High Court Holds Chemical Supplier Not Liable for Pollution Cleanup
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a supplier that delivered pesticides to a company that polluted an industrial site in California is not liable for cleanup costs.
The court ruled that Shell Oil Co. was not liable under the Superfund law for delivering the chemicals, the Associated Press reports. The court also found that the landlords for a portion of the contaminated site, the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railroad Co. and the Union Pacific Railroad, were responsible for only 9 percent of the cleanup costs.
Justice John Paul Stevens wrote the majority opinion, SCOTUSblog reports.
The 8-1 ruling (PDF) overturned a decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals based in San Francisco that found Shell and the railroads could be held liable for nearly the full costs of the cleanup, Reuters reports. The company that operated the site is now defunct.
The 9th Circuit had found Shell liable under a Superfund provision that imposes cleanup costs on companies that “arranged for disposal” of hazardous substances. The Supreme Court said Shell had taken steps to reduce the likelihood that its chemicals would be spilled at the site, and knowledge that some spills and leaks were still occurring was insufficient to establish the company “arranged for” disposal of its chemicals there.
The court also said most of the pollution at the California site was not on the railroad’s land.
The cases are Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Co. v. U.S., and Shell Oil Co. v. U.S.
