Monsanto has been trumpeting its award from the Wildlife Habitat Council – a PR invention by the worlds most egregious polluters. Their website appears to be created by the same company that created Great Ecology‘s website. Great Ecology is a corporate PR company.
According to a website critical of the Wildlife Habitat Council, its members include major polluters such as Koch Industries, Bayer, Dow, Monsanto itself, BASF, Exxon, Dupont and more. The following is a partial list of members reproduced from the site.
Advanced Disposal Services – Settled pollution complaint
Aggregate Industries Management, Inc. – $2.75 million fine for violating Clean Water Act
Albemarle Corporation – Violated emissions standards
American Electric Power – Settled $4.6 billion air emissions lawsuit
ARCADIS – Accused of supplying contaminated landfill
ArcelorMittal – Contaminated groundwater
Argos Cement – Paid $1.5 million fine for emissions
Ash Grove Cement Company – Paid $2.5million for emissions violation
Ashland Inc. – Paid $1million in cleanup fees for their Hercules chemical operation
BASF Corporation – Numerous pollution cases including $500million in worker contamination for their chemical manufacuturing operations
Bayer Corporation – listed as the most toxic company in the U.S. by UMASS
BB&J – Law firm that defends corporate polluters
Benjamin Moore & Co. – Numerous municipalities have sued them for polluting land
BP – Deep Water Horizon Blowout – need we say more?
Bridgestone Americas, Inc. – Sued for $85million toxic land contamination
Bristol-Myers Squibb Company –Numerous cases including discharging chemical waste into a lake
Bruce Power – Nuclear Wastes company
Buzzi Unicem USA, Inc. – See Ashland above – same company
California Resources Corporation – Petroleum company that fracks
CEMEX – Settled $1.7million air pollution case
Chevron – $9.5 billion fine for polluting Equador
CITGO Petroleum Corporation – Accused of criminally polluting Corpus Christi neighborhood
Consumers Energy – Paid $billion to settle air pollution lawsuit
CourseCo Inc.
CSX Transportation – Aquifer contamination
Dixie Chemical Company – Opposed chemical weapons ban because they would be subject to inspection for the chemicals they manufacture
DTE Energy – Sued for Air Pollution
DuPont – Notorious Chemical Company Polluter
Ensign United States Drilling – Fined for exposing workers to toxic chemicals after oil well explosions
EQT Gathering, LLC – Many fines for air and land pollution
Ernst Conservation Seeds – Petroleum Company that Fracks
Exelon Corporation – Nuclear and Coal utility
ExxonMobil – Exxon Valdez oil spill – need we say more?
Fairmount Santrol – Fracking supply company that polluted an entire town
Fidelity Investments
Formosa Plastics Corporation – Contaminated soil and water
Freeport-McMoRan Inc. – Accused of human rights violations and fined for corrupt business practices
General Motors LLC – Toxic Waste Dumping
GlaxoSmithKline – Bribery and fraudulent health claims
Great Ecology – White-washing for corporations being sued aka “litigation support” and what a coincidence – their website is created by the same company that created the Wildlife Habitat Council website!
Grifols USA – Accused of limiting plasma to patients and price fixing
Holcim – Cement plant with many pollution complaints
IBM Corporation – Multiple toxic pollution cases alleging deaths
ITC Holdings
Kinder Morgan – Contaminated San Diego’s ground water
Koch Industries, Inc. & Subsidiaries – Major Polluter who has donated hundreds of millions in political funds to weaken environmental laws and elect anti-EPA candidates
Lafarge – Cement manufacturer guilty of air pollution
Lockheed Martin – Multiple cases of toxic water pollution
Marathon Oil Company – Guilty of water pollution from fracking
Marathon Petroleum Corporation – See above
Master Brands
Monsanto Company – Subject of innumerable polution complaint: PCBs, Dioxin, Agent Orange, Alachlor,
This is an example of the corporate PR technique of creating front organizations used for deceiving the public.
In addition to corruption charges Monsanto has been responsible for destroying wildlife habitat (not to mention human habitat) via their chemicals including:
Agent Orange
Agent Orange used as a defoliant in Vietnam military personnel (and Vietnam residents) started seeing birth defects and health problems. On May 7, 1984, Monsanto settled by paying 45% of an $180 million fund.
In 2013 Monsanto reached a settlement with the town of Nitro, West Virginia, agreeing to pay $93 million for compensatory damages, cleanup, and ongoing monitoring of dioxin contamination in the area around a plant where Agent Orange was made.
Dioxin
In Kemner v. Monsanto plaintiffs were awarded $16.2 million in punitive damages. Monsanto appealed and the award was reversed.
Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs)
Monsanto settled numerous pollution cases around their product PCB which is used in the electrical industry.
In 2003, Monsanto settled for $700 million in the West Anniston, Alabama case for residents who had been affected by the manufacturing and dumping of PCBs.
In 2015, the cities of Spokane, San Diego, and San Jose initiated lawsuits against Monsanto to recover cleanup costs for PCB contaminated sites, alleging that Monsanto continued to sell PCBs without adequate warnings after they knew of their toxicity.
Alachlor
Alachlor, an herbicide widely used in the U.S., has been banned in the European Union after a French court found Monsanto guilty of chemical poisoning of a farmer
So congratulations, Monsanto, for your wonderful record in Wildlife Habitats!