Teflon was originally created in 1945, and soon found its way into products including stain-resistant carpets, carpet-cleaning liquids, microwave popcorn bags, outdoor furniture, baking pans, and frying pans. 3M originally created the PFOA compound, the key substance in Teflon, before selling it to DuPont. Despite a memorandum from 3M to specifically avoid dumping the substance into water, DuPont "dumped, poured and released" at least 1.7 million pounds of PFOA between 1951 and 2003.
