CERCLA Statute of Limitations, Preemption, and Allocation: Latest Developments in Superfund and Environmental Litigation
Course Details
- smart_display Format
On-Demand
- signal_cellular_alt Difficulty Level
Intermediate
- work Practice Area
Environmental
- event Date
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
- schedule Time
1:00 p.m. ET./10:00 a.m. PT
- timer Program Length
90 minutes
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This 90-minute webinar is eligible in most states for 1.5 CLE credits.
This CLE course will provide guidance and case studies for counsel on CERCLA statute of limitations (including removal vs. remedial measures and cost recovery vs. contribution claims), preemption, and allocation dynamics. The expert panel will also offer "in the trenches" strategies related to managing timing, choice of courts, and allocation challenges in Superfund and environmental litigation.
Mr. Brown’s practice focuses on environmental litigation, environmental regulation, product liability, toxic torts, ESG, and transactional due diligence. He represents clients throughout the full lifecycle of complex environmental and products liability litigations and regulatory matters. He has extensive experience addressing litigation and regulatory matters involving natural resource damages, contaminated sediments, and emerging chemicals of concern, particularly per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Mr. Brown has successfully defended claims in numerous federal and state courts across the country and also regularly counsels buyers, sellers, lenders, and underwriters on the full spectrum of environmental issues that may affect transactions.
Mr. Rockman counsels clients in managing environmental compliance and environmental risks to meet their legal obligations with respect to federal, state, and local environmental laws, regulations, and permits. He has experience with all of the major environmental programs governing air, water, waste, and land issues, across a broad spectrum of industries and activities.
Mr. Thurlow is an environmental litigator with significant experience in environmental matters brought under the Clean Air Act, CERCLA, Clean Water Act and RCRA. He formerly served in the Environmental Enforcement Section of the U.S. Department of Justice where he acted as lead counsel on a variety of civil enforcement matters, including a major Clean Water Act case against the city of Memphis, Tennessee, several Superfund cases, and several Clean Air Act matters involving power plants and oil refineries. He is a frequent writer and speaker.
Litigation to assign and apportion contamination cleanup costs among private and public parties under CERCLA raises some of the most complex issues in environmental law. Plaintiffs and defendants must navigate a growing and conflicting body of law regarding the timeliness of cost recovery and contribution actions to determine whether a three-year or six-year limitations period applies, and what event triggers which limitations period.
This webinar will explain the current state of the law on these issues and recent case law that underscores the challenge of classifying environmental work as removal or remedial in nature and the implications of such a classification on whether a lawsuit is timely.
Another fundamental timing issue under CERCLA is the extent to which the statute's preemption of state accrual dates for contamination lawsuits extends to state statutes of repose. The Supreme Court's ruling in Waldburger held that CERCLA does not preempt a state statute of repose, but only preempts state statutes of limitations in environmental tort cases.
Finally, allocation of liability and response costs among responsible parties remains a dynamic and fact-intensive process that will put litigation skills to the test. The panel will outline related foundational law and its nuances and detail case studies illustrating allocation opportunities and pitfalls.
Listen as our authoritative panel of environmental attorneys provides practitioners on both the plaintiffs' and defendants' sides guidance on how to approach CERCLA statute of limitations, preemption, and allocation issues.
- Statute of limitations under Section 107
- Statute of limitations under Section 113
- Preemption of state statutes of limitation and repose
- Apportionment of liability and response costs
The panel will review these and other key issues:
- When should a response action be considered a remedial or removal action?
- What steps can counsel take to leverage the federal accrual date for an environmental tort claim, whether governed by a statute of limitations or repose, or both?
- What best practices can counsel employ to reduce CERCLA liability early in the litigation?
- How can the allocation battle be won from discovery through trial?
