Editorials & Other Articles

bananas

(27,509 posts) Mon Jun 2, 2014, 06:16 AM Jun 2014

Largest environmental settlement ever won by the U.S. government: Kerr-McGee fraud

... announced last month by the U.S. Department of Justice and approved by a judge last week, required Anadarko Petroleum Corp. to pay a $5.15 billion settlement of fraud claims from a 2006 acquisition of Kerr-McGee.

The agreement is the largest environmental settlement ever won by the U.S. government, and about $4.5 billion is earmarked for cleaning up thousands of sites around the country contaminated by creosote and uranium debris.

http://rapidcityjournal.com/news/local/settlement-gives-million-to-clean-up-abandoned-uranium-mine-in/article_bf5f6b6b-ad32-5239-a130-cccd47d8ec29.html

Settlement gives $179 million to clean up abandoned uranium mine in Harding County

22 hours ago • Joe O'Sullivan Journal staff

Used in the early years of America's thirst for nuclear fuel, the Riley Pass uranium mine in Harding County was one of hundreds of sites mined to provide fuel for nuclear weapons and reactors.

Companies strip-mined the site, which sprawls across 250 acres of bluffs and other land in the North Cave Hills, about five miles east of the town of Ludlow about 130 miles northwest of Rapid City. In those days, there were no regulations forcing companies to clean up old mines.

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Now, a tangled series of court proceedings has resulted in a $179 million plan to clean up the majority of the mine site. That money is part of a settlement, announced last month by the U.S. Department of Justice and approved by a judge last week, required Anadarko Petroleum Corp. to pay a $5.15 billion settlement of fraud claims from a 2006 acquisition of Kerr-McGee.

The agreement is the largest environmental settlement ever won by the U.S. government, and about $4.5 billion is earmarked for cleaning up thousands of sites around the country contaminated by creosote and uranium debris. The rest will pay for legal claims filed by individuals

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Related Links
Read the 2006 health risk assessment report for the Riley Pass uranium mine site

Via http://nuclear-news.net/2014/06/02/largest-environmental-settlement-ever-to-clean-up-south-dakota-uranium-mine/

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Largest environmental settlement ever won by the U.S. government: Kerr-McGee fraud (Original Post) bananas Jun 2014 OP

wikipedia: Largest environmental settlement in American history bananas Jun 2014 #1

bananas

(27,509 posts)

1. wikipedia: Largest environmental settlement in American history

Reply to bananas (Original post)

Mon Jun 2, 2014, 06:22 AM

Jun 2014

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anadarko_Petroleum_Corporation

Anadarko Petroleum Corporation is an American oil and gas exploration company and one of the world’s largest publicly traded oil and gas exploration and production companies, with approximately 2.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent (BOE) of proved reserves and annual sales volumes of 248 million BOE as of December 31, 2011. Anadarko employs a worldwide workforce of about 4,000.[1] The company is headquartered in The Woodlands, SPD Montgomery County, Texas.[2]

The company has been the subject of multiple environmental cases, including the largest environmental contamination settlement in American history in 2014.[3]

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Largest environmental settlement in American history

In April 2014, Anadarko settled with the Federal Government to pay over $5 billion to clean up environmental waste sites around the country. It was the largest environmental contamination settlement in American history.[3]

The environmental contamination sites were inherited by Anadarko after it purchased Kerr-McGee in 2005. As background, Kerr-McGee had spun off the company Tronox to offload generations of environmental dumping of toxic waste across 22 states beginning in the 1920s. According to one report, "Kerr-McGee, rather than pay for the environmental mess it created, decided to shift the liabilities between 2002 and 2006 into Tronox. Kerr-McGee, meanwhile, kept its valuable oil and gas assets."[3] Anadarko then purchased the "clean" portion of Kerr-McGee free of its legacy of environmental dumping. In 2009, shareholders of Tronox sued Anadarko (successor to Kerr-McGee) for having misled investors about the large environmental and other debts Tronox would inherit from its parent corporation.[10][11][12][13] The environmental pollution included polluting Lake Mead in Nevada with rocket fuel, leaving behind radioactive waste piles throughout the territory of the Navajo Nation and dumping carcinogenic creosote in communities throughout the East, Midwest and South at its wood-treating facilities.[3]

In April 2014, the federal government reached an over $5 billion settlement with Anadarko in the largest environmental contamination case in American history.[3]

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