🏭 The Column: June 27, 2025

Good morning. After yet another unplanned 2-month hiatus, The Column has returned! I apologize for disappearing—life decided to throw me a health curveball this spring, and sometimes you just need to take a step back. Let’s get back into it:

Veolia is removing PFAS from your water

I’m sure most of you have heard of per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), but in case you haven’t, these are the carcinogenic and endocrine disrupting molecules made famous for their use in the production of Teflon (the 2019 movie Dark Waters provides great context!). Dealing with PFAS is particularly difficult because these molecules don’t degrade in the environment—which is what earned them the nickname “forever chemicals”. That means that even though we can use activated carbon to get PFAS down to parts-per-trillion (ppt) levels, the carbon used to capture that PFAS will eventually become saturated with PFAS, and then that PFAS-containing-carbon needs to be disposed of properly (by blasting it in a furnace) and replaced with fresh carbon. Anyways, thanks to some regulation that passed last year, water utilities are now required to either a) reduce PFAS to ppt levels by 2029, or b) face fines for failing to do so. But while the cost of those fines will be at least partially offset by those billion dollar class-action settlements with 3M, Chemours, Dupont, and Corteva, someone still has to put up the capital to build and operate PFAS-treatment facilities. In the case of investor-owned utilities (IOUs), such as the one Veolia operates in Delaware, that capital will be provided by Veolia and returned to Veolia by charging customers more. All they need to do now is get a water bill increase approved by the Delaware Public Service Commission, which they will do because the law now requires PFAS removal. I’m curious to see how this plays out since only ~10% of the US is served water by IOUs, the rest are municipalities that will be more reliant on taxes and bonds for raising the capital needed to make these plants a reality. I suppose that means it will happen faster in populated wealthy areas (such as Orange County, which is also getting a new PFAS-treatment plant) and slower elsewhere. [LINK]

Other Things Happened:

Eastman Chemical lost a $375M grant from the U.S. DOE, as did 23 other companies pursuing various decarbonization initiatives. Braskem decided to exit its Netherlands-based recycling joint venture. Stepan started up a new 75 KTA alkoxylation plant in Pasadena, Texas and expanded its alpha olefin sulfonate capacity. IFF divested its nitrocellulose business (which primarily serves coatings and ink customers today, but let’s not forget this polymer’s original application: photographic film!). Kraton is exiting their dimer and polyamide business lines. Umicore is expanding its catalyst production in Catoosa, Oklahoma. Honeywell acquired Johnson Matthey’s catalyst business. LyondellBasell sold a bunch of their European olefins and polyolefins plants. OCOchem started up its CO2 electrolysis pilot plant. BASF started up a new hexamethylenediamine (HMD) plant in France. Kemira expanded its sodium borohydride powder production at its site in Finland. Tosoh is going to build a new 22 KTA chloroprene rubber plant in Japan. An MDI producer in South Korea decided to build their own chlor-alkali plant to reduce their reliance on chlorine imports. Ineos is shutting down its phenol and acetone production site in Gladbeck, Germany. PureCycle raised $300M and will now build a plant in the Netherlands and in Thailand. Veolia started up a new PFAS treatment plant in Delaware. Halliburton will drill for lithium in the Smackover before the end of the year. A huge seawater desalination plant in the US is being built in Corpus Christi, Texas. LG Energy and Toyota are forming a battery recycling joint venture. Gradiant is producing lithium carbonate from the produced water by-product of oil and gas production in Pennsylvania. Two players in the water treatment market, Solenis and NCH, are merging.