Editorial: Targeting pollution

Saturday, June 16, 2007 | 7:38 a.m.

The U.S. Supreme Court reinforced the federal Superfund anti-pollution program this week when it ruled that companies that voluntarily clean up hazardous materials are allowed to sue the government to recover cleanup costs.

The court issued its unanimous ruling in the case involving Atlantic Research Corp., which had contracted with the federal government to retrofit rocket motors, the Associated Press reported Monday. The company had voluntarily cleaned up the pollution caused by rocket propellant seeping into the soil and ground water.

The company had sued the government to recover some of the cleanup costs. But the Bush administration contended that in order for a company to sue the government, federal regulators acting under the 1980 Superfund law must first sue the polluting company or take government action against the company.

The Supreme Court disagreed, saying the Superfund law isn't that specific. Justice Clarence Thomas, who wrote the court's opinion, said that the 1980 Superfund law is worded "so broadly as to sweep in virtually all persons likely to incur cleanup costs" and that the Bush administration's narrower interpretation "makes little textual sense."

The Superfund program is administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and is designed to locate and direct the cleanup of hazardous waste sites such as landfills or abandoned warehouses and work areas of companies that used or dealt with hazardous materials.

Corporations, state environmental regulators and environmental groups criticized the Bush administration's position and correctly said companies prevented from recovering some of the costs associated with voluntarily cleaning up their hazardous messes would have little incentive to do such work. Many likely would just wait for the government to act.

Federal regulators have only enough time and funding to take action against the very worst of the nation's estimated 450,000 hazardous cleanup sites. The government should do all that it can to encourage industry to do what is right.