2022.03.04_CCO.p.18_Chemours Downstream Counties Response Letter

The Chemours Company
Fayetteville Works
22828 NC Highway 87 W
Fayetteville, NC 28306

March 4, 2022
Sushma Masemore
Assistant Secretary
N.C. Department of Environmental Quality
1601 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, NC 27699-1601
[e-mail]

Re: DEQ’s March 2, 2022 Letter re “Notice Regarding Chemours’ Obligations Under
Consent Order and 15A NCAC 02L .0106 - Offsite Groundwater Assessment and
Provision of Replacement Drinking Water Supplies”
Dear Ms. Masemore,
We have received your March 2, 2022 letter containing comments on Chemours’s
Interim Four Counties Sampling and Drinking Water Plan (New Hanover, Brunswick,
Columbus, and Pender Counties). That letter did not include DEQ’s comments on the related
Framework to Assess Table 3+ PFAS in New Hanover, Brunswick, Columbus, and Pender
Counties, which was submitted at the same time. Your letter states that those comments will be
provided “at a later time.”

We intend to respond to your letter in full, but for now wanted to communicate the
following:

First, because the two plan submittals are related and each will provide information that
informs the other, and given your request that we continue to proceed on such an expeditious
schedule, we ask that you send us any comments on the Framework to Assess Table 3+ PFAS no
later than March 15, 2022. This should allow us to more fully respond to your March 2nd
comments within your requested timeframe.

Second, and similarly, it is critical that we receive timely and complete responses to the
pending public records requests submitted to DEQ in November 2021, almost four months ago.
Both plans were developed based on the limited information made available to us as of the
required submittal date and we believe the additional data pending from DEQ (and others noted
below) are necessary as we implement the plans. We ask that you provide complete responses to
the pending public records requests submitted to DEQ by March 15, 2022 as well.

Third, as you know, we have sent similar public records requests to the four counties and
others in possession of relevant information, and have gotten to date only partial responses from
some of the parties. We ask that DEQ work with us to facilitate receipt of the requested
information, which is necessary for Chemours to respond fully to your March 2nd letter.

2

Finally, in connection with your bolded statement that a revised plan “shall be
submitted” within 30 days, we note that in the month since the two submissions were made, we
have had numerous conversations with DEQ on the submitted plans, and at no point did DEQ
raise a timetable for a revised submission. We have submitted revisions to multiple plans to
address DEQ comments under schedules that have been worked out by the parties, and DEQ’s
imposing an arbitrary deadline is inconsistent with that course of dealings, especially when (i)
DEQ has not set its own timetable on providing its responses to Chemours, and (ii) much of the
DEQ data that your November 3rd request was based on is three years old.

If you have any questions or would like to discuss this matter further, please contact me
at [e-mail].

Sincerely,

Dawn M. Hughes
Plant Manager
Chemours – Fayetteville Works