REPORT: GM gets out from under its polluted sites scot-free

[cwerdna]

REPORT: GM gets out from under its polluted sites scot-free — Autoblog Green
GM gets to dump its polluted sites | Freep.com | Detroit Free Press

[jayman]

Oh, goody. Gotta love Chapter 11

I suppose CERCLA/SARA will need more funding

[markderail]

The Prius gets the blame for Sudbury Ontario, the Volt can get the blame for this, right?

[a priori]

Originally Posted by jayman

I suppose CERCLA/SARA will need more funding

As a matter of fact, Superfund will need new funding. It has nothing to do with the GM bankruptcy, but rather with the recent Supreme Court ruling that removes the strict and joint & several liability scheme from many situations. See BURLINGTON NORTHERN & SANTA FE RAILWAY CO. et al. v. UNITED STATES et al.

(Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit) No. 07–1601. Argued February 24, 2009—Decided May 4, 2009. A .pdf is attached.

What this means is that the responsible parties at a Superfund site still are going to be obligated to fund the cleanup, per each party's share of responsibility for the problem. The change is that those responsible parties are not going to have to pay for the shares of the other parties who cannot be identified or are out of business (bankruptcy or other causes). This rectifies a certain inequity in application of the law, but it makes it clear that the U.S. government is going to be responsible for the "orphan" shares that remain.

[PriusLewis]

Originally Posted by a priori

As a matter of fact, Superfund will need new funding. It has nothing to do with the GM bankruptcy, but rather with the recent Supreme Court ruling that removes the strict and joint & several liability scheme from many situations. See BURLINGTON NORTHERN & SANTA FE RAILWAY CO. et al. v. UNITED STATES et al.

(Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit) No. 07–1601. Argued February 24, 2009—Decided May 4, 2009. A .pdf is attached.

What this means is that the responsible parties at a Superfund site still are going to be obligated to fund the cleanup, per each party's share of responsibility for the problem. The change is that those responsible parties are not going to have to pay for the shares of the other parties who cannot be identified or are out of business (bankruptcy or other causes). This rectifies a certain inequity in application of the law, but it makes it clear that the U.S. government is going to be responsible for the "orphan" shares that remain.

Great research. I'll file this one away for possible use in my PhD thesis...

[dogfriend]

GM should clean up its messes? Oh no, that was the old GM. This is the new GM, those messes aren't ours anymore.

This is a huge loophole in the whole capitalism scheme. The spoils of success belong to a few, the disasters of failure belong to us all.

[jayman]

Originally Posted by a priori

As a matter of fact, Superfund will need new funding.

I should have phrased my comment

[Sarcasm Mode = ON] I suppose CERCLA/SARA will need more funding [Sarcasm Mode = OFF]

There are a lot of messes out there, such as Formerly Used Defense Sites, forgotten/abandoned underground storage tanks, old chemical plants, industrial sites, etc

I honestly don't think anybody went out of their way to purposely try to kill us. It's just that, over 40-50 years ago, nobody thought anything unusual about sticking a single wall, thin gauge, underground storage tank into the ground

Now we're faced with a legacy of heavily contaminated sites, with underground plumes royally screwing up acquifers. I've done some work on site remediation, it's expensive and dangerous

[a priori]

Originally Posted by jayman

I should have phrased my comment

[Sarcasm Mode = ON] I suppose CERCLA/SARA will need more funding [Sarcasm Mode = OFF]

There are a lot of messes out there, such as Formerly Used Defense Sites, forgotten/abandoned underground storage tanks, old chemical plants, industrial sites, etc

I honestly don't think anybody went out of their way to purposely try to kill us. It's just that, over 40-50 years ago, nobody thought anything unusual about sticking a single wall, thin gauge, underground storage tank into the ground

Now we're faced with a legacy of heavily contaminated sites, with underground plumes royally screwing up acquifers. I've done some work on site remediation, it's expensive and dangerous

I should have posted: [Responding to a shrewd observation = ON]You've got that right![Responding to a shrewd observation = OFF]

I wasn't aiming for a full-blown observation/discussion/opinion piece, but I have a feeling we have some similar appreciation for the situation.

I don't disagree with the sentiment and opinion behind CERCLA/SARA, but I've never believed the public policy portion of the strict liability piece for past acts was correct. On a going-forward basis (meaning 1980 and into the future), I think the policy is correct. Really. We should stick it to the people who ignore CERCLA, RCRA and the other environmental laws for self-aggrandizement. They should pay for avoiding the appropriate actions spelled out in laws on the books at the time they've acted.

As written, Superfund is an ex post facto law. Despite the legal losses on that argument, I think the law speaks for itself: If what you did was legal in 1948, that doesn't mean you can't be prosecuted for the act just because the applicable law wasn't passed until 1980 (or 1986 in parts).

The recent BNSF case rights a bit of the wrong by having the responsible parties pay for only their shares and not for the other shares of persons long since deceased. Still, I believe that if public policy demands fixes for these old harms (and many of them are serious harms!), then public funds should be used. If the acts were illegal, improper, or even outside the norm for the time period, then I'd agree with assessment of costs to the responsible parties. Yes, it would take some work to determine what was appropriate at the time, but it would still cost less than all of the legal challenges that have happened just to get the law to its more reasonable expression.

[hill]

Oh the irony of ironies . . . GM's malibu hybrid, which they no longer build, and the Volt, that they NEVER have built, and the EV1, that they crushed, and the land barges they push, topped with the green commercials that we the tax payer fund. Ya gotta love it.


.

[jayman]

Originally Posted by a priori

I have a feeling we have some similar appreciation for the situation.

You bet. Something tells me that after 5-6 drinks, we'd have a lot of solutions to the problem

Originally Posted by hill

Oh the irony of ironies .

Oh, isn't THAT the truth? Oh, nothing heavy drinking won't cure. Oh, my poor enlarged aching liver ....