In Rumilly, a commune in Haute-Savoie, residents can no longer drink tap water. So they had to connect to that of Greater Annecy. The reason ? Groundwater is contaminated by a highly toxic product, called PFOA and banned since 2020 due to its carcinogenic potential. And when looking for a manager, all eyes are on the Tefal factory, the department’s largest employer with its 1,850 employees.
The offending product has long been used by the company to make Teflon, the non-stick coating for its frying pans, reveals a newspaper investigation The world. And when you know that 45 million kitchen utensils come out of the factory each year, the figures make you dizzy.
No “wild deposits”
PFAO is part of the list of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), called “eternal pollutants”. The first traces were found in groundwater last fall. According to the samples taken at the time by the regional health agency, the samples contained between 114 and 117 nanograms of PFAO per liter of water, while the limit set by the experts is 100 ng/l.
Concentrations reaching nearly 600 ng / l were also measured in the private catchment used by a factory manufacturing cereals for breakfast and located near the Tefal site, reveals again The world. Asked by the daily, the Seb group – owner of Tefal – claims to have never dumped its Teflon sludge in “wild dumps” and has not used PFAO for ten years.