>> Unanswered questions about PFAS, also known as forever chemicals.

>> So if they’re forever, how do we address them?

>> NARRATOR: A collaborative investigation-- >> Our reporting in Northwest Georgia has brought us before numerous people whose drinking water is contaminated, whose land is contaminated, whose food is contaminated.

>> NARRATOR: Of the chemicals known as PFAS.

>> All the onus was on EPA to prove that there was an existing chemical causing a problem before they could take action.

>> Once they get into people, their body levels stay high for three to 15 years.

>> NARRATOR: And the companies that produced and used them.

>> These are major employers within these communities and it is big, big industry.

>> NARRATOR: Now, as part of FRONTLINE’s Local Journalism Initiative-- >> Who should be held accountable is basically a finger-pointing game between the chemical industry, the carpet industry, and others.

>> NARRATOR: Contaminated: The Carpet Industry’s Toxic Legacy.

♪ ♪ >> This is Pine Chapel Road.

One of the most beautiful spots in the county.

The rolling hills, the wildlife, vegetation, the water, absolutely stunning.

It's kind of my Zen place.

(insects chirping) (cow lows) >> (chuckles) (shutter clicks) (shutter clicks) ♪ ♪ These beautiful rolling hills behind us are used for cattle grazing.

There's nothing about this that doesn't look healthy, right?

And lo and behold, it is absolutely contaminated with the sludge and the PFAS.

(shutter clicks) It's one of many fields that are toxic in this county.

It's kind of concerning, isn't it, to see these guys standing in the water?

It's so polluted with PFAS.

Poor things have no idea what they're standing in.

>> Polyfluoroalkyl, commonly called PFAS.

>> A contaminate linked to cancer and other illnesses.

>> Families in North West Georgia have been living with unanswered questions about PFAS.

>> Water quality experts are raising alarm bells about -- >> I think that PFAS is going to eventually be the front and foremost of health problems here.

I moved here around the age of five.

I've basically been here ever since.

That's a good chunk of my life.

I just turned 34 a couple weeks ago, and I feel that's too young to feel how I do physically.

What I technically have been diagnosed with is non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

It's something that affects you from the second you wake up to the second you go to bed.

It makes me feel guilty as a mom, you know, that when my kids ask to do something, I have to explain to them I don't feel well enough to do that.

I feel it's unfair to them, you know?

I mean, we have to be realistic in the fact liver is something you have to have to survive.

And, um, if the damage continues, you eventually have to go on a transplant list, and a transplant list is a long wait.

My husband and I actually were discussing a will last night.

I've discussed it a little bit with my daughter.

You know, it's one of those things that, when I do discuss it, you can tell it sets panic off in her for a second.

She needs to care more.

(chuckles) You know, um... She's young.

But just because you're young doesn't mean these things don't scare you.

It doesn't mean that we can't prepare you for the worst, we can't discuss this.

I love you-- have a good day.

(brakes hiss) (chuckles) Morning!

(in interview): I hope for the best for the future, but right now, it's a day at a time.

♪ ♪ >> Dalton is known as the carpet capital of the world.

This is a town that lives and breathes the carpet industry.

>> There are dozens of carpet mills located there.

And at these carpet mills, there's a dyeing process where they put the color on the carpets.

Well, when they do that, they also add chemicals.

The PFAS was in these chemicals that provide stain resistance.

So PFAS got into the water because when that washes off the carpets, it ended up going into the drains to the local utility and ultimately ending up in the river water.

>> NARRATOR: For much of the past year, a consortium of journalists from "The Atlanta Journal-Constitution," the Charleston "Post and Courier"... >> Great to see you again.

>> NARRATOR: ...and al.com in Alabama, along with the Associated Press and "Frontline," have been investigating the carpet industry's use of products that contain chemicals known as PFAS.

Even amid warnings of their accumulation in human blood and possible health effects.

>> We knew already that there was an environmental crisis unfolding in Northwest Georgia.

The story of responsibility and who should be held accountable is basically a finger-pointing game between the chemical industry, the carpet industry, and others.

♪ ♪ >> There's a couple things I want to check in here.

>> NARRATOR: The team reviewed thousands of pages of documents and court depositions.

>> I really appreciate you taking the time... >> NARRATOR: And interviewed former regulators and industry insiders, as well as doctors, scientists... >> ...extract PFAS from the sample... >> NARRATOR: ...and people who have the kinds of illnesses that researchers have linked to PFAS contamination.

>> We think it's affecting your liver.

>> What took it to the next level for us and what drew our attention is that there were clear lines of accountability for this contamination and a clear need to really understand why things are the way they are up in Northwest Georgia.

