3M Company (Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing) operated the Chemolit Plant (also referred to as the Hastings Plant) in Cottage Grove, Minnesota. This facility is documented in asbestos litigation — specifically in insulator deposition testimony — as an industrial site where trade workers performing installation, maintenance, and construction work were exposed to asbestos.

Corpus documentation

Deposition testimony from a worker employed as a Navy Boiler Tender and later as an Insulator lists the 3M Chemolit Plant/Hastings Plant in Cottage Grove as one of his documented jobsites between approximately 1962 and 1979. The deposition lists it alongside Rush Island power plant (Festus, MO), the Quad Cities Nuclear Plant (Cordova, IL), a Koch oil refinery (Rosemount, MN), and the Waldorf paper mill (St. Paul, MN) — a typical Midwest insulator’s work history that crossed industrial and power generation sites.

This type of documentation establishes the Cottage Grove 3M plant as a site where trade contractors (insulators, pipefitters, boilermakers) were deployed for maintenance and construction work, bringing them into contact with asbestos insulation products at the facility.

3M asbestos products

3M manufactured multiple asbestos-containing products during the asbestos era:

  • Asbestos tape — documented in worker affidavits as used during residential and commercial construction and installation work (cutting and installing 3M asbestos tape in construction settings through the late 1970s)
  • Asbestos gaskets for Chesterton — 3M manufactured asbestos gasket material for A.W. Chesterton Company, a major industrial packing and sealing products manufacturer; the Chesterton “mechanical seal school” used 3M-sourced asbestos gasket material in training

Facility

  • Location: Cottage Grove, Minnesota (Washington County)
  • Also known as: Chemolit Plant, Hastings Plant
  • Documented in: Insulator deposition testimony (1962–1979 jobsite history)

If you worked at the 3M Chemolit Plant in Cottage Grove

Trade contractors, insulators, pipefitters, and maintenance workers who performed work at the Cottage Grove 3M facility during the asbestos era may have been exposed to asbestos from insulation, gaskets, and other materials at the site.

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References to manufacturers, products, and litigation history reflect what has been alleged or documented in publicly filed asbestos litigation, federal regulatory records, and industry archives. This information does not constitute a finding of fact or liability.