Seattle Says Monsanto to Pay $160 Million to Settle PCB Pollution

By Mark R. Long

Seattle said Monsanto will pay the city $160 million to settle a lawsuit over PCB pollution in the Lower Duwamish River.

The settlement releases the unit of Bayer from the city's claims against it for its alleged role in polluting city stormwater and the Lower Duwamish with chemical compounds.

The city sued the company in 2016 and the agreement heads off a trial that was scheduled for September, the city said in a statement on its website. Polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, were widely used in the industry until they were banned in the U.S. in 1979. They have been linked to a variety of health problems, including cancer.

The settlement contains no admission of liability or wrongdoing by the company, Bayer said in a statement. It added that it never made PCBs in the Seattle area and ended its production of the chemicals nearly 50 years ago. Bayer said $35 million of the total will go toward PCB remediation, with the remaining $125 million to reimburse the city for cleanup, legal and other costs.

Seattle said that although Monsanto stopped making PCBs in 1977, the chemicals remained in paint and caulking on buildings that washed into the Lower Duwamish.

Germany's Bayer bought Monsanto for more than $60 billion in 2018 and has faced a raft of litigation over Monsanto's Roundup herbicide, as well as PCBs. In 2020, the company reached a $650 million settlement involving about 2,500 municipalities that alleged PCB pollution of water bodies. In May, a court of appeals in Washington State overturned a $185 million verdict against Monsanto over PCB contamination at a Seattle-area school, sending the case back to a lower court.

Write to Mark R. Long at mark.long@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 25, 2024 16:10 ET (20:10 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2024 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.