>> NARRATOR: The carpet industry has long insisted it's not to blame for PFAS getting into the environment, and argued that chemical companies obscured the risks and assured them that the products they were supplying were safe.

But the recently reviewed records also show that executives from the two largest carpet companies, Shaw and Mohawk, were getting warnings about potential harms dating back decades.

And with little regulation until recently, the team found that for years, both the companies and their suppliers were able to legally switch among stain-resistant products that contained different types of PFAS.

>> We can't do this story without industry's perspective.

>> You want to just update us on where we are with data.

>> Most of the testing up in Northwest Georgia is completed, but the rest of the state we still are looking at.

Downstream of Dalton and into Alabama, we've estimated that there's approximately hundreds of thousands, 200-plus thousand people who get their drinking water from the surface waters that originate with the Conasauga River.

>> NARRATOR: The carpet companies say they stopped using any kind of PFAS in U.S.

production in 2019.

But for years the compounds ended up in the environment.

And take decades or more to break down.

These so-called forever chemicals have routinely tested in the local drinking water at levels the E.P.A now considers unsafe.

Today, there are lawsuits against both carpet and chemical companies, and uncertainty and feelings of betrayal are boiling across the region.

>> We pay for poison in our water.

>> NARRATOR: Communities are worried about their drinking water and local governments say the problem is too vast for them to fix alone.

>> It really is still a crisis that's not fully understood.

(motor humming) >> NARRATOR: The first signs of trouble began coming to light in the late 1990s.

>> I'll come up through here, and these suds, or foam, on the water, whatever you want to call it, that's about 18 inches tall, hanging out up in there.

I want to show you what happened to this cow's calf.

Right here lays this cow's calf.

It's about like that other calf up yonder.

It's getting the point now you can start to smell it.

>> I first learned about it when a farmer from West Virginia called me trying to figure out why his cows were getting sick.

And that phone call back in October 1998 led to what has become, uh, several decades of research and work now into this family of chemicals we now call PFAS.

>> NARRATOR: Rob Bilott is a lawyer whose suits over the years have exposed how chemical companies had research showing PFAS was more dangerous than the public knew.

>> Obviously, you've seen a lot of internal company documents through your work.

When did the companies, 3M and DuPont, makers of these chemicals, really start to know themselves about the health and safety?

>> You know, I think that's probably one of the most disturbing aspect of the whole story on PFAS, is how far back the makers of these chemicals understood how dangerous these materials were.

>> "Industry on Parade" visits the $2 million home of a department of the DuPont Company.

>> From the 1950s and '60s, you had the manufacturers understanding if this stuff gets out into the world, it's not going to break apart.

And that led to the companies being concerned about what happens to living things that might be exposed.

By the '60s, you know, the companies were getting information, through a variety of their own studies and tests, showing incredible toxic effects in multiple different animal species.

Mice, rats, rabbits, dogs, guinea pigs, and, eventually, even monkeys that were dropping dead from exposure to the particular types of these chemicals that had eight carbons attached to fluorine, these original PFAS that they were creating.

As I'm seeing all these documents, all these studies, all of this information that suggested there was a very dangerous, toxic, carcinogenic material possibly not only in the water these cows in West Virginia were drinking, but possibly getting into the blood of the entire U.S.

population, possibly getting into water all over the country, and nobody knew about it.

>> My new cookware's coated with Teflon.

Food just slips off easy!

>> NARRATOR: PFAS had become virtually ubiquitous.

>> With Scotchgard Protector, water beads up and runs off.

>> NARRATOR: From non-stick pans to raincoats to shoes.

>> I got a little down my neck, but otherwise, great!

>> You need Scotchgard Fabric Protector.

It keeps ordinary spills from becoming extraordinary stains.

>> NARRATOR: And prized for its ability to protect against stains, which was especially useful in the carpet industry.

>> Carpet treated with Scotchgard doesn't absorb dirt, it rejects... >> NARRATOR: One of the most popular products was 3M's Scotchgard.

>> Look for the Scotchgard label underneath.

>> PFAS chemicals became basically intertwined with carpet manufacture on a deep level since the 1970s and into the '80s and beyond.

>> NARRATOR: Steven Amter is an environmental scientist who has worked with Rob Bilott on PFAS lawsuits.

>> Here boy, come.

>> Carpets could be hard to clean and they could stain.

And what these chemicals promised to do was reduce or eliminate a lot of that, plus make them last for years.

♪ ♪ >> There's still nothing more dependable... >> Scotchgaurd and Stainmaster.

