Multiple cities and villages in Lake County, along with the state, have been awarded $120 million following a lawsuit against Monsanto over the contamination of PCBs in the area.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul said the $120 million settlement was reached with Monsanto Company and affiliates Solutia Inc. and Pharmacia LLC over the environmental and health effects of Monsanto’s decades-long production of polychlorinated biphenyls, known as PCBs.
The attorney general’s office filed a lawsuit in 2022 alleging the company was aware of the chemicals’ toxicity while publicly denying any knowledge of the danger to human health and the environment.
The settlement will provide funds to address PCB contamination in the state of Illinois, the City of Chicago and the surrounding cities of Evanston, Lake Forest, North Chicago, Zion, Beach Park, Glencoe, Lake Bluff, Winnetka and Winthrop Harbor.
“This settlement helps Illinoisans recover from the unlawful and reckless behavior that led to contamination in their communities,” Raoul said.
“PCBs have been banned in the U.S. for decades. I’m pleased that this settlement will hold Monsanto accountable for producing and disposing of a dangerous toxic chemical that continues to impact Illinois’ natural resources,” Raoul said.
The state will receive $80 million by March 31, 2026, which will be allocated to the state and the nine settling cities.
The state will additionally receive a minimum of $40 million and up to a maximum of $200 million, depending on the outcome of additional, related legal action.
Illinois and the settling cities could receive additional amounts up to a total of $280 million.
The court approved a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, resolving the attorney general’s litigation, as part of the settlement.
Monsanto said in a statement to Lake and McHenry County Scanner that its settlement agreements with West Virginia and Illinois mark the ninth and 10th settlement agreements the company has made with states over PCB claims.
There are five state cases remaining against the company. The Illinois settlement also resolves the pending opt-out cases filed by the City of Chicago and Evanston, along with eight other municipalities.
“Monsanto has reached settlement agreements with West Virginia and Illinois to resolve all claims relating to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a legacy product the Company voluntarily ceased producing in 1977 at values that are in the Company’s best interest. The settlements contain no admission of liability or wrongdoing by the company,” Monsanto said.
“Both states agreed to cooperate with Monsanto in this action, having determined there is a substantial basis for the company’s pending indemnity case and a significant portion of the liability should be borne by Monsanto’s former customers,” the company said.
Monsanto said that during the time of manufacture, it conducted hundreds of studies on PCB safety, provided appropriate warnings to its sophisticated industrial customers based on “state-of-the-science at the time” and cooperated with the U.S. government’s 1972 interdepartmental study.
“To recover a substantial portion of its PCB-related litigation costs, Monsanto filed a complaint in Missouri to enforce its rights under 1972 indemnity contracts with its six largest former PCB customers. Under these contracts, these sophisticated companies agreed to indemnify Monsanto for PCB-related litigation costs. The litigation against the former PCB customers remains pending,” Monsanto said.
PCBs have been banned by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) since 1979.
They were used in a wide range of products, including paints, caulks and industrial electrical equipment lubricants.
Nearly all hazardous materials used in the United States, including PCBs, were manufactured by Monsanto, many of them at the company’s facility in Sauget, Illinois, the attorney general’s office said.
Monsanto sold nearly 50 million pounds of commercial PCB mixtures to customers in Illinois from 1960 to the mid-1970s alone.
The attorney general’s office said Monsanto for decades discharged massive amounts of hazardous waste from its Krummrich Plant in Sauget directly into the surrounding environment, including sewers that allowed the toxic waste to enter the Mississippi River.
Hazardous waste was also dumped in landfills, which allowed waste to leach into surrounding soil, water, groundwater and air, according to the attorney general’s office.
Human health effects associated with PCB exposure include cancer and reproductive toxicity, including increased difficulties conceiving, neuro-developmental and neurobehavioral changes, along with liver, thyroid, dermal and ocular changes.