Engineered Stone Silicosis: Who You Can Actually Sue

A material marketed as a durable, low-maintenance alternative to natural stone has produced one of the fastest-moving occupational disease crises in recent memory — workers getting seriously, sometimes fatally, ill after just a few years on the job, not the decades doctors historically associated with this disease. The litigation that followed is still being fought on multiple fronts at once, including one in Congress right now.

Quick answer: Engineered stone (quartz-composite countertop material) can contain 90% or more crystalline silica, far above natural stone, and cutting or grinding it without proper controls has caused silicosis — an irreversible lung disease — in workers after just a few years of exposure. California has confirmed more than 500 cases and at least 29 deaths since 2019. Lawsuits against manufacturers including Caesarstone, Cambria and Cosentino have already produced a $52.4 million verdict (2024) and a $26 million-plus settlement, with combined results exceeding $78 million. Cal/OSHA’s emergency safety standard, adopted in 2023 and made permanent in 2025, now requires wet-cutting methods. A bill in Congress, H.R. 5437, modeled directly on the law shielding gun manufacturers, would dismiss roughly 500 pending lawsuits if it becomes law — as of this writing, it has passed committee but is not yet law.

Why Engineered Stone Specifically Causes This

Silicosis is caused by inhaling fine crystalline silica dust, which triggers permanent lung scarring that worsens over time and can eventually require a lung transplant or cause death. Engineered stone — the quartz-composite material behind most modern countertops, sold under brand names including Silestone, marketed for its durability and design consistency — is a specific, measurable escalation of this old occupational risk: it can contain 90% or more crystalline silica, compared to roughly 45% in granite and under 5% in marble. Cutting, grinding and polishing it without wet-cutting methods or adequate ventilation releases extraordinarily high concentrations of respirable silica dust.

The result is a genuinely different disease pattern than historical silicosis, which typically developed after decades of exposure in mining, quarrying or sandblasting. Fabrication shop workers have developed severe, and sometimes fatal, silicosis after just a few years of cutting engineered stone — a compressed timeline public health researchers have specifically documented and that has surprised even physicians experienced with occupational lung disease.

The Scale of the Crisis

California’s Department of Public Health has tracked confirmed silicosis cases linked to engineered stone fabrication since 2019. As of this writing, the state has confirmed more than 500 cases and at least 29 deaths, with dozens of workers requiring lung transplants — a toll concentrated heavily among fabrication shop workers in the Los Angeles area, where much of the industry is based.

Workers’ Comp Doesn’t Reach the Manufacturer

Because this is fundamentally a workplace exposure, the first question most affected workers ask is whether they can sue their employer — and the answer is generally no. Workers’ compensation exclusivity bars an ordinary lawsuit against your employer for a workplace injury or illness, the same rule described in our guide to occupational disease and workers’ compensation claims. But that exclusivity has never reached a separate claim against a third party — here, the manufacturer of the engineered stone itself — and that third-party product liability claim is where essentially all of the litigation covered in this guide is actually happening. If your own workers’ comp claim over a silicosis diagnosis has been denied or contested, see our guide to appealing a denied workers’ comp claim for that separate process.

The Lawsuits: Verdicts, Settlements, and a Foreign Criminal Conviction

Lawsuits have named Caesarstone, Cambria, Cosentino (maker of the Silestone brand), Color Marble and other manufacturers, generally on design-defect and failure-to-warn theories — alleging the companies sold a product with an extraordinarily high silica content without adequately warning the workers who would be cutting and installing it about the resulting exposure risk.

• August 2024 — a California jury returned a $52.4 million verdict against Caesarstone, Cambria and Color Marble in the first case tried to verdict.
• Shortly after, a second case settled for more than $26 million.
• Combined, verdicts and settlements in this litigation have already exceeded $78 million, and Caesarstone has separately disclosed, in its own financial filings, claims from more than 500 individuals and a $46 million loss reserve, with roughly $24.3 million expected to be covered by insurance.
• Most of the pending litigation is concentrated in California courts, reflecting where both the fabrication industry and the confirmed case count are heaviest.

Separately, in a related matter that became part of the broader public narrative around this crisis, an executive at Cosentino received a six-month suspended prison sentence in Spain in 2023 on five counts of causing serious injury through gross negligence, after admitting the company had covered up the health dangers associated with working with its product. No comparable individual criminal conviction has been reported in the U.S. civil litigation, which remains a civil matter here.

