## Facts

- Several Fairfax, Virginia homeowners lived near a petroleum distribution terminal (“Tank Farm”) owned and operated by Texaco and Star Enterprises.
- The facility included multiple aboveground and underground storage tanks and sat over an aquifer recharge area feeding nearby waterways.
- Homeowners alleged that, over many years, petroleum products leaked into soil and groundwater, creating a migrating oil plume toward their properties.
- Petroleum became visible in a nearby creek; state regulators investigated, required testing and monitoring, and ordered certain recovery measures, but concluded releases continued.
- The EPA acted under RCRA § 7003 and required remedial measures through an administrative order later incorporated into an EPA–Texaco consent order prescribing a detailed cleanup program.
- Homeowners filed a federal diversity suit asserting Virginia common-law nuisance and trespass, seeking (1) injunctive cleanup relief and (2) compensatory damages.

## Issues

1. Whether diversity jurisdiction was properly pleaded when multiple plaintiffs alleged the amount in controversy only in the aggregate rather than for each plaintiff.
2. Whether RCRA, and specifically an EPA consent order issued under RCRA § 7003, preempts state-law nuisance and trespass claims seeking injunctive relief.
3. Whether RCRA or the EPA consent order preempts state-law nuisance and trespass claims seeking compensatory damages.

## Decision

- The Fourth Circuit held the complaint inadequately pleaded diversity jurisdiction because each plaintiff must satisfy (and allege) the jurisdictional amount; plaintiffs were allowed leave to amend.
- The court held RCRA does not occupy the field and does not categorically preempt state common-law nuisance and trespass actions.
- The court held that once EPA has imposed a remedial scheme through a valid RCRA consent order, conflicting state-law injunctive relief is preempted.
- The court held the homeowners’ state-law claims for damages were not preempted because damages do not conflict with the EPA-directed remediation plan.
- The court vacated the dismissal and remanded for further proceedings consistent with these rulings.

## Legal Principles

- In diversity cases with multiple plaintiffs, separate and distinct claims generally may not be aggregated to satisfy the amount-in-controversy requirement; each plaintiff must independently meet and plead the jurisdictional minimum.
- RCRA does not broadly preempt state regulation or state common-law remedies by field preemption; it contemplates cooperative federal–state roles.
- RCRA § 7003 authority, standing alone, does not extinguish state common-law nuisance and trespass remedies where EPA has not acted.
- When EPA exercises RCRA authority through a consent order that prescribes a remediation plan, conflict preemption bars state-law injunctive relief that would impose remedial obligations inconsistent with the federal plan.
- State common-law damages for contamination-related nuisance or trespass are not preempted absent an actual conflict with federal requirements.

## Conclusion

The Fourth Circuit permitted the homeowners to attempt to cure defective diversity-amount pleading, held that the EPA’s RCRA consent order preempted state-law injunctive relief that would conflict with the federally selected cleanup, and allowed state-law damages claims for nuisance and trespass to proceed because they did not interfere with the consent order’s remedial program.


Feikema v. Texaco, Inc., 16 F.3d 1408 (4th Cir. 1994)