Background Information

On January 25, 2006, the US EPA announced a global stewardship program aimed at moving DuPont and other manufacturers to reduce emissions and the presence in consumer products of PFOA (Perfluorooctanoic acid) or its precursors by 95 percent by no later than 2010 and to work toward eliminating these sources of exposure five years after that but no later than 2015. Five days later an EPA panel affirmed that PFOA is a likely human carcinogen.

PFOA is used or created through the manufacture and use of a wide range of surfaces and coatings on food packaging, clothing, carpets, pots and pans. Teflon, Gortex and Stainmaster are all made with PFOA. On February 6, 2005 John Hopkins researchers announced that they had found PFOA in the cord blood of 298 of 300 newborn babies tested over a 5-month period.

What led up to the US EPA's decision to act and to DuPont's decision to phase these chemicals out of products? What role did consumer activity, investigative research, emerging science, labor union involvement, shareholder activism and other factors play in these decisions? And what are groups doing now to convince retailers and fast food restaurants to replace PFOA containing products with safer alternatives?

Resources 

• The Shareholder's Right to Know More (PDF) Prepared by Sanford Lewis, Esq., Strategic Counsel on Accountability on behalf of DuPont Shareholders for Fair Value
• Link to half hour radio show/podcast interviewing Teflon Class Action
  Attorney Alan Kluger and Dupont Whistleblower Glenn Evers: http://corporatewatchdogmedia.org
• See a list of DuPont consumer products
  

Useful Websites

Ohio Citizen
Environmental Working Group
DuPont Shareholders For Fair Value
United Steelworkers of America