
Attorney Robert Bilott discovered that DuPont had known since the 1960s that PFOA (used to make Teflon) was toxic and contaminating water supplies near its Parkersburg, West Virginia plant. Internal documents showed DuPont found the chemical in workers' blood, linked it to birth defects, and detected it in public water — yet continued production and hid the data. A class-action settlement funded a health study linking PFOA to six diseases including kidney cancer.
“DuPont has been dumping toxic chemicals into our water for decades and covering up the health effects. They knew PFOA was poisoning people.”
What they said vs. what the evidence shows
“DuPont has always been committed to the safety of its products and the communities where we operate. PFOA levels pose no health risk.”
— DuPont Corporate Communications · Jan 2001
SourceFrom “crazy” to confirmed
The Claim Is Made
This is the moment they called it crazy.
For decades, DuPont told regulators, workers, and the public that PFOA—a chemical used to manufacture Teflon nonstick coatings—was safe. The company's position was unequivocal: there was no evidence of harm. Meanwhile, in Parkersburg, West Virginia, residents were drinking contaminated water and developing illnesses they couldn't explain. It would take one attorney's persistence and thousands of internal company documents to expose what DuPont had known all along.
Robert Bilott, an environmental lawyer, stumbled onto the story in the late 1990s when a farmer approached him with a disturbing observation: his cattle were dying near a DuPont waste disposal site. That small inquiry would unravel a four-decade cover-up. What Bilott discovered through litigation was damning: DuPont had identified PFOA as a toxic substance in its own laboratories as far back as the 1960s. The company found the chemical in workers' blood. It detected birth defects in the children of exposed employees. It discovered contamination in the public water supply serving Parkersburg. And it did almost nothing to warn anyone.
DuPont's official stance during this period was dismissive. The company maintained that PFOA posed no documented risk to human health. Regulators largely accepted this characterization. The chemical continued to be manufactured and released into the environment. Meanwhile, internal memos and study results—buried in company files—painted a starkly different picture of what the company actually believed about its own product.
The turning point came through discovery in litigation. Documents obtained during Bilott's class-action lawsuit against revealed the company's knowledge and inaction. Memos showed that DuPont executives understood the chemical's toxicity but chose not to disclose findings to regulators or the public. A 2005 settlement agreement required DuPont to fund an independent health study—the C8 Health Project—which eventually examined thousands of Parkersburg residents. The results were definitive: PFOA exposure was linked to six diseases, including kidney cancer, testicular cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, high cholesterol, and pregnancy-induced hypertension.
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Confirmed: They Were Right
The truth comes out. Officially documented.
Confirmed: They Were Right
The truth comes out. Officially documented.
What makes this case particularly significant is not just that DuPont knew and concealed information—corporate malfeasance, while inexcusable, is unfortunately familiar. What matters is how the company's actions shaped policy and public health for fifty years. Regulators relied on industry assurances. Workers made employment decisions without full information about their exposure. Families drank contaminated water believing it was safe. DuPont profited while costs were externalized onto a community.
The PFOA story exemplifies a pattern: when corporations possess critical safety information, institutional pressures often favor concealment over disclosure. Regulatory agencies depend partly on company data. Legal liability creates incentives to remain silent. The burden of proof falls on those trying to prove harm, not those claiming safety.
Today, PFOA remains in the bodies of most Americans. It persists in the environment indefinitely—hence the nickname "forever chemicals." The health consequences continue to accumulate. Bilott's work, documented in litigation and later in film, demonstrated that what DuPont claimed didn't know, the company had actually documented. The question now is whether this case will change how industries disclose—or conceal—information about potentially harmful chemicals. The answer will determine whether future communities have better protection than Parkersburg did.
Beat the odds
This had a 0.8% chance of leaking — someone talked anyway.
Conspirators
~100Network
Secret kept
19.1 years
Time to 95% exposure
500+ years