MADISON — Gov. Tony Evers today, together with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR), announced a historic settlement agreement reached, marking one of the first efforts to hold polluters accountable for PFAS contamination caused in Marinette, Wisconsin. Under Gov. Evers, who’s spent much of his time in office leading the state’s fight against so-called “forever chemicals” like PFAS, the Evers Administration has aggressively pursued PFAS polluters for contaminating Wisconsinites’ water and natural resources across the state, including filing several lawsuits aiming to prevent taxpayers from footing the bill to clean up widespread contamination and to hold polluters financially responsible for the costs instead. During the governor’s first term in office, the Evers Administration referred Tyco Fire Products LP (Tyco) for charges for failing to report, investigate, and remediate PFAS discharge at and around the Tyco Fire Technology Center in Marinette, alleging the company violated the state’s hazardous substance Spills Law. 

Under the settlement agreement announced today, a monumental first step in holding PFAS polluters accountable, Tyco must provide clean drinking water for Marinette-area residents, must address PFAS discharges in the area, and must pay an additional $10 million beyond existing cleanup costs that will be deposited into the PFAS Trust Fund to help clean up future PFAS contamination, making one of the largest settlements stemming from a DNR referral in state history. Additionally, the agreement requires Tyco to continue providing for replacement wells, conducting monitoring and reporting for PFAS contamination, and implementing additional measures toward long-term remediation of the area.

Importantly, the announcement today is the result of one lawsuit with still more to come. For example, the lawsuit settlement announced today does not impact a massive, separate lawsuit that was also filed during Gov. Evers’ first term in 2022 against Tyco, Chemguard, 3M, DuPont, and several other defendants for allegedly wrongfully, knowingly, and deceptively contaminating natural resources with PFAS across Wisconsin, which remains active and ongoing.

“Today is a historic and important milestone in our fight to make sure every Wisconsinite has access to clean and safe drinking water, whether they live in Marinette or Stella or on French Island or anywhere in between. Every Wisconsinite should be able to trust the water coming from their tap. We’ve worked to lead the fight against PFAS from Day One of my administration, and today’s a key step toward making sure polluters are held accountable, take responsibility for their actions, and ensure Wisconsinites don’t have to foot the bill for cleaning up the messes that others made,” said Gov. Evers. “While today is an important victory, we know our work cannot stop. For the folks in Marinette, this day has been a long time coming, but we know that for so many families and communities across our state, dealing with PFAS pollution is still a daily reality. Here in Wisconsin, we must keep working to tackle PFAS head-on, and that includes continuing to hold PFAS polluters accountable for the damage they’ve caused and are causing across our state. That’s work we’re going to continue doing as long as I’m governor.”

The settlement announced today comes in a year marked by historic progress toward Wisconsin’s fight against PFAS contamination statewide. Gov. Evers earlier this year signed into law the state’s first-ever comprehensive PFAS clean-up bill, which will provide over $125 million to help address PFAS contamination and ensure Wisconsinites in communities across the state will have access to clean water.

Gov. Evers spent years working across the aisle with Republican lawmakers to negotiate and usher two bipartisan bills, Assembly Bill 130, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 200, and Assembly Bill 131, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 201, which, together, facilitate the release of the $125 million in stalled PFAS investments that had sat unspent in Madison since the signing of the 2023-25 Biennial Budget in July 2023. With the addition of the settlement funds announced today, the Evers Administration remains committed to supporting communities in PFAS mitigation and ensuring clean, safe drinking water for all.  “The DNR will keep fighting to ensure that Tyco takes the necessary steps to restore the environment to the extent practicable,” said DNR Secretary Karen Hyun. “We will continue to listen to and collaborate with the community that has been affected by the environmental and human health impacts of PFAS for many years.”  

Under the settlement, which was negotiated by the Wisconsin Department of Justice, Tyco must:  Invest $10 million into the state of Wisconsin’s PFAS Trust Fund to help clean up future PFAS contamination; Provide clean water for affected Wisconsinites in the Marinette area, including deep drinking water wells for every existing plot within an agreed-upon area for the next 20 years; Continue monitoring and reporting on ground and surface water quality within an agreed-upon area;  Establish cleanup goals for PFAS and submit reports to DNR—which retains control over approving, conditionally approving, or disapproving Tyco’s submittals—that establish goals for PFAS remediation in soil, groundwater, and surface water, including submitting documentation to DNR that shows it will restore the environment to the extent practicable as required under the Spills Law; and Remediate PFAS and restore the environment to the extent practicable, including continuing to remediate PFAS in the soil, groundwater, and surface water, and using the Groundwater Extraction and Treatment System.The settlement is being filed today with a Brown County judge handling the case on behalf of the Marinette County Circuit Court. The agreement will go into effect once approved by the court. 