>>...than Stainmaster carpet.

>> They had advertisements on television where they poured soil on carpets, and they had animals, you know, all kinds of things, just to show, "It's incredible how, how you can keep these things now clean much easier."

>> By the '90s, you could buy a house or rent an apartment, and there was no finished floor except carpet.

And so the demand was created, and this, the industry exploded in size and scope to meet that demand.

>> NARRATOR: It wasn't until the late '90s that 3M began informing the carpet industry that the type of PFAS in Scotchgard might accumulate in people's bodies.

>> Were there times when the carpet industry knew or strongly suspected that PFAS would cause some sort of problems?

>> It was an evolving process, and that's very much argued over in, in lawsuits.

Certainly, they were given explicit warnings by the late 1990s.

They were getting information from the chemical suppliers that were making the chemicals that were then applied to the carpets at carpet mills by the carpet manufacturers.

>> NARRATOR: In depositions and other court records, the reporters discovered accounts of meetings between 3M and the two main carpet companies in Northwest Georgia, Shaw and Mohawk.

>> We have these meetings between 3M and Mohawk, Shaw, where basically 3M discloses that they're finding this stuff building up in the blood of workers and the general public.

>> Wow.

>> NARRATOR: In one meeting in January 1999, a Shaw executive expressed concerns about getting sued, according to notes from a 3M employee.

>> They met with a couple executives there, and one said, "He felt plaintiffs' attorneys would be involved immediately."

>> Okay.

>> Which, I mean, they weren't involved immediately, but they were involved about two decades later, almost.

>> So one of the major two carpet companies was, like, "How is this going to affect our bottom line?

We're going to get sued."

>> Yeah, they were worried about getting sued.

>> Okay, got it.

>> All the way back then.

>> NARRATOR: That same day, in a meeting at Mohawk, officials there seemed far less worried.

>> "No real sense of Mohawk problem/ responsibility," the 3M employee noted.

"If it's good enough for 3M, it's good enough for Mohwak."

>> NARRATOR: 3M continued to reassure the companies that Scotchgard was safe to use.

But a year and a half later, the company and the E.P.A.

made a dramatic announcement.

♪ ♪ >> The 3M Company is phasing out some Scotchgard stain repellent products because of concerns about a chemical used in their production.

The company says the chemical has been detected at low levels in people and the environment.

>> NARRATOR: A top E.P.A.

official at the time said there was no "imminent harm" to consumers during the phaseout, but called the chemical compound in the product an "unacceptable technology that should be eliminated "to protect human health and the environment from potentially severe long-term consequences."

The news didn't go over well at a meeting with Shaw Industries, the largest carpet company in the country.

>> Bob Shaw, the C.E.O.

of Shaw Industries, confronted 3M chemical executives.

>> So in that meeting, Bob Shaw picked up a carpet square with a Scotchgard logo on it and said, "This isn't a logo, this is a target."

>> "And I got 15 million of these out in the marketplace.

What am I supposed to do about that?"

And then he threw that piece of carpet at them and stormed out of the meeting.

This chemical on which his company relied, his billion-dollar company, billions of dollars in revenue every year, was now going to be forced to change a key ingredient of their carpet.

♪ ♪ You have to reach out to people who are reluctant to talk.

>> Yeah.

>> You know, having a letter to deliver with your request and your contact information... You know, "I want you to read it.

Your input to the story is really important to us."

>> NARRATOR: No one from the chemical or carpet industries would agree to on-camera interviews.

In statements, both Shaw and Mohawk underscored that they had been assured that Scotchgard was safe and they stopped using the chemical in it after 3M's disclosures.

Shaw said in its statement that PFAS were for "soil and water resistance" and have also been used in "thousands of applications and products."

And a lawyer for Mohawk said they were "relying on and trusting the chemical manufacturers-- "the inventors of these products-- for their expertise."

3M has said it discontinued making products with any kind of PFAS in 2025.

A successor company to DuPont still uses some PFAS compounds thought to be less persistent in the body for products like Teflon.

(insects chirping) Much of the attention around PFAS in the region has been about exposure to it in the environment, especially drinking water, not carpets themselves.

In Northwest Georgia, the forever chemicals from the carpet mills ended up in the local rivers for years.

In 2008, a landmark study at the University of Georgia found that the PFAS levels in one river were "among the highest ever recorded in surface water."

♪ ♪ (engine starts) >> We're really water-rich in Northwest Georgia.

There is a massive network of really special creeks and rivers that weave throughout the entire region.

They were transportation networks before we had rail systems and interstates.

The Indigenous populations had enormous civilizations up and down these rivers before settlers came.

