3M has agreed to pay $7.35 billion over nine years to settle personal injury claims over "forever chemicals" in firefighting foam, the company announced Tuesday evening. It says the deal covers about 99% of current personal injury claims against it, from roughly 115,000 to 120,000 plaintiffs who are eligible to take part.

The money arrives slowly. 3M will pay $50 million in 2026 and nothing in 2027, and about a fifth of the total comes due in the last two years. Spread out that way, the commitment has a present value of $5.8 billion, which 3M will book as a pre-tax charge in the fourth quarter. The company says the settlement is not an admission of liability.

Who the settlement covers

A sailor holding papers and a radio while a ship's hangar bay floor fills with white firefighting foam during a sprinkler test
A Navy damage controlman coordinates a test of the aqueous film-forming foam sprinkler system in the hangar bay of the USS Kitty Hawk in May 2006.U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate Airman Patrick L. Heil / Wikimedia Commons_sprinkler_system_aboard_the_conventionally-powered_aircraft_carrier_USS_Kitty_Haw.jpg) / Public domain

The claims come from the federal multidistrict litigation over aqueous film-forming foam, the firefighting foam used on liquid fuel fires. The court overseeing the cases, in the District of South Carolina under Judge Richard M. Gergel, describes more than 23,000 cases involving 100,000 plaintiffs since the litigation began. They generally allege that foam containing PFOA or PFOS, two types of PFAS, contaminated groundwater near military bases, airports and industrial sites, and that the contamination caused personal injury, a need for medical monitoring, property damage or other losses.

3M's agreement reaches claims both inside and outside that litigation, including every personal injury claim that has been the focus of the MDL.

For claims that remain or come later, 3M lists several mechanisms: payments that depend on plaintiffs joining the resolution, a $680 million reserve inside the total, and a court order the company expects the judge to issue setting evidence and timing requirements for anyone who chooses to keep suing. The release does not say when that order will come or how individual payments will be calculated.

How this fits with earlier PFAS deals

Sailors in red helmets and fire gear holding a hose nozzle during a firefighting drill
Sailors aboard USS Bonhomme Richard train with aqueous film-forming foam on a simulated aircraft fire in Sasebo, Japan, in January 2017.Petty Officer 2nd Class Kyle Carlstrom, U.S. Navy / Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

CEO William Brown called the agreement "another important step in managing legacy PFAS matters." He pointed to 3M's 2023 settlement with U.S. public water suppliers and a more recent one with New Jersey. 3M says it stopped making the older PFAS compounds after announcing a phase-out in 2000, and that it met a goal of ending all PFAS manufacturing worldwide by the end of 2025.

The deal can still come apart. If too few plaintiffs sign on, 3M can end the settlement under its own risk disclosures, and the company says it is prepared to keep defending itself in court if agreed terms are not met.

3M plans to discuss the agreement with investors at 8:30 a.m. Eastern on Wednesday.