I never imagined that DuPont had poisoned virtually the whole planet HEALTH BLIGHT
Robert Bilott was not sure why the ageing cattle rancher had shown up at his big city office. Then Earl Tennant pushed a tape into his VCR and the young environmental lawyer gasped in shock.
Camcorder footage showed cows and calves lying dead or dying, their bodies deformed and wasted, blood dripping from their noses and mouths.
Other animals were still alive but only barely – staggering bow-legged like drunks while slobbering white slime the consistency of toothpaste.
The camera then cut to the rancher dissecting one of the cows and pulling out green, enlarged organs, lungs streaked with purple and a heart oozing yellow, foul-smelling slime.
Earl was in no doubt about what had killed 153 cows at his 300-acre farm in Parkersburg, Virginia.
But the DuPont chemical factory pumping waste into his river was the town’s biggest employer and no one wanted to help him take it on.
Robert, who normally defended huge corporations like DuPont, was also initially sceptical, knowing he would be setting himself against the powerful chemicals industry.
But he was so horrified by Earl’s video he agreed to help.
And before long, Robert had pinpointed what was killing Earl’s cows – DuPont’s own chemical, C8.
He was then shocked to learn the company had also knowingly been poisoning local people for decades – and even using employees as guinea pigs in secret experiments.
A 20-year David and Goliath battle ensued, in which Robert exposed one of history’s biggest corporate coverups and cast light on a man-made chemical hidden from the scientific community that has polluted the world, affecting 99% of humanity.
Robert’s book about the battle, Exposure, was published last year. And the story is now being told in the film Dark Waters – starring Mark Ruffalo as Robert and also featuring Anne Hathaway and Tim Robbins.
Still a lawyer at the same firm, Taft in Cincinnati, Robert, 54, remembers clearly the day in 1998 that Earl appeared in a scruffy coat and baseball cap.
He says: “He wasn’t dressed as most of our clients would dress. And I had no idea why he was reaching out to me, because this was not the kind of case I typically dealt with.
“But he wasn’t there to impress, he wanted someone to believe him and do something about it.
“What Earl was suggesting was shocking and I doubted what he was telling me could be true. But by the end of the video I was floored. I knew something was terribly wrong here.
“But I still couldn’t believe a company as big as DuPont would be knowingly dumping illegal chemicals. I knew their lawyers and I was sure they’d want to get to the bottom of it. I felt it would be a fairly small matter.
“I certainly never imagined it would morph into something so big it would involve the contamination of virtually the entire planet.”
Once he had accepted the case, Robert visited Earl’s farm to see for himself. And it was then he began to suspect it was not just the cows and other animals getting sick and dying.
He says: “I could tell Earl was having health issues. He was wheezing, he was coughing, he told us about vapour clouds coming off the factory’s landfill site. As time went by his health problems became worse.”
But identifying the chemical was harder than he expected.
Tests by DuPont scientists showed no signs of any known chemicals in the water at Earl’s farm.
But after the firm was finally forced to hand over 160,000 internal records, Robert came across the name of an unregulated chemical compound called Perfluotooctanoic acid (PFOA) – also known as C8.
C8, he discovered, was used in the manufacture of Teflon, a substance DuPont scientists invented by accident in the 1950s. The slippery, non-stick material was used to coat pots and pans, to waterproof clothing, rugs, pizza boxes and microwave popcorn bags, and put in firefighting foam.
DuPont, which made over a billion dollars a year from its Teflon products, knew C8 was harmful to humans. Yet it had been releasing waste into the water near Parkersburg and concealing evidence of its actions for decades.
In the 1960s, the company had even been giving employees cigarettes laced with Teflon and recording the effects that heating it had on humans.
Its researchers found that it caused a flu-like illness they called Teflon flu – which, Robert said, was kept a secret from the public.
Each discovery shocked Robert more. He says: “Not only was it in the local drinking water, it was known to be getting into the blood of people in the community, and DuPont had known this for some time, without the public or government regulators being aware.
“Meanwhile, more people were being exposed and contaminated. I was looking at these documents, thinking I must be the only person outside the company who knows. I felt an obligation to warn of this public health threat.”
The first victory came in 2001, when DuPont settled with Earl and his family. But Robert was on to something much bigger after discovering how people in the Parkersburg area had been getting gravely ill with a mysterious disease for decades. Many of them died and women were giving birth to children with severe deformities.
He found levels of C8 in the drinking water were 14 times higher than DuPont’s own scientists considered safe. And although the firm was aware of this and that dust clouds