Chemours, DuPont and Corteva reached an agreement with the State of North Carolina and eleven local entities to resolve litigation over PFAS and other historical discharges from North Carolina production sites, along with separate state claims unrelated to that site, including contamination from the use of aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF). The local parties are Bladen, Brunswick, Columbus, Cumberland, New Hanover, Robeson and Sampson counties, the City of Lumberton, the Town of Wrightsville Beach, the Village of Bald Head Island and the Lower Cape Fear Water and Sewer Authority. These entities are located near the affected facility and had been excluded from the 2024 U.S. Public Water System Settlement.
Payments under the new agreement total 455 million dollars over fifteen years. Chemours will fund half of the amount, described as approximately 180 million dollars on a net present basis. The agreement credits the substantial investments and progress achieved under Chemours’ 2019 Consent Order with North Carolina, which reduced PFAS emissions from the site and mitigated off-site impacts on surrounding communities. It also sets out procedures to address remaining obligations, including implementation of drinking water programs. The settlement requires court approval and dismissal of the underlying lawsuits before becoming effective.
The North Carolina agreement is part of a broader pattern of PFAS settlements involving the same three companies, each addressing gaps left by prior deals. In January 2021, DuPont, Corteva and Chemours established a framework to manage legacy PFAS liabilities, featuring a 50/50 cost split between Chemours and a combined DuPont/Corteva share, backed by a shared escrow account for future claims.
That framework was first applied at scale in June 2023, when the companies announced a 1.185 billion dollar national fund intended to compensate public drinking water utilities for the cost of testing and treating PFAS. The national settlement contained exclusions, leaving out water systems owned by a state or the federal government, and allowing Cape Fear River Basin utilities in North Carolina to participate if they specifically opted in. State attorneys general, who have pursued broader environmental and natural resource claims rather than utility cost recovery, were not included in that deal.
In August 2025, New Jersey reached a separate settlement with the three companies for 875 million dollars to be paid over 25 years. That agreement addressed state claims spanning four current and former operating sites, as well as statewide AFFF contamination. In June 2026, a federal enforcement settlement was reached with U.S. agencies and West Virginia’s environmental regulator for 450 million dollars. That action addressed alleged unpermitted PFAS discharges into the Ohio, Cape Fear and Delaware rivers and requires Chemours to install pollution controls on its surface water discharges, pay civil penalties, and provide clean drinking water to communities near its West Virginia and New Jersey sites.
Other manufacturers have followed a similar path. 3M, a large PFAS producer, reached its own national public water system settlement alongside the June 2023 agreement, valued at up to 12.5 billion dollars over 13 years, which received final court approval in March 2024. 3M also entered state-level settlements, including a 2018 agreement with Minnesota for 850 million dollars and a May 2025 agreement with New Jersey for between 400 million and 450 million dollars over 25 years, connected to historical PFAS supply to the Chambers Works site.
By mid-2025, payments from the 3M and DuPont-linked national settlements had already started reaching water providers, with more than 900 million dollars distributed in the first wave. The North Carolina settlement still requires the relevant courts to dismiss the underlying lawsuits before it becomes final, a step that took several months to complete in New Jersey during late 2025.
Looking ahead, personal injury claims and natural resource damage claims from other states remain largely outside the scope of the settlements reached to date. Ongoing regulatory developments, including the pace of enforcement under the EPA’s national PFAS drinking water rule, are expected to influence how many additional utilities and states pursue their own claims. Individual water systems are also testing the boundaries of national settlements; for example, the City of Hastings, Minnesota, filed suit in August 2026 over PFOA detected in five public wells after opting out of the 2023 national settlement. More utilities may consider similar actions.
