Wastewater spill
Exxon Mobil subsidiary charged for wastewater spill in Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane filed criminal charges on Tuesday against XTO Energy, an Exxon Mobil subsidiary based in Fort Worth, Texas, related to a spill of more than 50,000 gallons of chemical-laced wastewater in 2010. Having already been fined $100,000 by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) in July, XTO claims that the polluting of a Susquehanna River tributary, located near the company's water recycling plant in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, was an accident. On Tuesday, XTO was charged under the state's Clean Streams Law and Solid Waste Management Act, both of which carry prison sentences as possible punishment. According to XTO, "The criminal charges filed by the Attorney General are unprecedented and an abuse of prosecutorial discretion." XTO admitted no wrongdoing as part of the settlement with the EPA and DOJ.
The Exxon Mobil Corp. has previously faced allegations of improper conduct. In 2011 the US District Court for the District of Alaska refused to reopen the $900 million settlement agreement that was reached in 1991 following the infamous Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989. Following similar attempts to reopen the settlement by the US and Alaskan government in 2006, the US Supreme Court ruled 5-3 in June 2008 to reduce a punitive damages award to be paid by Exxon from $2.5 billion to $500 million. The Valdez dumped 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound and contaminated about 1,300 miles of coastline.
(Published by Jurist - September 11, 2013)