Recent Developments in the Field of Liability for Hazardous Wastes under CERCLA and Natural Resource Damages in the United States
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Description
The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act of 1980, known as CERCLA or the Superfund statute, is the United States law authorizing the government to sue for the costs of cleaning up sites on land or in water where hazardous substances have been released. This statute contains a stringent liability scheme forcing polluters to perform or fund the cleanup of such substances. Liability under CERCLA for cleanup is strict, and defences to liability are few and narrow. Those liable include owners and operators of lands or facilities from which releases have occurred, those transporting wastes to such sites, and generators of wastes that are disposed there. Cleanup liability does not depend on proof of actual harm. It is enough that a release of toxic substances occurred or is threatened. Moreover, a generator or transporter of toxic wastes disposed of at a side may be liable even if it cannot be shown that the toxic chemicals from a facility were precisely the same as those taken to the site. Unless those responsible for different wastes at a site can show that the harm caused or threatened by their wastes is divisible and distinct, each responsible party is jointly and severally liable for the entire cleanup. Accordingly, CERCLA cleanup is far broader than private law tort liability. Since CERLCA’s enactment ten years ago the government has pursued remediation and concomitant protection of human health as the first priority. The Justice Department, on behalf of the Environmental Protection Agency, has initiated hundreds of suits to recover the costs of government cleanup sites or to force cleanup by the responsible parties. In the past year, the Environmental Division of the United States Department of Justice initiated 151 new actions and received more than $1.1 billion in cost recovery and cleanup under CERCLA and related statutes. In addition, CERCLA authorizes natural resource damage actions. These are suits by federal and state governments seeking compensation on behalf of the public for damage to natural resources owned or managed by such governments, when such damage has been caused by release of hazardous wastes. CERCLA requires that funds recovered in these suits be applied to restore or replace the damaged natural resources. The Oil Pollution Act of 1990 creates a similar system authorizing governmental claims for resource damage caused by oil spilled into inland or coastal waters, expanding the earlier system of liability established by the Clean Water Act. Only recently has the federal government initiated a substantial number of suits seeking compensation for damaged natural resources under CERCLA. An array of formidable questions surrounds these suits. Foremost among these is whether CERCLA’s stringent cost recovery rules or traditional private law tort principles, or some other set of liability rules applies to natural resource damages claims based on releases of hazardous wastes of oil spills.
Source Publication
Transboundary Pollution and Liability: The Case of the River Rhine: Proceedings of an International Conference, Held in Rotterdam, 19 October 1990
Source Editors/Authors
Jan M. van Dunné
Publication Date
1991
Recommended Citation
Stewart, Richard B., "Recent Developments in the Field of Liability for Hazardous Wastes under CERCLA and
Natural Resource Damages in the United States" (1991). Faculty Chapters. 1705.
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-chapt/1705
