CHARLESTON — The Courtland Company has filed another lawsuit against Union Carbide Corporation seeking for it to cease and desist from allowing pollutants to leach into navigable waters.
Courtland alleges in the latest suit that Union Carbide, for the last four decades, has violated federal and state environmental and public health protection laws, and has breached common law duties owed to the plaintiff and the public at large by letting pollutants make their way into the Kanawha River and Davis Creek. Courtland claims UCC is violating the Clean Water Act.
UCC's Filmont Waste Disposal Facility is part of 31 acres owned by UCC that is also occupied by the Massey Rail Yard in South Charleston.
"UCC has been aware of this Discharge and the continuous, ongoing, and unpermitted Discharges of Pollutants from its Filmont Waste Disposal Facility for many years, as it has been called to their attention by CH2M Hill, environmental consultants employed by UCC and its parent company, Dow Chemical Company," the complaint states.
The lawsuit claims UCC has allowed the pollutants to leach into the river beginning in the 1950s until at least the 1980s.
Last year, Dr. David Scott Simonton traveled by kayak on West Virginia waters on Sept. 11 and 12, 2020, and observed orange sludge below the waterline that he said appeared to consist of fairly thick deposits of iron hydroxide/oxyhydroxides. In December 2019, Courtland sued Union Carbide, alleging it was leaking harmful pollutants into Davis Creek.
In the complaint, Courtland claims it didn't even know the Filmont Landfill existed until a deposition testimony was taken in a related lawsuit that Courtland had filed against Union Carbide in 2018 for pollutants from the Union Carbide Tech Center that is near Courtland's property. The information regarding the Filmont Landfill was unearthed during depositions for that lawsuit.
Courtland is represented by Michael O. Callaghan of Neely & Callaghan in Charleston.
This is the third lawsuit filed by Courtland about the pollution. Last month, UCC agreed to a consent order from the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection that focused on making sure the site was compliant.
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia case number: 2:21-cv-00487
