I believe it was American Poet, Walt Whitman, who said, “If you done it, it ain’t bragging.” While I don’t know if it amounts to bragging, a recent accomplishment by my colleagues that resulted in a very favourable outcome in an Ontario court case was at least very satisfying professionally. Here are the specifics:
Source of Groundwater Contamination is Questioned
A large Canadian retailer, and one of the most recognizable names in Canada, takes its Corporate Citizenship responsibilities seriously – committed to not only being a responsible corporate citizen, but a good neighbour as well. So when free product gasoline was discovered in a monitoring well on one of their properties in Ontario during a routine inspection in 2007, it was viewed as a serious issue.
- Protection of store employees and patrons was a significant concern.
- How significant the contamination was had to be known as quickly as possible.
- The source of the contamination, as well as the responsible parties, had to be determined to proceed with remediation of the site.
Proving who is responsible for contamination
Our client tasked the Dragun Corporation with determining the immediate environmental and health issues, finding the source of the contamination, and proving who was the responsible party for clean-up.
- First, to address the immediate concerns, Dragun directed an interim remediation to protect the store employees and patrons from potential vapour intrusion, the impacted groundwater, and free product.
- Second, Dragun conducted a site characterization investigation on the property, which indicated a significant extent of impact. We also investigated the historical use of the property and surrounding properties.
- Third, Dragun systematically ruled out a nearby competitor gas bar, our client’s brand new gas bar, and other potential, historical, on-site sources. Dragun could not rule out the adjacent, hydraulically-upgradient property that had historically stored gasoline in an underground storage tank (UST). Dragun found that data from the upgradient property showed significant impact all the way from their UST area to the client’s property.
- Finally, since the adjacent property owner disagreed with our findings, there were several follow-up investigations and expert reports from its consultant. Our client went to Court for three weeks during the fall of 2013 to seek financial compensation. Dragun provided expert testimony on site characterization, extent of impact, source(s) of contamination, costs for the interim and final remediation of the property, and flaws in the neighbour’s expert reports.
Ontario court ruling
In its May 2014 decision, the Court fully agreed with Dragun’s interpretation of the situation and determination of the remediation costs. The Court ordered the upgradient neighbour to pay our client’s costs for all investigative work, all interim remediation work to date, and the estimated remediation cost to clean up the client’s property – a total of over $4.5 million.
If you would like more information about our litigation support services, contact Dr. Michael Sklash, P. Eng. (msklash@dragun.com) at 519-979-7300, ext. 120.