The Chemours Company (Chemours) said Friday that it has made “significant progress” in reducing polyfluoroalkyl substances at its Fayetteville site.

The company also said Friday that two additional milestones focused on reducing loading of legacy PFAS to the Cape  Fear River.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, PFAS are a group of chemicals that can be found in “food packaged in PFAS-containing materials, processed with equipment that used PFAS, or grown in PFAS-contaminated soil or water.”

The harmful chemicals can also make their way into the human body from commercial household products such as stain, water-repellent fabrics, non-stick products and many other sources.

In Friday’s announcement Chemours said it has made “significant  progress on meeting its commitments to North Carolina on PFAS reductions at its Fayetteville Works site and it recently reached two additional milestones focused on reducing loading of legacy PFAS to the Cape  Fear River.”

According to the announcement, Chemours said that in June it had finished the last of four Cape Fear River treatment systems to remove PFAS from groundwater making it natural course toward the river. 

The company said tests of the systems showed they were exceeding requirements to remove 80 percent of PFAS. 

Additionally, the company said construction was completed in June “on a complex stormwater capture and treatment system that is designed to remove a minimum of 99 percent of PFAS from collected stormwater near two of the site’s manufacturing units.

“This system is meeting consent order requirements,” the company stated on Friday. “These projects  add to the previous loading reduction project where Chemours is capturing and treating groundwater that  expresses itself as a stream. This facility began operating on Sept. 30, and additional  enhancements have been made in the first half of 2021 to improve the resiliency of the system." 

Chemours will now focus on site preparation and working with NCDEQ on a proposed groundwater remedy “that includes an underground barrier wall,” officials said. The barrier would be more than 70 feet deep and more than a mile long near the Cape Fear River. 

This wall and related pumping system are designed to keep groundwater and legacy PFAS from reaching the river. 

“With this proposed system, the water would be captured by interceptor wells that would pump the water to a newly constructed water treatment facility where PFAS would be removed from the groundwater before being discharged,” the company stated on Friday.

According to Friday’s official statement, “These actions reduce loadings to the Cape Fear River from legacy discharges and follow actions previously taken that greatly reduced PFAS water discharges and air emissions from our manufacturing processes. For example, Chemours has reduced HFPO-DA (GenX) discharges and emissions by 97 percent.”

Information provided by the EPA states that evidence shows that exposure to PFAS can lead to adverse health outcomes in humans. 

“The most-studied PFAS chemicals are PFOA and PFOS, according to report on the EPA’s website. “Studies indicate that PFOA and PFOS can cause reproductive and developmental, liver and kidney, and immunological effects in laboratory animals. Both chemicals have caused tumors in animals. The most consistent findings are increased cholesterol levels among exposed populations, with more limited findings related to “low infant birth weights, effects on the immune system, cancer (for PFOA), and thyroid hormone disruption (for PFOS).”