Environmental PFOA contamination and outdoor gear

Ask questions and share your experiences with hiking & backpacking gear, and share trail recipes and gadget tips. Please see classifieds forum for buying/selling stuff.
Post Reply
User avatar
Bosterson
Posts: 2317
Joined: May 18th, 2009, 3:17 pm
Location: Portland

Environmental PFOA contamination and outdoor gear

Post by Bosterson » March 7th, 2016, 7:23 pm

With recent long-form news articles detailing just how bad, ubiquitous, and non-biodegadeable perfluorinated chemicals (PFOAs) are (they're used to make Teflon and nonstick/waterproof coatings), it's sobering to consider how much outdoor gear must be coated in them - gear we then take outside into "wild" places...

DuPont used to produce C8 PFOAs in the manufacture of Teflon. This was phased out once their adverse health effects came to light.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/magaz ... .html?_r=0

These chemicals have been replaced with "new" shorter chain C6 PFOAs, but the new chemicals exhibit many of the same properties and are not being subject to environmental health and safety testing before their implementation.

https://theintercept.com/2016/03/03/how ... lon-toxin/

Greenpeace had people ask a number of outdoor companies to disclose their use of PFOAs, and it turns out almost all of them use such chemicals. (Columbia notably refused to answer...)

http://www.greenpeace.org/international ... log/54178/

Patagonia has discussed PFOAs on their blog. (Note that only the first section is relevant, and the rest is basically promotional distraction.) While I don't doubt that there is definitely an engineering consideration of durable gear features (like water repellency) vs avoiding the toxic chemicals that provide such features, it is still disconcerting considering how water resistant everything is these days compared with gear from 20 or even 10 years ago.

http://www.thecleanestline.com/2015/09/ ... dated.html

Anyway, some interesting and troubling reading if you have some time to kill... :?
#pnw #bestlife #bitingflies #favoriteyellowcap #neverdispleased

User avatar
retired jerry
Posts: 14395
Joined: May 28th, 2008, 10:03 pm

Re: Environmental PFOA contamination and outdoor gear

Post by retired jerry » March 8th, 2016, 6:10 am

It's too bad because they work better at keeping the water out yet still being breathable

Webfoot
Posts: 1759
Joined: November 25th, 2015, 11:06 am
Location: Troutdale

Re: Environmental PFOA contamination and outdoor gear

Post by Webfoot » December 1st, 2018, 5:08 pm

There is a recent documentary on this DuPont atrocity: Poisoning America: The Devil we Know

Reddit, BBC

User avatar
Charley
Posts: 1834
Joined: May 28th, 2008, 10:03 pm
Location: Milwaukie

Re: Environmental PFOA contamination and outdoor gear

Post by Charley » December 1st, 2018, 6:03 pm

It's becoming clearer and clearer to me that, no matter what I do in this world, it's sort of the case that I'm the problem. But it's also true that, if you believe there's any hope in the world, I'm the solution. We are all compromised, all fallible, and all responsible.

So. Time to research alternative waterproofing? Back to whale oil? (JUST KIDDING!!!)
Believe it or not, I barely ever ride a mountain bike.

Post Reply