They didn’t nominate PFOA as hazardous to avoid its regulation.
All this leads to some interesting questions. Does self-regulation work? Can we trust corporations to regulate themselves? How were these harmful discharges missed by the regulators? Who was monitoring their discharges? Are the laws sufficient to ensure our water supplies are protected? How much damage was done to the aquatic life and the riverbank flora and fauna? Were the corporations ever held to account for this damage? When a substance is suspected of being harmful, should the use of the substance be halted until we know more?
And then more broadly, questions around water catchment protection. Who is responsible for protection of our water supplies? How do we protect the downstream users?
We at Access don’t have the answers to these questions, but we know that there is strength in numbers. We believe that together, we can work through some of these questions, enhance our understanding, and maybe find ways we can protect ourselves and our families today and our environment and planet into the future.
Join the Access Community today to have your say, to share your story and to become part of the solution, for your family and for the planet.