Australia announced it is suing 3M for more than $1 billion over contamination from PFAS “forever chemicals” used in firefighting foam at defense bases, accusing the company of withholding information about the risks posed by the foam, the Associated Press reported Thursday.
Australia’s government is pursuing the record-breaking compensation claim after discovering PFAS pollution at 28 military bases, including PFAS-contaminated groundwater near at least one base. Australia’s Assistant Defense Minister Peter Khalil said the department has already spent $920 million on efforts to manage and mitigate the environmental impacts of the pollution.
“We are prepared to take on powerful corporations when Australians and Australian communities have been impacted,” Khalil said.
3M told the AP it would challenge the claims.
The Minnesota Reformer has a preview of the Minnesota Republican and Democratic-Farmer-Labor state conventions, which start Friday and run through Sunday. DFLers will gather in Rochester to review their platform and endorse candidates for November’s midterm elections while Republicans will head to Duluth to do the same.
Related: Weighing the opportunity cost of treating PFAS in drinking water
A district judge in Goodhue County has issued a temporary restraining order halting work on a large-scale Google data center in Pine Island, a town north of Rochester, the Star Tribune reported Thursday. The Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy secured the court order temporarily stopping the work while its lawsuit, which seeks an in-depth environmental review of the project and surrounding area, moves forward.
Minnesota is nearing the end of a major, decades-long cleanup of industrial pollution in the St. Louis River estuary, the headwaters of Lake Superior, MPR News reported Thursday.
The last major aspect of the project, cleaning up contaminated sediment on Minnesota’s side of the river, was completed Wednesday. Workers removed or treated 225,000 cubic yards of polluted sediment, described by MPR as “enough to cover a football field more than 100 feet deep.”
The University of Minnesota is returning 3,400 acres of land from its forestry center in Cloquet, which sits entirely on tribal land and has been used by the university since 1909, to the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, WCCO News reported Wednesday.
Related: Don’t let well-intentioned PFAS law stall Minnesota’s used car market
“As we move ahead, we will continue building a respectful relationship that supports the land, honors our sovereignty and creates space for learning and stewardship. This is a meaningful step for our people today and for the generations yet to come,” Fond du Lac Tribal Chairman Bruce M. Savage said.
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