Toxic-Free Communities News

DuPont shareholders sent a clear message to the company today when 7.8 percent voted in favor of a shareholder resolution asking DuPont to report on the potential for improving the safety of its chemical plants by reducing the use of extremely hazardous chemicals and taking other similar steps.

According to EPA filings, DuPont operates 30 plants which in total put more than 10 million Americans at risk of death or injury in case of an accident or terrorist attack. These plants use large quantities of some of the most dangerous chemicals in existence, chemicals such as hydrofluoric acid, chlorine, phosgene, and sulfur trioxide. Until today, DuPont had never disclosed the existence of this danger to shareholders.

“DuPont’s operations are putting Americans in danger,” said Andrew Shalit, Director of Shareholder Advocacy at Green Century Capital Management, the environmentally responsible investment firm that sponsored the resolution. “The company has failed to disclose these dangers to its shareholders, and they have failed to articulate plans for reducing the number of people who they put at risk. While we appreciate the company’s security programs, they need to do more to remove the risk by reducing the use of these chemicals.”

This shareholder vote came at a time of heightened concern over chemical plant security and continued inaction by the U.S. Congress. The U.S. Army Surgeon General has called chemical plant security second only to biological terrorism for the risk it places on Americans.

“Chemical security can’t be fixed by adding more guards or building more fences,” said Meghan Purvis of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund, which has issued reports on chemical plant security. “The only foolproof way to address the problem is to reduce the use of these extremely hazardous chemicals. We hope DuPont will step forward with a plan for doing that.”

This is the first time that shareholders at any company have been asked to vote on matters related to chemical security. The resolution had been challenged by DuPont, but the SEC decided to allow it to move forward. A similar resolution will be voted on at Dow Chemical’s annual meeting on May 11th in Midland, Michigan.

Green Century Capital Management (GCCM) is an environmentally responsible investment firm which focuses on environmentally progressive companies and uses shareholder advocacy to improve corporate environmental responsibility.

U.S. PIRG is the national lobby office for the state Public Interest Research Groups. State PIRGs are non-profit, non-partisan public interest advocacy organizations.

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Whereas: A report by the Army Surgeon General in 2003 ranked an attack on a chemical plant second only to a widespread biological attack in the magnitude of its hazard to the public. Numerous other government agencies and private groups have published warnings about these dangers. (http://www.crtk.org/detail.cfm?docID=765%26cat=spills%2520and%2520emergencies);

Whereas: It is often possible for a company to increase the inherent security of a facility and decrease the number of people at risk of harm by switching to chemicals that are less acutely hazardous, reducing the quantities of extremely hazardous substances stored at facilities, altering the processes used at facilities, or locating facilities outside densely populated areas;

Whereas: Improving physical security through such steps as hiring additional security guards and building perimeter fences will not reduce the number of people endangered by a facility;

Whereas: DuPont operates thirty-three facilities in the United States that combined put a total of over nine million people at risk in the event of a catastrophic release of chemicals caused by an accident or terrorist attack, according to an independent report analyzing RMPs filed by our Company with the EPA as of 2004 (http://uspirg.org/uspirg.asp?id2=13532&id3=USPIRG&). These facilities use large quantities of extremely hazardous substances including hydrofluoric acid, chlorine, hydrochloric acid, oleum (fuming sulfuric acid), phosgene, sulfur trioxide, and titanium tetrachloride;

Whereas: Shareholders know little about our Company’s efforts to prevent and reduce the magnitude of catastrophic incidents at its facilities. Our Company’s most recent 10-K and 10-Q filings contain no information on the possibility of such incidents and their potential impact on the Company or on employees, surrounding communities, and the environment;

RESOLVED, shareholders request that the independent directors of the Board of DuPont prepare a report, at reasonable cost and omitting proprietary information, on the implications of a policy for reducing potential harm and the number of people in danger from potential catastrophic chemical releases by increasing the inherent security of DuPont facilities through such steps as reducing the use and storage of extremely hazardous substances, reengineering processes, and locating facilities outside high-population areas. The report should be available to investors by the 2007 annual meeting.