Latest news with #Miteni
France 24
5 hours ago
- France 24
Italy chemical plant execs jailed for pollution
Eleven executives from companies including Japan's Mitsubishi and Luxembourg-based International Chemical Investors (ICIG) were convicted for contaminating nearly 200 square kilometres (77 square miles) of drinking water as well as soil through the Miteni plant in the northeastern city of Trissino. The court sentenced them to prison terms ranging from two years and eight months to 17 years, in the case of two executives at now-folded Italian firm Miteni. Four other defendants were acquitted. PFAS -- or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances -- are a group of more than 10,000 human-made chemicals that repel heat, water, oil, and stains. Developed in the 1940s, they are still used in nonstick pans and stain-proof carpets, yet are now linked to hormonal disruption, immune suppression and cancers. Their ultra-tough carbon-fluorine bonds take millennia to break down in the environment. The now-shuttered plant produced PFAS from 1968 and was run by three companies until its closure due to bankruptcy in 2018. It leaked chemical-laced waste into a waterway, polluting a vast area between Vicenza, Verona and Padova, according to prosecutors. The trial opened in 2021. Prosecutors had requested cumulative jail terms of 121 years. The court's sentence was even tougher: a total of more than 141 years. Hundreds of civil plaintiffs joined the trial, including environmental group Greenpeace and local mothers who united after discovering their families had the chemicals in their blood. Greenpeace Italy representative Chiara Campione called the ruling "historic" in a statement. The individuals and companies involved were sentenced to pay more than 6.5 million euros ($ 7.6 million) in damages to the Veneto region -- a ruling welcomed by regional leader Luca Zaia. They will also have to pay 58 million euros in damages to the Italian environment ministry, according to media reports. In May, a court ruled the death of a worker at the plant who died of cancer in 2014 was caused by prolonged exposure to PFAS. © 2025 AFP
Yahoo
11 hours ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Verdict expected in Italy 'forever chemicals' trial
A verdict is expected Thursday in the trial of 15 managers of a chemical plant accused of knowingly contaminating the water of hundreds of thousands of people in Italy. The now-shuttered Miteni factory near the northeastern city of Vicenza is alleged to have polluted one of Europe's largest groundwater basins with PFAS, dubbed "forever chemicals" because they never break down. The prosecution alleges that the plant in Trissino, which produced PFAS from 1968 and was run by three companies until its closure due to bankruptcy in 2018, leaked chemical-laced wastewater into a waterway, polluting a vast area between Vicenza, Verona and Padova. Fifteen managers from Mitsubishi, International Chemical Investors (ICIG) and Miteni are charged with contaminating nearly 200 square kilometres (77 square miles) of drinking water, as well as soil. Prosecutors in the trial, which began in 2021, have called for the managers to be sentenced to a total of 121 years in jail, lawyer Edoardo Bortolotto told AFP Thursday. Over 200 civil plaintiffs have joined the trial, including Greenpeace and local mothers who united after discovering their families had the chemicals in their blood. PFAS have been used since the late 1940s to mass produce the nonstick, waterproof and stain-resistant treatments that coat everything from frying pans to umbrellas, carpets and dental floss. But chronic exposure to even low levels of the chemicals has been linked to liver damage, high cholesterol, reduced immune responses, low birthweights and several kinds of cancer. The contamination was discovered in 2013 after Italy's environment ministry ordered tests of the Po River following a 2006 European project assessing exposure to such chemicals in rivers. Of all the rivers studied, the Po had the highest concentrations of one specific PFAS called PFOA, a known carcinogen. Further investigation identified Miteni as the source. At the time, there were no Italian or EU thresholds for PFAS content in drinking water, according to a regional report by the World Health Organization (WHO). ide/giv
The Sun
14 hours ago
- Health
- The Sun
Verdict expected in Italy ‘forever chemicals' trial
ROME: A verdict is expected Thursday in the trial of 15 managers of a chemical plant accused of knowingly contaminating the water of hundreds of thousands of people in Italy. The now-shuttered Miteni factory near the northeastern city of Vicenza is alleged to have polluted one of Europe's largest groundwater basins with PFAS, dubbed 'forever chemicals' because they never break down. The prosecution alleges that the plant in Trissino, which produced PFAS from 1968 and was run by three companies until its closure due to bankruptcy in 2018, leaked chemical-laced wastewater into a waterway, polluting a vast area between Vicenza, Verona and Padova. Fifteen managers from Mitsubishi, International Chemical Investors (ICIG) and Miteni are charged with contaminating nearly 200 square kilometres (77 square miles) of drinking water, as well as soil. Prosecutors in the trial, which began in 2021, have called for the managers to be sentenced to a total of 121 years in jail, lawyer Edoardo Bortolotto told AFP Thursday. Over 200 civil plaintiffs have joined the trial, including Greenpeace and local mothers who united after discovering their families had the chemicals in their blood. PFAS have been used since the late 1940s to mass produce the nonstick, waterproof and stain-resistant treatments that coat everything from frying pans to umbrellas, carpets and dental floss. But chronic exposure to even low levels of the chemicals has been linked to liver damage, high cholesterol, reduced immune responses, low birthweights and several kinds of cancer. The contamination was discovered in 2013 after Italy's environment ministry ordered tests of the Po River following a 2006 European project assessing exposure to such chemicals in rivers. Of all the rivers studied, the Po had the highest concentrations of one specific PFAS called PFOA, a known carcinogen. Further investigation identified Miteni as the source. At the time, there were no Italian or EU thresholds for PFAS content in drinking water, according to a regional report by the World Health Organization (WHO).
