There are two chemicals that, when combined together in the appropriate manner, cause the reaction that produces Kevlar, the super strong synthetic fiber used to make bulletproof vests. The primary chemical ingredient is known as PPDA, which itself is derived from benzene, a petrochemical found in oil.
In Reserve, Louisiana, in the heart of the area along the Mississippi known as Cancer Alley, the chemical company DuPont has an entire facility dedicated to producing PPDA, which supplies another DuPont plant where it’s made into Kevlar. And at the Reserve factory, which sits about a half mile away from a predominantly Black elementary school, DuPont stores a whole lot of benzene, which is a known carcinogen.
There’s a given amount of allowed pollution from such a facility, what’s considered to be an acceptable risk. But the Environmental Protection Agency also has a rule for the maximum amount of benzene that can be emitted, and any emissions over 500 parts per million are over that threshold. At an inspection of the Reserve facility in 2022, benzene levels of over 20,000 parts per million were measured. DuPont now agreed to pay a $480,000 fine over the leak.
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A spokesperson for DuPont Specialty Products said in a statement the company has “taken immediate corrective actions to resolve the issues identified in the inspection process. It is important to note that there have been no impacts to site personnel or to the community related to this matter.”
Under the agreement, the company will also retrofit the equipment where the leaks were found (a separate leak that measured just under 2,000 ppm was also documented during the inspection). Long-term exposure to benzene affects the blood and bone marrow, reducing the production of red blood cells, which can lead to anemia, bleeding issues (including menstrual problems), and leukemia. The two leaks were releasing so much benzene that they could have caused far more immediate problems for workers at the plant: being exposed to benzene at 20,000 ppm for just 5 to 10 minutes can be fatal, according to the Centers for Disease Control Control and Prevention.
A factory that makes a chemical used to make bulletproof vests being so close to an predominantly Black elementary story (in what is a predominantly Black community overall) presents issues on its own — but in Cancer Alley, it’s never just one petrochemical plant that’s nearby. And the DuPont facility is a stark reminder of that fact: it’s in the same industrial complex as Denka Performance Elastomers, the country’s sole producer of neoprene. The synthetic rubber is made using a chemical called chloroprene, another carcinogen.
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Living next to these factories is a massive health liability even when there isn’t benzene rushing out of a storage tank at fatal levels. For most parts of the United States, the risk of developing cancer due to pollution is less than one in one million. But according to the EPA’s 2015 National Air Toxic Assessment, the cancer risk in Reserve is 777 cases per million people — far and away the highest in the entire country.
“So if they actually agreed to not pollute us, it would be something at least,” Robert Taylor, executive director of local nonprofit Concerned Citizens of St. John, told Atlanta Black Star. “I have just been overwhelmed with their ability to avoid being a safe neighbor in our community. They find ways to litigate while they continue to poison us.”