A New Milford resident has filed suit against Kimberly-Clark Corp., alleging the consumer-goods giant contaminated her drinking water and the Housatonic River with toxic “forever chemicals” from an unlined landfill where the company disposed of manufacturing waste for decades.
Minah McBreairty filed the complaint Oct. 17 in Litchfield Superior Court, claiming the Irving, Texas-based company’s former landfill has leached dangerous levels of PFAS into groundwater and surface water in violation of state environmental laws.
PFAS, or perfluorinated alkylated substances, are used in the manufacturing of many consumer products and are resistant to biodegradation. They are known carcinogens and can cause numerous health problems.
Kimberly-Clark has operated a manufacturing facility in New Milford since the late 1970s. It also ran a 165-acre landfill from 1969 to 2010 — directly across from McBreairty’s home and adjacent to the Housatonic River.
The company used the landfill to dispose of “short-fiber paper sludge, according to the complaint.
The suit also names the Town of New Milford and its Inland Wetlands Commission for allegedly refusing to investigate the contamination.
The lawsuit is the second filed against Kimberly-Clark over PFAS contamination in New Milford.
In March, the same law firm representing McBreairty — Stamford-based Silver Golub & Teitell — filed a class action suit in federal court alleging the company released PFAS through airborne emissions from its New Milford plant. The new case focuses on a different contamination source: water flowing through the company’s closed landfill site.
Testing conducted in April showed McBreairty’s drinking water well contained 8.74 parts per trillion of PFOS and 4.83 ppt of PFOA, according to the complaint. Both levels exceed the Environmental Protection Agency’s safety standard of 4 ppt for each chemical.
Water samples taken in August from runoff flowing directly from the landfill property showed even higher concentrations: 31.2 ppt of PFOS and 9.33 ppt of PFOA. That water discharges through a culvert directly into the Housatonic River, a 149-mile waterway that flows to Long Island Sound, the complaint states.
The complaint alleges Kimberly-Clark intentionally used PFAS chemicals manufactured by 3M and DuPont in its production processes to provide liquid repellency in diapers and wet strength in tissue products.
“Kimberly-Clark’s patent filings spanning more than four decades prove the company’s deliberate and continuous use of PFAS products in its manufacturing activities,” the complaint states.
The complaint alleges Kimberly-Clark knew about the dangers of these chemicals by 2000, when 3M and the EPA jointly announced a phase-out of PFOS due to its persistence, bioaccumulation and toxicity. Internal 3M documents from the 1970s and 1990s showed company scientists knew the chemicals were “more toxic than anticipated” and could cause environmental harm, according to the complaint.
Despite this knowledge, the suit alleges, Kimberly-Clark took no steps to address contamination from its New Milford operations.
Unlike the earlier class action suit, which seeks more than $5 million in damages for personal injuries from airborne PFAS emissions, McBreairty’s lawsuit focuses on environmental statute violations and seeks injunctive relief rather than monetary damages.
The lawsuit seeks declarations that Kimberly-Clark violated Connecticut’s Inland Wetlands and Watercourses Act and Environmental Protection Act by discharging PFAS without required permits. It requests an injunction ordering the company to stop all PFAS discharges and to investigate, remediate and monitor the contamination.
The complaint also seeks orders requiring New Milford’s wetlands commission to enforce environmental laws against Kimberly-Clark. McBreairty said she notified the commission of the contamination in February, but officials declined to investigate, citing limited resources.
The earlier federal lawsuit, filed by three New Milford residents living within 3 miles of Kimberly-Clark’s facility at 58 Pickett District Road, alleged PFAS was released through stack emissions during tissue manufacturing. That case claimed the chemicals went airborne, traveled and deposited on properties and into drinking wells.
Connecticut has taken aggressive action on PFAS in recent years. The state banned the chemicals in firefighting foam and food packaging in 2021 and enacted sweeping legislation in 2024 to phase out PFAS in textiles, cosmetics, cookware and other consumer products by 2028.
Kimberly-Clark did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this article, but previously told the Hartford Business Journal that it has phased out the use of PFAS chemicals.
“We believe the allegations raised in this lawsuit are unfounded and plan to vigorously defend against them,” a spokesman for the company said, in response to the federal lawsuit.