## Facts

- The United States operated Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Base in the Philippines for decades under bilateral agreements and closed and transferred the bases to Philippine control in the early 1990s.
- Environmental organizations and individuals alleged that U.S. operations left hazardous substances in soil and groundwater, creating continuing health and environmental risks to nearby communities.
- Plaintiffs sought declaratory and injunctive relief to compel U.S. investigation and remediation, relying primarily on CERCLA and also invoking NEPA and constitutional theories.
- Plaintiffs argued CERCLA’s remedial purpose and statutory language should be read to cover foreign “facilities” and “releases,” and that the Charming Betsy canon supported an interpretation consistent with international-law principles.
- The federal defendants argued CERCLA lacks a clear statement of extraterritorial reach, that applying it abroad would interfere with Philippine sovereignty and foreign relations, and that any responsibilities were governed by international agreements rather than unilateral application of U.S. environmental statutes.
- The district court dismissed the action; plaintiffs appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether CERCLA applies extraterritorially to impose cleanup obligations for contamination at former U.S. military bases located in the Philippines.
2. Whether NEPA or constitutional and related doctrines provide a judicially enforceable basis to compel U.S. environmental remediation at those foreign sites.

## Decision

- The Ninth Circuit affirmed dismissal of the suit.
- The court held CERCLA does not apply extraterritorially to contamination at former U.S. bases in the Philippines because Congress did not clearly express an intent to extend CERCLA to foreign territory.
- The court rejected plaintiffs’ reliance on the Charming Betsy canon as a basis to expand CERCLA’s reach absent a clear congressional statement.
- The court concluded NEPA and the other asserted statutory and constitutional theories did not authorize courts to compel the requested foreign-site remediation.

## Legal Principles

- Federal statutes are presumed to apply only within U.S. territory unless Congress clearly indicates extraterritorial application.
- CERCLA’s text and structure do not contain a clear statement extending its response and liability scheme to sites located in foreign sovereign nations.
- The Charming Betsy canon is used to avoid conflicts with international law where a statute is otherwise ambiguous; it does not supply extraterritorial scope that Congress did not provide.
- Courts are reluctant to interpret domestic environmental statutes to require remediation in foreign territory where doing so would implicate another nation’s sovereignty and foreign-relations concerns.
- NEPA is primarily procedural and does not itself create a substantive duty to conduct or fund environmental cleanup abroad under the circumstances presented.

## Conclusion

The Ninth Circuit held that CERCLA’s cleanup regime does not reach contamination at former U.S. military bases in the Philippines and that plaintiffs’ alternative NEPA and constitutional theories did not support court-ordered remediation, so dismissal was affirmed.


ARC Ecology v. U.S. Dep’t of the Air Force, 411 F.3d 1092 (9th Cir. 2005)