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON PFAS

PFAS are per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, synthetic chemicals known to be toxic, mobile, and persistent in the environment, meaning they do not break down naturally. PFAS are a group of human-made chemicals used for decades in numerous products, including non-stick cookware, fast food wrappers, stain-resistant sprays, and certain types of firefighting foam. PFAS chemicals resist degradation in the environment and accumulate in the body. These contaminants are linked to serious adverse health effects in humans and animals. Epidemiologic studies have shown that potential adverse human health effects from exposure to some PFAS include increased serum cholesterol, immune dysregulation, pregnancy-induced hypertension, liver damage, and kidney and testicular cancers. Exposure to certain types of PFAS is also associated with low birthweight in humans, suppressed immune system response, dyslipidemia, impaired kidney function, and delayed onset of menstruation.

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND ON GOV. EVERS AND THE EVERS ADMINISTRATION’S EFFORTS TO FIGHT PFAS CONTAMINATION STATEWIDE   

Gov. Evers declared 2019 the Year of Clean Drinking Water, and for the past seven years, has prioritized efforts to address PFAS contamination, proposing numerous comprehensive plans to protect Wisconsinites from PFAS in drinking, ground, and surface water. The Evers Administration enacted the first statewide standards for PFAS in surface and drinking water and has proposed groundwater standards multiple times despite Republican obstruction, with the most recent effort ongoing and on track to be completed in 2026. Gov. Evers also secured a historic $125 million investment of state funding in the 2023-25 Biennial Budget to assist homeowners and communities in addressing PFAS contamination, but Republicans in the Legislature blocked the DNR from accessing this funding for over two years.    

Following multiple attempts to call on the Legislature to release this funding without delay, last session, Gov. Evers vetoed Senate Bill 312, a Republican bill claiming to release the PFAS Trust Fund and address contamination but in fact did not release one dollar from the PFAS Trust Fund and also included harmful “poison pill” provisions that would have removed authority the DNR currently possesses to hold PFAS polluters accountable and require those polluters to clean up their own spills, despite the governor communicating to bill authors that the bill would be vetoed unless they removed this “poison pill” provision.    

Months later, in his 2025-27 Executive Budget, Gov. Evers once again recommended a comprehensive plan to address PFAS contamination across surface, drinking, and groundwater. Among other provisions, the governor’s proposal recommended allowing the full balance of the PFAS Trust Fund to be utilized by the DNR, with special attention made to protect innocent landowners, as well as the adoption of major policies in the CLEAR Act, including exempting DNR rulemaking relating to setting enforceable PFAS standards from the REINS Act. Unfortunately, Republican lawmakers removed all of the governor’s proposals to address PFAS contamination from the final budget.     

Despite these obstructions, the Evers Administration has continuously sought bipartisan compromise to release funding from the PFAS Trust Fund as well as protect truly innocent landowners, and after years of advocacy, in April, Gov. Evers signed Assembly Bill 130, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 200, and Assembly Bill 131, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 201.   

Together, these bills deliver on Gov. Evers’ promise to continue addressing PFAS contamination and ensure safe, clean water for all by securing protections for innocent landowners, investing $80 million of the $125 million in the PFAS Trust Fund to support local communities, investing $35 million of the $125 million in the PFAS Trust Fund for an expanded Well Compensation Grant Program, providing funding for emergency bottled water for private well owners in situations in which PFAS contamination in drinking water is discovered, and creating new opportunities for the DNR to support communities in PFAS mitigation, among other important provisions.  

In March, Gov. Evers also approved new changes to bring the state’s current drinking water standards in line with federal limits for PFAS, reducing the state’s threshold for PFOA and PFAS contamination in drinking water from 70 parts per trillion (ppt) to a new enforceable standard of 4.0 ppt—an effort that will significantly improve drinking water quality for Wisconsinites. However, the Trump Administration has recently tried to roll back some of these standards, making statewide action to protect Wisconsinites from PFAS even more significant.   
 

An online version of this release is available here.