These waterways are critical for recreation, for anglers, for paddlers.

They're providing hundreds of thousands of people with drinking water.

It's really hard to overstate the historical impact of, of how these rivers have shaped the communities across this region.

>> NARRATOR: Jesse Demonbreun-Chapman leads an environmental protection group that has sued the chemical and carpet companies over PFAS contamination.

>> So now these rivers have taken on a new significance because of PFAS.

>> It's not a badge of honor to be known for some of the most contaminated surface water in the country.

And it's certainly something that's going to keep us, you know, very busy for years to come to try and tease out how to fix this, how to maintain healthy drinking water systems, how to remediate the environment where we know we have contaminated soil and groundwater.

So this issue of PFAS contamination looms large over the entire region of Northwest Georgia.

♪ ♪ You can't see it, you can't smell it, it doesn't have a taste.

So being told that you live in, you know, an area that has contaminated drinking water is a shock to people that came here for an environment that they felt was pristine.

♪ ♪ >> Our reporting in Northwest Georgia has brought us before numerous people whose drinking water is contaminated, whose land is contaminated, whose food is contaminated, yet when they go to the doctor, or they go to their local officials or their water district and ask, "What, what can we do about this?

How can we get this out of our...?"

there's no answers for them.

>> NARRATOR: It's difficult to definitively connect people's specific illnesses to the chemicals, and there are an estimated 15,000 varieties of PFAS.

Little is known about the health effects of most of them.

But research has been linking high levels of some types of PFAS in the body to cancers, immune disorders, and diseases of the liver and thyroid.

>> The levels are pretty high in Northwest Georgia.

We've compared them to the general U.S.

population, and, and their values are much higher than the general U.S.

population.

>> NARRATOR: Dana Barr is an environmental health researcher who's tested the blood of almost 200 residents in the region.

>> You know, 24% of them had levels that were above that, that level of, of high risk of health outcomes, and, and 74% were in that moderate-risk area.

And so what we want to do with these people is try to figure out what, how they're being exposed, how they're being the most exposed, and try to reduce those exposures over time.

This is a community that, you know, they just live there.

I mean, they were exposed because of just the surrounding conditions.

>> What do we know about the medical effects PFAS has on the human body?

>> So PFAS had been linked to a lot of different diseases, including thyroid hormone disruption-- endocrine disruption in general-- cancers like kidney and testicular cancer, and then also alterations in lipid content in the blood, as well.

>> That stain resistance, the thing that made them successful as a product for the chemical companies that made them, are the same reason that they're persistent in the environment?

>> Once they get into people, they actually bind to albumin, which is a protein that's in your blood.

And the albumin is reabsorbed in your gut, and so it keeps circulating, so it's not eliminated like a lot of chemicals are.

>> Is there nothing that can be done in terms of treating or mitigating after it's already been found in someone's blood?

>> There is nothing that has been shown to be effective yet.

We have ideas and we're pursuing those right now.

♪ ♪ >> I reached out to my doctor.

It's, like, silence.

They don't know what to do or how to handle it.

>> NARRATOR: One of the people in Dana Barr's study is a hair salon owner named Dolly Baker.

>> Hey, Dolly.

>> Hi.

>> I'm Jason.

>> Jason, nice to meet you.

>> Yeah, Jason's my reporting partner.

>> Dana from Emory called me, and she was on her vacation, and said that she just wanted to talk about my results.

Mine was over 1,300.

High is 20, and the next-highest one below me was 200-something, I believe.

And she said, you know, "I don't want to alarm you, but we're just trying to figure out what could be causing this."

>> Had you ever had any health problems or anything before?

>> I did have to start taking thyroid medicine last year for the first time.

>> But before... >> But before that... >> Nothing.

>> Nothing.

>> What's it like knowing that you have this inside your body and that you can't really do much yet to address that?

>> I feel like... I don't know, almost like there's a, a blanket over me, smothering me, that I can't get out from under and that it's just... You're trapped, I guess, is the best way to describe it.

♪ ♪ >> NARRATOR: Thyroid issues are among the conditions linked to PFAS.

Lisa Martin is another one of the study participants with a thyroid issue.

>> Hi, Lisa.

How are you doing?

>> Hey, Dylan.

>> NARRATOR: She spent 20 years working at Mohawk as an inventory manager.

>> I was very healthy, active, I, perfect bill of health, and within... (sighs) ...you know, just half a dozen years of working in the carpet industry, my health started to decline.

We couldn't figure out why.

I, I ended up having autoimmune disease, had to have my thyroid removed.

