Sixteen years after residents filed suit claiming to have been injured from poisonous water, DuPont and Chemours Co. said on Monday they had agreed to pay about $671 million in cash to settle several lawsuits related to the leak of a toxic chemical it used to make Teflon.
The chemical, allegedly leaked into waterways around a West Virginia plant, has been linked to cancer and other diseases.
The companies said they settled about 3,550 personal injury claims arising from the leak of perfluorooctanoic acid, also known as PFOA or C-8, from DuPont’s plant in Parkersburg.
The leak allegedly contaminated local water supplies and has been linked to six diseases, including testicular and kidney cancers.
DuPont has used C-8 at the plant since the early 1950s.
Chemours, which was spun off from DuPont to house its performance chemicals segment, said it will pay half of the settlement. Both companies denied any wrongdoing.
Wall Street, which had feared Chemours would have to pay out so much more, rallied the company’s shares in the wake of the settlement—pushing shares of the Wilmington, Del., company, up 15 percent in early Monday trading, to $32.34.
Earlier it had hit a 52-week high. DuPont shares edged up 59 cents, to $77.42.
“We look forward to working with DuPont to finalize this settlement and get these injured class members paid as quickly as possible,” Rob Bilott, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said in a statement.
The settlement comes ahead of DuPont’s planned $130 billion merger with Dow Chemical, which is due to close later this year.
In 2001, residents brought a class action against DuPont over C-8 exposure. The company agreed in 2004 to fund medical monitoring programs and install new water treatment systems.
DuPont convened a panel of scientists to determine whether any diseases were linked to C-8. The panel concluded that there was a probable link between C-8 and six diseases: kidney and testicular cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, pregnancy-induced hypertension and high cholesterol.
Members of the class action lawsuit, suffering from one of the diseases, then individually sued DuPont. The company agreed not to challenge whether C-8 can cause those diseases, but plaintiffs still must prove it is to blame for their individual illnesses.
In October 2015, a jury awarded a kidney cancer patient $1.6 million after finding DuPont was liable for the leak. This was seen as the first bellwether case.
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