Source: http://www.mondaq.com, February 7, 2014 By: Stan Martin Diesel fuel is spilled during renovation of a library, damaging both the work in progress and the surrounding building or land.  Damages may exceed $500,000, but the owner’s pollution coverage is apparently limited to $5,000.  Is the owner barred from pursuing the contractor and others based on […]

Source: http://enr.construction.com, February 17, 2014 By: Jeffrey D. Stevens For years, some state courts and insurance companies have been telling contractors that the construction defect claims they face aren’t covered by their insurance because faulty work is not an “accident” that insurance is intended to guard against. This situation is rapidly changing, however, as more […]

Source: http://www.propertycasualty360.com, February 1, 2014 By: Amanda Duncan Empty Buildings and Pollution-Related Liability As America’s real estate crisis slowly recovers along with our economy, more than 14 million properties remain vacant or abandoned across the country. Real estate is considered a vacant property when it is not currently occupied or in use. This includes empty […]

Source: http://www.ibamag.com, February 11, 2014 By: Caitlin Bronson When extreme weather events threaten the country, most producers scramble to update traditional policies like homeowners, auto or business interruption. However, many clients also stand in danger of liabilities that perhaps aren’t so obvious. In many cases, extreme weather can cause serious environmental liabilities and high monetary […]

Source: New York Times Online, February 10, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com Half a mile beneath the desert surface, in thick salt beds left behind by seas that dried up hundreds of millions of years ago, the Department of Energy is carving out rooms as long as football fields and cramming them floor to ceiling with […]

Source: The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 10, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com The very thing Shirley Johnston is fighting against is all around her, flowing from the faucet in her cozy kitchen, showering onto family members in the bathroom. Johnston and Paulsboro’s 6,100 other residents are navigating the latest public health scare — elevated levels of perfluorinated […]

Source: Times Union (Albany, NY), February 8, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com Amid growing public pressure, the state Department of Environmental Conservation has reversed itself and will now require owners of a crude oil terminal seeking to expand at the Port of Albany to prepare a way of informing the predominantly poor and minority South End […]

Read here about whether a company should build a copper-nickel mine as critics worry about the company covering clean up costs after it closes.

Source: Star-Ledger (NJ), February 9, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com When A&S Russo Real Estate Co. tried to sell its Union Township property two years ago, it learned a consultant hired more than a decade ago to clean up an underground heating oil spill hadn’t really done the remediation. So when it tried to force the […]

Source: Miami Herald, February 10, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com A federal judge in Miami will consider Monday whether to sign off on a legal settlement that would require county government to spend $1.6 billion over the next 15 years to fix its dilapidated sewer system. Miami-Dade County has been negotiating the consent decree with federal […]

Source: San Bernardino County Sun (CA), February 10, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com Pacific Gas and Electric Co. is offering some residents north of this High Desert community a free water purification system until more is understood about the nature of their pollution. Officially, Hinkley’s plume of cancer-causing chromium-6 is now eight miles long, from north […]

Source: Gloucester Daily Times (MA), February 8, 2014 Posted on: http://envfpn.advisen.com An Essex-based demolition company has been ordered by the state Attorney General’s Office to pay up to $125,000 in civil penalties to resolve allegations of improper handling and disposal of asbestos during the demolition of a building in Worcester. According to the complaint, filed […]