>> Did you work closely with people who were applying these PFAS chemicals to carpet?

Did they have any sense of the risks that they faced?

>> They did not-- they didn't have a clue.

The first plant that I worked at was in Dalton, and we had a dye house up there.

My first shock came when we would walk for exercise around this facility, which is a huge facility.

But as we would walk out back in the waterways, you could see what color they had been dyeing that day.

It was just accepted.

It was just the culture.

So I became complacent about what I was seeing, and I just, I didn't say anything, which is, it's my fault.

>> Had you heard of PFAS before?

>> No.

I was familiar with Scotchgard, that we used it.

I knew that we used it.

I knew that we used stain resistance on our products.

But I did not understand the, the PFAS element to the degree that I do now.

>> NARRATOR: Mohawk said in its statement that they weren't aware of any instance where PFAS was directly discharged into the environment and that it has always complied with wastewater regulations.

By the time Martin started at Mohawk in 2005, 3M had pulled Scotchgard from the market, and the carpet industry was using different products like Stainmaster, made by DuPont.

>> Experience a whole new era in style and beauty for your home.

Stainmaster Carpet.

Always stylish.

Always beautiful.

>> NARRATOR: According to Shaw and Mohawk, they received assurances from the chemical companies that these alternative products didn't contain the types of PFAS that accumulate in the body and were not as persistent in the environment.

But still, the carpet makers were worried about new PFAS research that was starting to emerge.

>> I have an email between Werner Braun, the head of the Carpet and Rug Institute, that lobbying group for the carpet industry.

>> Yeah.

>> It says, "The troubling issue for me in this report is a determination that this is carcinogenic in rats."

>> So that's showing that as early as in 2002, the carpet industry knew of a animal study that was showing carcinogenic nature of these chemicals.

>> NARRATOR: Around 2003, Dupont disclosed that trace amounts of the chemical that caused cancer in rats was in fact in their Stainmaster carpet protector.

But Dupont insisted it was an unintentional byproduct and still safe.

The carpet companies would continue to use Stainmaster for another five years before dropping the chemical in it too as part of another E.P.A.-negotiated phaseout.

The Carpet and Rug Institute and its former head, Werner Braun, declined to be interviewed.

In a statement, the group said it evaluates its products to reflect "science, innovation, and customer expectations," and that the carpet industry's conduct was, and continues to be, appropriate and lawful.

In their statements, Shaw and Mohawk again pointed the blame at the manufacturers for misleading them.

>> Around that time, the E.P.A.

approached the carpet industry, seeking to test their facilities for PFAS.

>> The E.P.A.

was starting this priority review, and, in 2003, one of the things they wanted to do was focus on, "Let's go get some samples from the water supply in these areas."

And one of the areas they had targeted was carpet manufacturing.

>> NARRATOR: The carpet companies refused to allow the testing, citing confidentiality concerns, and told the E.P.A.

to ask the local water authority, Dalton Utilities, which also refused, saying there wasn't an agreed-on, scientifically sound testing method.

>> The carpet industry completely declined to have their wastewater sampled.

And I would also add that Dalton Utilities was asked if they would allow sampling from them as an alternative to the carpet companies allowing sampling, and to quote, "Dalton Utilities didn't just say no.

They said, 'Hell, no.'"

♪ ♪ >> Dalton Utilities is the agency responsible for providing drinking water to the people of Dalton, but it's also responsible for treating the wastewater that comes from the mills in Dalton.

>> Dalton is a carpet company town, and the local utility there, some 80, 85% of the water that it takes, the wastewater that it takes in, comes from the carpet industry.

Historically, carpet industry executives and former executives have made up a part of its board.

>> NARRATOR: No one from Dalton Utilities would agree to an interview.

In a statement, it said its board was never influenced by carpet executives, and it didn't know there was PFAS in the wastewater until 2009.

The utility is currently suing the carpet and chemical companies.

In the suit, it said its wastewater treatment process cannot screen out PFAS chemicals.

Dating back to the '80s, it has run a system that filters some contaminants from the carpet companies' wastewater and then sprays it out over thousands of acres it owns on the outskirts of Dalton.

♪ ♪ >> The thing that was a light bulb moment for me was the land application.

That's a big concentration of PFAS for... >> Yeah.

>> ...a long time.

>> I have... >> And every time it rained, it just flows off that site into the environment.

>> Yeah, so this is the L.A.S., the land application system.

The boundaries are in black here.

And then the Conasauga River, you can kind of see, moves its way down along the western boundary of the L.A.S.

One expert in a lawsuit against carpet and chemical companies said that the land application system will be a perpetual source of contamination for a hundred years, at least.

