The UCSF Library has added the new Forever Pollution Project Collection as part of the UCSF Industry Documents Library Chemical Industry Documents Archive.
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), so-called “forever chemicals” are now widely recognized as a serious environmental problem because they do not break down quickly in the environment and have been linked to a growing list of health problems.
In February 2023, five European countries proposed a PFAS “universal restriction” under the European Union chemical regulation REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals). The ban would include the entire PFAS chemical ‘universe’, with some exceptions until alternatives are developed. In response, hundreds of industry players have been lobbying decision-makers across Europe to undermine and perhaps kill the proposal.
Over the course of a year, a team of 46 journalists in 16 countries investigated the ongoing orchestrated lobbying and disinformation campaign by the PFAS industry and its allies. Their investigation revealed the staggering cost of cleaning PFAS contamination in Europe if emissions remain unrestricted: €2 trillion over a 20-year period, an annual bill of €100 billion!
The team collected over 14,000 unpublished documents on PFAS, constituting the world’s largest collection to date on the topic. The majority originate from 184 freedom of information requests, 66 of which were shared with the group by EU lobby watchdog, Corporate Europe Observatory.
In addition, the Forever Lobbying Project donated copies of all the documents to the UCSF IDL to make them freely available to everyone worldwide.
In addition, as part of IDL they are cross-searchable with all the other documents for all the industries in IDL, making them even more valuable.
Read more about the Forever Lobbying Project’s cross-border, interdisciplinary investigation: https://foreverpollution.eu/lobbying/
An important precedent
Over the years, I have seen several important examples of journalists collecting industry documents for their work and encouraged them to contribute the documents to IDL to ensure the widest possible reach. Most have said “no,” wanting to keep full control, but some have said “yes.” (This is how the Opioid collection got started.) Hopefully more journalists and other people doing investigative work will contribute documents to IDL in the future.
Stanton Glantz blog 