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Bayer’s Monsanto Must Pay $185 Million After State Supreme Court Restores Chemical Leak Verdict
A U.S. court reinstated a $185 million verdict against Bayer’s Monsanto unit over chemical contamination at a Washington state school on Thursday. The Washington state Supreme Court reversed a lower court ruling that had vacated the verdict in a 2021 trial over claims brought by three teachers at Sky Valley Education Center in Monroe, Washington.
Monsanto has faced a string of trials over claims by teachers and others at the Seattle-area school who say they were sickened by exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. More than 200 students, employees and parents say they developed cancer and other health problems from PCBs leaking from the school’s light fixtures. The chemicals were made by Monsanto, which Bayer acquired in 2018.
Verdicts in previous trials have totaled more than $1.5 billion, though some have been reduced or overturned. In August, the company announced it had settled all of the claims except for the nine cases already on appeal, including the teachers’ lawsuit at issue in Thursday’s ruling.
Rick Friedman and Deepak Gupta, attorneys for the plaintiffs, said in a statement the ruling “sends a clear message: companies that conceal the risks of toxic chemicals must be held accountable.” A Monsanto spokesperson said in a statement the court’s ruling was incorrect and the company was considering its legal options.
NJ Residents to Receive $4.9 Million Settlement for PFAS Contamination in Drinking Water
Some 60,000 residential water customers in New Jersey will share $4.9 million in the settlement of a lawsuit that charged a water company and a chemical maker with violating a state health limit on the presence of PFOA, a toxic “forever chemical,” in drinking water. Middlesex Water Co. and 3M agreed to settle the class action almost four years after it was filed in New Jersey state court, citing the length of the litigation and the prospect of further costs to both sides should it go to trial.
The settlement, announced on Oct. 3, is not a personal injury case but is designed to compensate individual claimants for the cost of buying bottled water, installing filtration or seeing doctors after Middlesex Water Co. told some of its customers in October 2021 that their drinking water exceeded the state’s “maximum contaminant limit” for the chemical.
Stephen DeNittis, lead attorney for the class, said the settlement was the largest of its kind in New Jersey, and may be the only case nationwide to win compensation for individuals who incurred out-of-pocket expenses in seeking to avoid drinking water contaminated with a PFAS chemical.
Traces of Old Farm Chemicals Contaminate Water Across the U.S.
Even though it delivers airtight data and analysis essential for understanding and managing the risks industrial societies pose to water, land and health, the U.S. Geological Survey is a federal science agency that rarely attracts public notice.
So when my colleague, Brett Walton, told me about a new USGS study that found diminishing concentrations in groundwater for all but one of a group of twenty-two old-school pesticides widely known to cause disease in humans, I got interested. Maybe something to cheer about amid all the turmoil of the era.
I took a close look. To some extent, the findings of the new study are a bit of good news. But as I considered the results presented by the report’s authors, and how they reached their findings, a much more significant measure of really bad news was revealed.
It wasn’t about pesticides. Rather it’s about the expertise, capacity, and value of an environmental monitoring agency capable of conducting such a study that the Trump administration is intent on wrecking.
Sludge Is Used as Fertilizer Across Wisconsin. How Much Is Tainted by PFAS?
Wisconsin Public Radio reported:
On a Saturday in June, Nancy Sattler bats away flies while standing in the shade of the Moen Lake boat landing near the town of Stella. With the sun’s sweltering heat, it’s exactly the kind of humid day that leads people to escape to the water.
Sattler, who is former president of the Moen Lake Chain Association, said she and her neighbors were worried when they first learned of high PFAS levels in the lakes.
“There were neighbors of mine who were very reluctant to even go in the water or allow their grandchildren in the water,” Sattler said.
Sampling of the Moen Lake Chain in 2023 found PFAS levels up to 4 times higher than Wisconsin’s surface water standards for the chemicals. Testing of private wells has also revealed PFAS levels among the highest concentrations found in drinking water anywhere in the nation. More than one-third of 241 wells tested so far have levels of the chemicals that are concerning to state health officials.
Major American LNG Exporters Habitually Break Air Pollution Laws, Report Finds
During the past five years, all seven of the fully operational LNG export terminals in the U.S. violated the Clean Air Act, America’s cornerstone law on air pollution, a new report from the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP) finds. The report comes as the Trump administration has moved to accelerate the approval of new export terminals to sell more U.S. LNG around the world, particularly to Asia and Europe.
Several major terminals rarely, if ever, managed to spend a full quarter in compliance with environmental laws over the past three years, the report found. Among the seven terminals that were fully operational by the end of 2024, publicly traded companies appeared among the most consistent violators, with the Cheniere Sabine Pass terminal and Venture Global Calcasieu Pass Terminal violating the Clean Air Act every single quarter from October 2022 to July 2025, EIP found. A third, the Cameron LNG terminal, faced “high priority” violations 11 out of the past 12 quarters.
Toxin Levels in Fish Lead to Calls for UK-Wide Ban on Mercury Dental Fillings
Britain is facing mounting pressure to ban mercury dental fillings, one of the few countries yet to prevent the practice, as new data reveals alarming contamination levels in the nation’s fish and shellfish. Mercury is a potent neurotoxin that can harm the nervous, digestive and immune systems, as well as the lungs, kidneys, skin and eyes, even at low levels of exposure. Its organic form, methylmercury, is particularly dangerous to unborn babies and can move through the food chain building up in insects, fish and birds.
Britain is lagging behind the rest of the world on phasing out mercury dental fillings, with 43 countries having already banned mercury amalgam, including the EU, Sweden, Norway, Tanzania, Uganda, Indonesia and the Philippines. Northern Ireland will outlaw mercury fillings from 2035 but no such ban is planned in the rest of Britain.
According to new analysis by the Rivers Trust and Wildlife and Countryside Link, more than 98% of fish and mussels tested in English rivers and coastal waters contain mercury above safety limits proposed by the EU, with more than half containing more than five times the recommended safe level.