The L.A.S.

is at the center of several lawsuits.

So the utility, through a lawyer, told us that we would be able to take a tour like normal that they offer, but we wouldn't be able to ask any questions on the record.

Going there for the first time was a bit surreal.

Wow, look at that.

Everywhere you look, you can see some form of transportation of water from the waste treatment facilities... ...eventually into the sprinkler heads that spray the forest with the treated wastewater.

And they rely on the land and the soil to absorb that water and remove many of the remaining contaminants that might still be in the wastewater.

The problem is that PFAS are chemicals that do not break down in the environment.

They don't biodegrade for decades.

And you could look at a tree, you could look at soil, any of the spray heads, and fully expect that if you were to test that for PFAS, it would be there, and it would be there in high, in high quantities.

♪ ♪ >> In the course of our investigation of Dalton Utility's role in PFAS contamination, I was told I should talk to Scott Gordon.

Gordon was involved in inspecting issues with Dalton Utilities land application system as far back as 2000.

>> When you got out on site, each one of those risers-- pipes-- with the sprinkler heads on top looked like it had a wig on top.

There were so many carpet fibers on the spray itself.

And then when, as you're walking around those areas, it felt like you were walking on shag carpet.

>> So, shag carpet, like, on the, on the... >> On the ground.

>> Wow.

>> Yeah.

There was, there was that much carpet fibers in, in the material they were spraying.

And all of those pipes going up and the sprinkler heads weren't stabilized at all.

Any limb that came along and knocked them over, a deer running through the pasture knocks them over.

So, when we got on site, we saw lots of just flowing wastewater going down the sides of the hills, into the creeks, and eventually into the, into the river.

>> They were putting this wastewater onto land that was draining directly into the river, which people used for drinking water?

>> Correct, and, and this is, this is a very, fairly large utility, so they were discharging between 20 and 25 million gallons a day to this land application system.

♪ ♪ >> NARRATOR: Dalton's filtering system has been cited in lawsuits as one of the main sources of PFAS contamination in the region.

The utility has said it is looking for new technology that can treat or remove PFAS.

♪ ♪ But the so-called forever chemicals have spread far down the regional riverways, where, in Alabama, places like Gadsden have been impacted.

>> Gadsden is about 100 miles west of Dalton, of the carpet capital, and they get their drinking water from the Coosa River.

Early 2016, state officials sent out a memo saying, "We are concerned about the PFAS levels in eight water systems."

And Gadsden was one.

And so that really set alarm bells off in Gadsden, where they said, "What is this?

Where's this coming from?

They were kind of able to conclude that the PFAS was coming from the carpet companies.

Within a few months, Gadsden decides to sue chemical manufacturers as well as the carpet companies.

>> NARRATOR: It was the first time a carpet maker had been sued over its role in PFAS contamination.

>> What we learned in our reporting is, the lawsuit was sort of what they felt like was the only avenue to get any kind of funds or recourse to address the PFAS problem.

Hey, Fred.

>> Hi, how are you?

>> I'm good, how are you?

Don't get up.

>> I'm well, thank you.

>> Fred Zackery, he's a native of Gadsden.

Yeah, it's good to see you.

>> Welcome.

>> He lived away for many years, but he returned to Gadsden, and he started doing a radio show called "Introspection."

>> Well, good afternoon, my friends, and welcome again to "Introspection."

We're coming to you live from the village of Gadsden on the banks of the poisoned Coosa.

And we're going to be talking about poisoned water.

There is no mistake... >> About ten years ago, when PFAS started to become an issue in Gadsden, he really rededicated his radio show to water quality.

>> The contaminants were not flowing from the county.

They, they came downriver from Dalton, Georgia, and those carpet plants upriver.

>> I think part of Fred Zackery's frustration is, city government has not moved quickly enough, has not met the moment well enough, and has just left the people of Gadsden to deal with this contamination issue.

>> We're in need of leadership in this community, and you can't keep talking about the, "Oh, well, they won't let you."

Nobody ever let me do anything.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> Do it.

>> Right.

>> Because you see it needs to be done.

>> Exactly.

>> NARRATOR: Since the lawsuit in 2016, six other drinking water systems in Alabama have sued the carpet and chemical companies, alleging PFAS has contaminated their water supply.

Gadsden's suit ended in 2022 with a confidential settlement.

The city has been trying to reduce the PFAS in the water, including using a carbon filtering system.

It recently broke ground on a new high-tech treatment plant that is set to open in 2027.

>> It's sad that it's taken so long for this to materialize.

