WILMINGTON, DELAWARE — In a release entitled, “Chemours announces voluntary actions to respond to North Carolina community,” the Delaware-based chemical company announced it will take steps starting Wednesday to capture all wastewater containing the GenX chemical, remove the substance and dispose of it.
“We are capturing the byproduct GenX from the waste streams of the fluoromonomer production and disposing of it,” Gary Cambre, a Chemours spokesman, wrote in an email.
Tuesday evening, N.C. Department of Environmental Quality (NCDEQ) Secretary Michael Regan said in a statement that Chemours’ announcement was “a step in the right direction,” but NCDEQ and the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services plan to continue to investigate the issue “until we have answers to address the concerns of downstream water users.”
He added that plans to collect and analyze water samples from the Cape Fear River would continue.
Researchers had found GenX in the Cape Fear River on three separate occasions, with testing in 2013-14 showing an average of 631 parts per trillion at Cape Fear Public Utility Authority’s intake.