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> None of the industrial uses of fluoropolymers can cause significant pollution. However using them in things like kitchenware, or worse, in packaging, makes no
by rocqua 4y ago
> None of the industrial uses of fluoropolymers can cause significant pollution. However using them in things like kitchenware, or worse, in packaging, makes no sense.
I presume it is possible for these industrial uses to cause significant pollution, but you mean that it is not difficult to prevent pollution from these processes because they happen in controlled locations?
Contrasting that against PFAS in kitchenware, packaging, or rain-coats where pollution is incredibly difficult to prevent because low-level leakage occurs everywhere?
I believe a lot of PFAS contamination comes from the production process itself. Especially looking at the 3M plant in Belgium. To what degree can the production process be made contamination free?
- kortex 4y ago> I presume it is possible for these industrial uses to cause significant pollution, but you mean that it is not difficult to prevent pollution from these processes because they happen in controlled locations? Fluoropolymers don't really leach in significant quantities on commercial timescales. That would sort of defeat their purpose of being inert. So there is a huge difference between "these teflon o-rings in this chemical plant leach 0.1 ppb of small molecule PFAS per day" and "millions of teflon pans go into the landfill each year". And further still to "we produce railcars worth of volatile fluoropolymer monomers for producing teflon and viton". > I believe a lot of PFAS contamination comes from the production process itself. This exactly. Low-molecular-weight PFAS are much more mobile than high weight, thus more polluting. Once "bound" in a polymer, the leaching is minimal. The problem is the production process, where you have primarily the small molecules, which inevitably get into the environment.