We shouldn't have had to wait on a settlement to, to do this-- bond issues.

There's a whole lot of ways you could've done this.

So, um, I want to give great credit where it's due, but we are still being poisoned while this is being built, and nobody's talking about establishing a medical facility where we can do testing of citizens to see... >> Yeah.

>> ...what level of PFAS, if any, that they have in their system.

It's, it's just not proactive so far as the citizens are concerned.

>> NARRATOR: In 2025, on average, Gadsden's water contained more than twice the E.P.A.

's recommended level of the two key PFAS compounds that had historically been used by the carpet industry.

>> NARRATOR: None of Gadsden's elected officials would be interviewed about the PFAS situation and the frustration people like Fred Zackery have with how the city has responded.

>> ...parts per trillion for PFOA.

The head of Gadsden's water authority, Chad Hare, said they're doing all they can to address residents' concerns.

>> Do you hear from residents that are still frustrated with the level of PFAS in the water, even with the carbon filters?

>> As we get phone calls, we, we answer the questions the, the best that we can, and we provide every, every bit of the information that we have, as far as all of our sampling, all of our monitoring, um, is provided to the public on the website.

Our responsibility is to meet all state and federal regulations.

We're water treatment professionals.

And so we take that very seriously.

>> So, the state requires some water systems to test for PFAS.

However, because the E.P.A.

has not made their guidelines enforceable, there are not really any limits in Alabama.

So, even if their drinking water tests above these guidelines established by the E.P.A., they are still not in violation of Alabama's water quality rules, because the E.P.A.

has not said those guidelines are enforceable.

♪ ♪ >> NARRATOR: In 2024, after decades of studying the issue, the E.P.A.

finally issued drinking water regulations for some of the PFAS compounds they'd flagged over the years, though they don't take effect until 2031.

In a statement, the agency said it is committed to combatting PFAS contamination.

It noted that during the first Trump administration it issued a nationwide PFAS action plan and said it is now working to help public water systems around the country.

It also said it intends to rescind and reevaluate restrictions put on some PFAS compounds under the Biden administration, and implement a PFAS testing strategy that doesn't create an undue burden for industry, and protects human health and the environment.

>> E.P.A.

can only act as quickly as the law allows them to, and so, again... >> NARRATOR: Betsy Southerland is the former director of the E.P.A.

's water protection division, and spent more than 30 years at the agency.

She has become a vocal critic.

>> If the agency knew that there was a concern with toxicity in 2000, can you just... Help explain to people who are, you know, have this in their bodies, are drinking it in their water, why the agency takes so long.

>> At the time, the Toxic Substances Control Act that we were working under at E.P.A.

was very weak.

All the onus was on E.P.A.

to prove that there was an existing chemical causing a problem before they could take action.

So we were really hamstrung at the time.

That current law did not allow E.P.A.

to do bans or restrictions of chemicals unless there was enormous evidence.

>> Some people we've talked to have said that this was a failure of accountability at every level, from the local utility, to the state, to E.P.A.

Do you agree with that?

>> So, I do agree with that, because in this particular case, there, there were ways we could've been more aggressive at E.P.A., and, again, but because of the limitations of that Toxic Substances Control law, we could've been more aggressive in offering technical assistance to get the states to do things.

>> NARRATOR: Even today, when there are concerns a chemical might be unsafe, the agency has to go through a seven-year process before it can actually impose a ban or restrictions.

>> In meantime, the industry can continue using these chemicals?

>> Absolutely, yes.

What it means for public health is that, again, we're left to our own devices.

We can buy a filter for our drinking water, we can get an HVAC for our house, but we're, we're not going to get helped by the federal government at all.

So, unless your state is one of those states that's out there actively working on it you're just going to continue to be exposed in what you eat, drink, and breathe.

♪ ♪ >> NARRATOR: By 2009, after abandoning products containing two prior PFAS compounds, the carpet industry had moved on to yet more formulations of the chemicals-- these known as short-chain PFAS, touted as less persistent in the human body.

>> Some of them didn't bioaccumulate in animals as much.

Some of them had early data showing less toxicity.

But in all cases, when they were making these moves, they didn't have a great deal of actual data to back it up.

So, this was done somewhat with a hope and a prayer.

>> NARRATOR: The carpet industry eventually stopped using products with the short-chain PFAS in 2019 amid a growing body of research raising questions about their toxicity.

>> The carpet industry says regulators from Dalton Utilities all the way up to the E.P.A.

never restricted their use of these chemicals.

What do you say to that?

>> I think that's true.

It's, uh, the... The, the regulatory system can be very slow to respond, especially when it doesn't have information.