France 24
15 hours ago
- Health
- France 24
Verdict expected in Italy 'forever chemicals' trial
The now-shuttered Miteni factory near the northeastern city of Vicenza is alleged to have polluted one of Europe's largest groundwater basins with PFAS, dubbed "forever chemicals" because they never break down. The prosecution alleges that the plant in Trissino, which produced PFAS from 1968 and was run by three companies until its closure due to bankruptcy in 2018, leaked chemical-laced wastewater into a waterway, polluting a vast area between Vicenza, Verona and Padova. Fifteen managers from Mitsubishi, International Chemical Investors (ICIG) and Miteni are charged with contaminating nearly 200 square kilometres (77 square miles) of drinking water, as well as soil. Prosecutors in the trial, which began in 2021, have called for the managers to be sentenced to a total of 121 years in jail, lawyer Edoardo Bortolotto told AFP Thursday. Over 200 civil plaintiffs have joined the trial, including Greenpeace and local mothers who united after discovering their families had the chemicals in their blood. PFAS have been used since the late 1940s to mass produce the nonstick, waterproof and stain-resistant treatments that coat everything from frying pans to umbrellas, carpets and dental floss. But chronic exposure to even low levels of the chemicals has been linked to liver damage, high cholesterol, reduced immune responses, low birthweights and several kinds of cancer. The contamination was discovered in 2013 after Italy's environment ministry ordered tests of the Po River following a 2006 European project assessing exposure to such chemicals in rivers. Of all the rivers studied, the Po had the highest concentrations of one specific PFAS called PFOA, a known carcinogen. Further investigation identified Miteni as the source. At the time, there were no Italian or EU thresholds for PFAS content in drinking water, according to a regional report by the World Health Organization (WHO). © 2025 AFP
Yahoo
13-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
The Italian mums who 'poisoned' their children
Elisabetta Donadello "poisoned" her children. After unwittingly living off polluted land in northeast Italy for decades, she had toxic chemicals in her blood -- which she passed on with each pregnancy. Donadello, 50, is one of thousands of mothers in the region who discovered they had ingested "forever chemicals" known as PFAS and transmitted them to their babies, both in the womb and through breastfeeding. Some are now civil plaintiffs in a criminal case against chemicals company Miteni, which is accused of causing one of Europe's biggest environmental disasters for discharging the hormone-altering substances into water sources, affecting 350,000 people. "For 40 years I ate the vegetables grown here, and passed them on to my children in pregnancy... so basically I poisoned my children," said Donadello, who lives in the house in which she grew up. Both children, now eight and 10, have high levels in their blood, but especially Donadello's first born, "because it's awful... the mother dumps them (the chemicals) on her first child", she told AFP. Chronic exposure to even low levels of PFAS has been linked to liver damage, high cholesterol, reduced immune responses, low birthweights and several kinds of cancer. Donadello says both children appear well, but she finds herself watching them closely for sickness. "I'm afraid. I don't have normal reactions when they have even trivial symptoms... because there is always the fear that it could mean something is happening because of the pollutants," she said. - No taste, colour, smell - Fifteen managers of the Miteni factory are on trial in Vicenza, accused of knowingly leaking PFAS into a waterway that fed into others, polluting a vast area between Vicenza, Verona and Padova. Donadello is part of a group of mothers dubbed the "Mamme No PFAS" (Mums Against PFAS), who united after discovering their families had the chemicals in their blood. She lives around 12 kilometres (7.5 miles) from the factory, which is now closed down. But her garden sits above a polluted aquifer that feeds the well and was used to water the allotment. She stopped using the well in 2015 and has turned it and part of her allotment over to scientists from Padua University, so they can study the extent to which the water with PFAS contaminates fruit and vegetables. "The first year salad and tomatoes were planted. Soil and water analysis before, during and after, showed the vegetables... if irrigated with contaminated water, are themselves contaminated," she said. The vegetables now watered with rainwater are safe, but the family has stopped eating their home-grown kiwis or making grape jam from their vines, for the plants have deep roots that draw on the aquifer. Donadello said PFAS were found even in the eggs from the family's free-range chickens. She and other campaigners accuse Veneto regional authorities of failing to properly inform people about the contamination, so that many families continue blithely to eat home-grown or locally grown produce. The region is also a plaintiff in the case. "PFAS have no taste, colour or smell, (so) the vegetables taste fantastic," she said. "How do you convince someone who has been eating the things he has been self-producing for his whole life... to stop eating them? With indisputable data, stated clearly and with authority." - Paradise lost - Donadello's 84-year-old father has a tractor, a shed piled high with tools and a passion for the allotment. She remembers helping him as a child, pulling up radishes and leeks with her sister. He was reluctant to stop using the land, and only did so when faced with his grandchildren's blood test results. "It's terrible for a person who is in touch with his land to think that he can no longer use it," Donadello said as she watched him and her young son uproot a contaminated cherry tree. The Miteni factory shut in 2018 but the land is still full of PFAS, which are washed into the torrent running beside it when it rains. Donadello is close to tears when she looks across the green fields to snow-capped mountains beyond and thinks of the ruin of what was once "my paradise". "It is painful to think that poisoned water is flowing under my feet, and it will probably be like that forever, if there is no cleanup," she said. "This was my grandparents' land, my father's land. What am I leaving to my children?" ide/ar/js
