Efforts to restrict the production of plastic “forever chemicals” that could threaten public health have been met with a large-scale coordinated attack by the multibillion pound industries that make and use them.
Industry-funded research and exaggerated claims litter the arguments made by the fluoropolymer industry against stricter regulation, a year-long investigation by the Forever Lobbying Project, a cross-border investigation involving 46 journalists and 18 experts across 16 countries can reveal.
Fluoropolymers are high performance plastics and a type of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) – a group of more than 10,000 human-made chemicals that will not break down in the environment for tens of thousands of years, if ever, earning them the nickname “forever chemicals”.
The substances are durable non-stick coatings used in an enormous range of industrial processes and consumer products. They have been in production for decades and pollution is so widespread that some have been found in water, soils and air across the world. They have been detected in fish, birds, otters, seals and whales – and are likely to be in the blood of almost every human on the planet.
In a speech in 2023, Michael Regan, the then director of the US Environmental Protection Agency, said: “What began as a so-called ‘miracle’, groundbreaking technology meant for practicality and convenience, quickly devolved into one of the most pressing environmental and public health concerns of our modern world.”
Two PFAS called PFOS and PFOA have been banned in many countries after decades of scientific study found links to cancers and thyroid disease, as well as immune and fertility problems. There are widespread concerns that other PFAS could cause health problems, but public interest science would take years to gather sufficient evidence to determine toxicity and cannot keep up with an industry that can relatively quickly create and market replacement PFAS molecules.
Frustrated by the unwinnable game of whack-a-mole and worried by the prospect of a potentially toxic and ever-growing timebomb, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and the Netherlands submitted a groundbreaking proposal to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) that would regulate all PFAS, including fluoropolymers, as one group across the European Union, based on their persistence or “forever” properties.
This led to an onslaught of lobbying activity from an industry with much to lose, including organisations such as the trade association Plastics Europe and their Fluoropolymers Product Group division, chemicals industry body Cefic’s PFAS group, as well as manufacturers and heavy users.
ECHA’s consultation on the proposal was inundated with more than 5,600 responses – an unprecedented number of submissions – hampering its ability to respond along normal timelines.
Vicky Cann from campaign group Corporate Europe Observatory, said the “scale of the industry lobby campaign against the EU’s proposed PFAS ban is huge. The mobilisation of broad swathes of industry, the lobbying of numerous departments across the commission, the big increases in lobby budgets, and the apocalyptic way in which the ban is referred to, are off the charts.”
Prof Gary Fooks, a researcher in corporate harm and the commercial determinants of health at the University of Bristol, said “the parallels that have been drawn with big tobacco are compelling. If anything, this is far bigger than anything the tobacco industry have been able to pull together.
“Everything about corporate lobbying around PFAS seems exceptional. The sheer number of businesses that participated in the various consultations that have taken place and the number of meetings with politicians and civil servants have been extraordinary.”
Journalists from across Europe scrutinised thousands of documents – from freedom of information requests to leaked papers and consultation responses – to identify the plastic industry’s lobbying tactics and arguments, and found some to be misleading, exaggerated and even false.
Lobbyists said the regulations would come at great economic cost, citing job losses, investment freezes, supply chain disruptions, closure of product lines and plants, and impacts on international trade and competitiveness. But they did not include any gains to economies from the innovation of new technologies and boost to industries that make alternatives to fluoropolymers. Nor did they factor in the cost of cleaning up contamination and costs to public and environmental health, which run into trillions of dollars.
Emil Damgaard-Møller, a PFAS expert at the Danish Technological Institute, said: “This is not the first time chemicals have been banned. Industries highlight these kinds of risks every time and, as seen from my perspective, we always overestimate the risks of a ban compared to the benefits.”
Not all investors agree with the fluoropolymer industry assessment. Rachel Crossley, head of stewardship, Europe, at the bank BNP Paribas, said: “Restricting and phasing out PFAS and other hazardous chemicals will spur companies’ investment in R&D to identify safer alternatives which, over time, will be the new sources of investors’ returns.”
One of the most common claims made by the industry is that there are no safe and effective alternatives to fluoropolymers, particularly within industries such as batteries, renewable energy and semiconductors, putting the transition to green and digital economies at risk.
Damgaard-Møller, an expert on PFAS replacements, said a large amount “can be easily replaced” and that if fluoropolymers in critical applications were exempted until a good alternative was found, replacements would be identified relatively quickly given the financial rewards. “You effectively achieve a monopoly for a period if you are the first on the market with a PFAS-free alternative.”
He also said: “We are never going to find a material that has the same versatile properties but there are very few applications that actually need the versatility. Therefore, an alternative can often be found if you figure out why you actually need the fluoropolymers. Many products are overengineered.”
Fooks said “the ‘no alternatives to fluoropolymers’ claims are used by lobbyists as broad statements to frame the policy debate … They are then rehashed by allies and business advocates, making them look like they enjoy wide support. Creating an echo chamber of rehashed arguments is a well-known tool in the corporate disinformation playbook.”
Further claims were made by the industry that the Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation (OECD) had developed criteria to identify polymers that are of “low concern” that included fluoropolymers, and that this meant that they were different from other PFAS and therefore safe. But the OECD told the Forever Lobbying Project that “no agreed-upon set of criteria at the OECD level was finalised”, and that it “has not conducted an assessment of fluoropolymers”.
Damgaard-Møller said: “The issues with the fluoropolymers are mainly during the manufacture and end-of-life. Fluoropolymers are per se not dangerous in use. But, you can basically say the same thing about asbestos – asbestos is not dangerous while in use, but is dangerous when handling.”
A number of industry-authored scientific papers supporting industry viewpoints were also discovered repeatedly among lobbying materials. The UK government is not following the EU’s lead in proposing to regulate all PFAS as one class but even so, emails reveal papers authored by the fluorochemicals industry have been sent to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) as evidence that similar regulation is not required in the UK, and promoting incineration as a safe method of disposal.
A Defra spokesperson said the “government is committed to protecting the environment from the risks posed by chemicals” and that it was “currently considering the best approach to chemicals regulation for the UK. We are also rapidly reviewing the environmental improvement plan to deliver on our legally binding targets to save nature. This includes how best to manage the risks posed by PFAS.”
Last year, 59 leading PFAS scientists wrote to the UK government asking it to take action on PFAS regulation and align with the EU proposals.
Fooks said: “The UK’s approach is likely to weaken collective efforts to address the PFAS problem and may embolden parts of the commission and some EU countries to challenge the bloc’s more rational approach to PFAS regulation.
“Its efforts to address the PFAS problem constitutes a manifest failure of the polluter-pays principle – capitulation to corporate interests masquerading as smart public policy,” he says. “Ultimately, the public pays the price – in terms of poorer health and more deaths brought forward. To describe it as shortsighted doesn’t come close to capturing its fatuousness.”
Cann said: “The UK approach to PFAS is too slow and too weak. The emerging evidence shows that the UK is very far from exempt from the PFAS pollution crisis and it is clear that the health consequences and bill to clean it up will only grow unless urgent action is taken.”
“The UK needs to transition to a PFAS-free economy quickly and that means following the EU’s lead on restricting thousands of PFAS, promoting PFAS-free alternative substances, and providing immediate support to the most polluted communities.”