And basically, the regulatory system did not have any, you know, really usable information on PFAS chemicals until 2000.

>> Is it fair to expect private industry to act before the government regulators do?

>> Absolutely, because government regulations are not designed to prevent every harm, especially ones it doesn't know about.

They're designed to facilitate, you know, stopping known harms or putting in place a system, um, where industry can make that call.

I mean, that's the basis for so much of environmental regulation, that there's industry responsibility.

♪ ♪ >> I would say that the failure really began with a lukewarm federal response, and cascaded down from there.

We never had a very robust federal response into the use of these chemicals, how they were allowed to move in the environment, how they were able to be sold in terms of commerce.

And as a result, that, that was a, a message that was signaling to states, "This isn't a big deal yet," that's signaling to local communities, "This isn't a big deal."

>> And how do you think Georgia is doing in regulating these chemicals?

>> I think Georgia, like most states, is terribly behind.

While I understand being reluctant to get too far out ahead of E.P.A.

and federal regulations, I think that there was certainly enough information to begin addressing this if lawmakers and, um, leadership within the State of Georgia wanted to address this problem.

>> NARRATOR: Today, the state is grappling with another concern: how the ongoing lawsuits might impact some of its largest employers.

>> We are now in the posture that we're all going to be suing each other, and when that happens, nobody wins.

>> NARRATOR: State legislator Kasey Carpenter, who represents Dalton, has been trying to get support for a bill that would limit lawsuits against the carpet industry.

>> This legislation is no laughing matter.

It's about protecting 50,000 jobs in Northwest Georgia and hundreds of thousands across the state.

>> NARRATOR: Critics say it would actually harm residents already coping with the area's PFAS contamination.

>> The bill you introduced that would have shielded carpet companies and other PFAS receivers who caused PFAS pollution from legal liability, you know, why did you bring that bill forward?

>> Because I think that it's important to focus litigation on the people that are at fault.

I, I tell people all the time, when we found out asbestos caused cancer, nobody sued the home builder that put it in your house.

You went straight to the asbestos manufacturers.

And that's, I see PFAS as being the next, uh, asbestos for, for the United States.

It's important to focus that litigation on the chemical manufacturers who knew it was not safe and who misled everybody that used it.

>> These lawsuits in particular are a lifeline for a lot of your constituents who are worried about their health.

Why did you propose a bill that, in some ways, would make it harder to get answers?

>> I don't think so.

I think that it just basically said, "Let's focus on the chemical companies."

(car alarm chirps) >> Stormy, how are you?

>> I'm good.

Today is okay.

>> Okay.

I just wanted to start to check all of my patients' levels, and follow everybody.

>> Yes.

>> We think it's affecting your liver.

You were found to have moderate fatty liver disease.

Now, the good thing is that, before we checked these, I already had you on a program of changing your diet, decreasing the amount of meat... >> Yes.

>> ...certainly not taking any more fast foods, and filtering your water.

>> Yes.

>> There is a new study, and it does talk about fatty liver disease and this relationship to what it's doing to cause hepatic cancer.

I'm going to watch your liver enzymes really closely, and at the first indication that they go up-- hopefully they won't, with everything that we're trying to do to prevent it.

We just want to keep an eye on everything.

>> I would like to see if we can, 'cause, I mean, I just know that it's so new, we're all just kind of, like, what can we do and can we figure out a solution to mitigate the damage that's been done?

♪ ♪ >> Every single part of the regulatory framework that should have addressed this compound essentially left somebody else to handle it.

In the end, no one has.

We're left with drastic contamination in this region, and these aren't the only communities that are facing this problem.

I tell everybody that asks me about this, "We're in an ultramarathon-- this is not a sprint."

This is going to require immense amount of resources, research and development, and direct leadership at every level to address the extent of this contamination.

♪ ♪ >> NARRATOR: Go to pbs.org/frontline for more reporting from our partners.

>> It really is, still, a crisis that's not fully understood.

>> This chemical on which his company relied was now going to be forced to change a key ingredient.

>> What is this?

Where is this coming from?

>> NARRATOR: And read more about PFAS, the forever chemicals.

Connect with FRONTLINE on Facebook and Instagram and stream anytime on the PBS app, YouTube, or pbs.org/frontline.

Captioned by Media Access Group at WGBH access.wgbh.org >> For more on this and other "FRONTLINE" programs, visit our website at pbs.org/frontline.

♪ ♪ FRONTLINE's "Contaminated: The Carpet Industry's Toxic Legacy" is available on Amazon Prime Video.

♪ ♪