March 17, 2025
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Will there be ‘forever chemicals’ in the Lake Michigan water Yorkville pipes in?

City joins class action lawsuit for any future costs to eliminate PFAS from water

By Joey Weslo
Students from Naperville Central High School kayak on the Fox River in Yorkville. According to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources (IDNR), the Glen D. Palmer Dam in Yorkville is not scheduled for removal or any modifications.

Yorkville is seeking to join a class action lawsuit against chemical companies for potentially contaminating its drinking water with 'PFAS,' commonly known as forever chemicals. Yorkville receives its water from an underground aquifer which gets replenished from water permeating its soil from the Fox River watershed. While aquifers typically don't contain PFAS, the city is switching to Lake Michigan water in 2028 which does contain the forever chemicals. Pictured, kayakers enjoy the rapids on the Fox River in downtown Yorkville. (Sandy Bressner)

Yorkville approved joining a national class-action lawsuit against four chemical producing corporations, including 3M and DuPont, seeking compensation for contaminating several towns’ public water systems with a group of chemicals known as PFAS. City council approved the agreement at their March 11 meeting.

While PFAS are not typically found in deep aquifers like the one Yorkville sources its water from, they are found in Lake Michigan water, which the city is switching to in 2028.

PFAS is an abbreviation for perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances. Studies of laboratory animals given large amounts of PFAS have found that some PFAS may affect growth and development, reproduction, thyroid function, the immune system, and the liver.

Yorkville has not detected any PFAS in their current water, City Administrator Bart Olson said during the meeting, but that doesn’t exclude the city from an award.

“It doesn’t mean we won’t be able to get an award for future issues down the road,” Olson said during the meeting. “We’re moving to Lake Michigan water, so there may be some award we would receive as a result of transferring to that water source. We’d be able to use those funds to then mitigate issues in the future. There is PFAS in Lake Michigan water.”

The award may help the city offset preventative costs and mitigating costs related to ensuring Yorkville has safe drinking water for its residents.

The city was approached by the law firm of Gardiner, Weisberg & Wrona, who believes Yorkville is a good candidate to receive an award from the lawsuit, according to city documents.

The size of compensation Yorkville may receive depends upon the concentration of PFAS detected in its water. 3M has already settled $12.5 billion with public water suppliers across the country. While three other companies – Chemours, DuPont and Corteva – have settled an additional $1.19 billion combined.

Several municipalities across Illinois have agreed to join the class action litigation.

To be eligible, Yorkville must perform tests on its public water systems and submit its claims before the end of 2025, according to documents prepared by the law firm.

In April 2024, the Environmental Protection Agency enacted the nation’s first drinking water standards for PFAS. The standards mandate that all municipalities across the country remedy and prove their water carries less than four parts per trillion of the most dangerous PFAS by 2029.

However, the Trump Administration announced in January 2025, it was directing the EPA to pause the pending plans to regulate PFAS in waste water. Several environmental organizations plan to take legal action against the Trump Administration’s moves.

The Trump Administration is expected to eventually bring back regulations against PFAS. However, the regulations may allow higher levels of PFAS than the standards under Biden, according to legal analysts at Clyde & Co, which have a Chicago-based office.

The legal analysts are not expecting the changes in EPA regulations to have any impact on the class action settlements against 3M and DuPont.

If Yorkville receives any settlement compensation in the litigation, the hired law firm is entitled to one-third the financial amount of the award plus attorney fees. Yorkville is not on the hook to pay the law firm if they do not receive any award funding.