Italian Chemical Plant Poisoned Water W. PFAS; After Bankruptcy, It Closed - And Now Operates In India
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The factory is almost brand new, but its machinery is not: it comes from the former Miteni factory in Vicenza, Italy. Miteni closed down in 2018 after one of the worst environmental scandals in the country’s recent history: after decades of producing Pfas forever chemicals, the company’s management was brought to trial for contaminating water resources in an area where 350,000 people live. In June, its former executives were found guilty at the Vicenza court of assizes of causing environmental pollution and other charges and given prison sentences, which they are expected to appeal against.
And yet, all of the company’s equipment, its patents and processes – everything needed to produce Pfas – is now here in Lote Parshuram MIDC, a vast industrial enclave almost 4,000 miles away, wedged between villages and groves of trees. And the factory has just started to produce forever chemicals again. Once known for its specialism in developing processes for advanced chemicals, Miteni is now infamous for the toxic legacy it left behind. In 2011, scientists found extraordinarily high concentrations of Pfas in the plant’s wastewater. Hundreds of thousands of residents had been exposed through drinking water.
The worst-affected were Miteni’s own workers. Ilario Ermetti, 69, who worked for decades in its fluorinated chemical department, showed one of the highest concentrations of Pfas ever recorded in human blood. “When the story came to light, I looked at a list of medical conditions related to Pfas, and found out I had them all,” says Ermetti. High levels of Pfas in the blood are associated with increased risk of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, liver and kidney damage, reproductive disorders and more. Ermetti is currently recovering from a recent surgical operation.
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After Miteni went bankrupt, its assets were bought in 2019 by Viva Lifesciences, a subsidiary of the Indian chemical company Laxmi Organic Industries – the only bidder in the public auction. By early 2023, all the equipment was travelling on freight ships, heading to Mumbai. Meanwhile, Laxmi was boasting of its new acquisition to investors. Transcripts of shareholders’ meetings show that Laxmi’s management downplayed environmental concerns, with its president, Harshvardhan Goenka, stating that Miteni was “doing everything legally according to European standards”. Goenka is one of the three men on the board of Laxmi Organic Italy, a company founded in 2021. Another is Antonio Nardone, the last chief executive of Miteni, who was found guilty of environmental pollution and false accounting at the June trial and sentenced to six years and four months in prison. According to a former mid-level manager speaking on condition of anonymity, Nardone was taking business trips to India months before the company went bankrupt.
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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/31/miteni-factory-pfas-plant-italy-india