Forever Chemicals: Ground Zero | Environment

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3M knew its forever chemicals were toxic and stayed in the environment for decades before the public ever heard the words PFAS.

Story Snapshot

Court filings claim 3M identified PFAS as toxic and environmentally persistent as early as the 1950s and 1960s.
New York’s 2026 lawsuit cites a 1963 3M report calling the chemicals “completely resistant to biological attack” and toxic.
Australia’s government alleges 3M knew by 1979 that the chemicals could bioaccumulate in humans and animals.
3M says it exited all PFAS manufacturing by the end of 2025 and has settled major water-contamination claims.

What Government Lawyers Say 3M Knew and When

New York’s attorney general filed suit against 3M in July 2026, arguing the company understood PFAS dangers “as early as the 1960s.” The complaint points to a 1963 internal report describing the chemicals as stable and toxic, plus a 1971 memo warning that PFAS in groundwater “would be reason for concern”. A New Hampshire court order goes back even further, saying 3M knew PFAS were toxic by the 1950s.

Blood Samples and a Company That Knew Its Own Numbers

Texas prosecutors allege 3M found a “universal presence” of PFAS in blood serum samples taken from Americans nationwide back in 1975. Fox affiliate reporting on internal depositions says scientists first flagged PFAS in human blood samples from Texas and New York that same year, and pointed to 3M’s Scotchgard as a likely source. A company that tracks its chemical showing up in strangers’ blood is not a company caught by surprise.

By the late 1990s, court records say 3M’s own toxicologist had calculated a “safe” exposure level for the chemicals, years before the public got any warning. That detail matters. It shows internal awareness moved from suspicion to actual risk math, all while regulators and customers were kept in the dark, according to the pleadings.

The Pattern Shows Up Far Beyond Minnesota

This is not a one-state story. Georgia federal litigation says PFAS manufacturers knew about persistence and mobility risks “long before” customers or regulators caught on, tracing that knowledge back to the 1960s. Montana’s amended complaint uses nearly identical language, claiming 3M has known for decades that PFAS exposure carries “adverse, substantial, and potentially lethal effects” on human health. When multiple state complaints echo the same timeline, it stops looking like coincidence.

Australia’s Government Makes the Same Case Down Under

The pattern is not just an American one. Australia’s federal government alleges in court documents that by 1979, 3M knew PFAS variants in its firefighting foam “persist indefinitely, bioaccumulate and bio-concentrate” in humans and animals, and could migrate into drinking water. The Guardian reported the government’s filing says 3M knew for “more than 50 years” its products could hurt people and animals. Two countries, two governments, the same underlying accusation.

Researchers Say Delay Tactics Followed a Familiar Corporate Script

A peer-reviewed analysis of internal 3M and DuPont documents found the companies used public relations methods that echoed the tobacco industry’s old playbook, publicly defending safety while internal files showed awareness of hazards. Consumer Reports separately noted a federal judge cited memos and scientific reports from the 1970s showing 3M knew PFOS turned up in blood bank samples, decades before the public learned anything about it. Documents like these are exactly what juries and judges weigh in these cases, and they carry more weight than any corporate press release.

3M’s Response and Where the Company Stands Today

3M has not conceded wrongdoing but has taken concrete action. The company says it completed a full exit from PFAS manufacturing by the end of 2025 and has worked to discontinue PFAS use across its product lines. 3M also states it “has and continues to support federal regulation of PFAS that is based on the best available science”, and it resolved major claims with public water suppliers and the state of New Jersey through settlements worth billions.

Give credit where it is due: exiting the business and settling with water suppliers are real steps, not just talk. But settlements are not admissions of innocence, and a corporate pivot in 2022 does not erase what internal memos from the 1950s and 1960s allegedly show company scientists already knew. Families who drank contaminated water for decades deserve courts, not corporate press releases, to settle what really happened.

A Legal Wave Two Decades in the Making

None of this emerged overnight. The first PFAS lawsuit was filed in 1999, and it took roughly 25 years of individual suits, class actions, and multidistrict litigation for settlements to reach an estimated $18 billion. More than 6,400 PFAS lawsuits piled up between 2005 and 2022 alone, according to the Environmental Law Institute. That slow grind through the courts, not a single dramatic revelation, is how the public finally learned what internal company files had reportedly shown for generations.