3M is closing its checkbook regarding pollution-control costs.

For the first time, 3M Co. is refusing to pay cleanup costs of polluting chemicals it manufactured. The company announced on Monday that it will not pay $377,000 for filters, bottled water and other costs of dealing with chemicals found in drinking water.

The state Pollution Control Agency billed 3M for those costs — the kind of expenses that 3M has paid in the past. But this time, 3M says that the parts-per-trillion amounts in water could have come from fire extinguishers or other sources, and not necessarily the dumpsites where it placed the chemicals.

The company has already spent more than $100 million on cleanup efforts. Now it is saying, in effect, enough is enough.

But state officials argue that regardless of the source, the chemicals were manufactured by 3M. They say that 3M should pay expenses, as stipulated in a 2007 agreement.

“There is no new information … that has not already been investigated,” said the agency’s emailed response.

“3M is trying to reinterpret an agreement they signed and have been complying with for more than a decade. It’s disappointing that the company is trying to rewrite history already agreed upon.”

3M manufactured perfluorochemicals, or PFCs, for use in nonstick cookware, fire-fighting foam and stain repellant. It legally dumped the chemicals in landfills in Woodbury, Lake Elmo and Oakdale ending in the 1970s. It stopped making PFCs in 2002.

The state has billed 3M for cleanup costs it incurred in Woodbury, Oakdale and Cottage Grove. Those costs include bottled water for residents, water-sampling costs and staff time.

But a letter from 3M lawyers Brewer, Attorneys & Counselors says exactly where the pollution is coming from is not known.

It is possible, they say, that chemicals in firefighting foam have seeped into groundwater. The foam used at a firefighter training facility has been identified as the source of PFCs in groundwater in Bemidji.

3M said that 4,000 gallons of foam were used to fight a 2002 fire at Up North Plastics in Cottage Grove. The foam has been sprayed at refinery fires in the area, too, the company said.

Cottage Grove operates a firefighter training facility that has used the foam — another potential source of the pollution, according to 3M attorney William A. Brewer III.

It’s also possible, he said, that the pollution came from a dump site in Lake Elmo.

“The state (not 3M) is responsible for that site and any PFC-related impacts resulting from it,” wrote attorney Brewer. Related Articles Third body recovered from scene of fatal plane crash in Cottage Grove

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In 2004, traces of the chemicals were found in drinking water of about 65,000 residents in Washington County. In high doses, the chemicals cause cancer and birth defects in mice, but the parts-per-trillion amounts in drinking water have not been proven to be harmful to people.

The company installed filters in the Oakdale water system and in private homes. It is currently pumping groundwater out of its old dump sites, filtering it, and returning it to the Mississippi River. 3M paid for bottled water and the costs of monitoring the chemicals in groundwater.

The costs totaled more than $100 million as of 2012, according to a company document.

The company has been pumping and filtering water from the dumpsites for more than 10 years. That’s why attorney Brewer said 3M no longer believes that the remaining pollution is coming from those sites — particularly because the underground water doesn’t flow that way.

The polluted underground water flows southward from the dump sites, yet PFCs have been found in other areas of Cottage Grove.