California’s Regulatory Response

In December 2023, Cal/OSHA adopted an emergency temporary standard that effectively bans dry-cutting of engineered stone containing 0.1% or more crystalline silica, and of natural stone containing 10% or more, requiring wet-cutting methods and respiratory protection for high-exposure tasks — cutting, grinding, polishing and cleanup. That emergency standard was made permanent in February 2025. Enforcement has been real, not symbolic: Cal/OSHA has opened more than 140 inspections of fabrication shops, assessed roughly $1.8 million in penalties, and issued stop-work orders at 26 shops found still dry-cutting or lacking adequate dust controls.

As of this writing, California regulators are considering further rulemaking that could restrict engineered stone even more, though the state has not adopted the kind of outright ban that Australia implemented nationally in the wake of its own silicosis crisis and California’s initial emergency standard. Whether California ultimately follows that path remains an open, actively-debated question rather than a settled one.

A Bill in Congress Right Now

The single most consequential, and most time-sensitive, fact in this entire guide is this: H.R. 5437, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Stone Slab Products Act, is currently moving through the U.S. House of Representatives. The bill is named and modeled directly on the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act — the federal law shielding firearm manufacturers from most lawsuits, covered in our guide to firearm injury claims and manufacturer liability — applying the same basic liability-shield structure to an entirely different industry. If enacted, it would grant engineered stone manufacturers and sellers broad immunity from lawsuits over injury or illness caused by their products, and would dismiss roughly 500 currently pending silicosis lawsuits outright.

The bill passed the House Judiciary Committee on a party-line 16-7 vote on June 3, 2026, and awaits a vote by the full House. It is not law as of this writing, and it may never become one — but its existence and current momentum is a specific, documented reason for anyone with a viable claim who hasn’t yet filed one not to wait and see how it resolves before acting.

Evidence That Matters

• Employment records identifying every fabrication shop you worked at, and your specific role and tasks (cutting, grinding, polishing, installation)
• The specific brand and product line of engineered stone you worked with, where identifiable, since different manufacturers are separate defendants
• Medical records documenting your diagnosis, including any imaging, pulmonary function testing, and the date symptoms first appeared or were first documented
• Records of the safety equipment and dust-control measures actually provided at your workplace — or the absence of them — including whether wet-cutting methods were used
• Any workers’ compensation claim records, since that separate process and this manufacturer claim can proceed on parallel tracks

Practical Steps

1. Get medically evaluated promptly if you have any respiratory symptoms and a history of engineered stone fabrication work, given how much earlier this disease can develop compared to historical silicosis.
2. Document every employer and shop you worked at, and the specific tasks you performed, since exposure history across multiple jobs may all be relevant.
3. Identify the specific brand of engineered stone involved, where possible, since the manufacturer — not your employer — is the primary civil defendant.
4. File a workers’ compensation claim and pursue a manufacturer liability claim separately — they are not mutually exclusive, and one does not substitute for the other.
5. Don’t wait to see what happens with pending federal legislation before consulting an attorney, given that a bill currently advancing in Congress could affect pending and future claims if it becomes law.
6. Consult an attorney experienced in silicosis and engineered stone litigation specifically, given how concentrated and fast-moving this litigation currently is.

Sources & Further Reading

• California Department of Public Health — ongoing confirmed case and fatality tracking for engineered stone-related silicosis, initiated in 2019
• Cal/OSHA emergency temporary standard on respirable crystalline silica in engineered stone and natural stone fabrication (adopted December 2023, made permanent February 2025)
• H.R. 5437, Protection of Lawful Commerce in Stone Slab Products Act — 119th Congress, passed the House Judiciary Committee June 3, 2026
• Reporting and court filings on the August 2024 California jury verdict and subsequent settlements against Caesarstone, Cambria, Cosentino and other engineered stone manufacturers
• Reporting on the 2023 Spanish criminal conviction of a Cosentino executive for concealing known health risks
• See our guides to defective product claims and the three liability theories for the design-defect and failure-to-warn framework this litigation is built on, occupational disease and workers’ compensation claims for why workers’ comp exclusivity doesn’t reach this manufacturer claim, appealing a denied workers’ comp claim for that separate process, and firearm injury claims and manufacturer liability for the federal liability-shield law this pending legislation is directly modeled on