## Facts

- A former chemical manufacturing facility in Trainer Borough, Pennsylvania contained large quantities of hazardous and flammable materials and posed a threat of release.
- State and federal agencies initiated removal actions after determining there was a release or threat of release presenting substantial danger to health or the environment.
- The prior owner could not fund ongoing site-safety needs; the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) paid certain costs to maintain protective systems.
- After a tax sale in which buyers acknowledged ongoing environmental issues, Trainer Custom Chemical, LLC took title to the property in October 2012.
- Before Trainer acquired title, PADEP had already incurred substantial response costs; the initial removal actions concluded in December 2012.
- After acquisition, Trainer demolished structures and sold salvaged materials, generating significant proceeds.
- PADEP later received reports of continuing hazards (including asbestos-containing materials), and sought recovery of response costs from Trainer and its principals under federal and Pennsylvania law.

## Issues

1. Whether a “current owner” is liable under CERCLA § 107(a)(1) for response costs incurred before the owner acquired title.
2. Whether Pennsylvania’s Hazardous Sites Cleanup Act (HSCA) similarly imposes current-owner liability for pre-acquisition response costs.
3. Whether a court may impose a temporal limitation on current-owner liability absent statutory text supporting that limitation.

## Decision

- The court held that a current owner is liable under both CERCLA and HSCA for all response costs, including costs incurred before acquisition.
- The court affirmed the determination that Trainer qualified as an “owner” subject to liability.
- The court vacated the district court’s order limiting Trainer’s liability to post-acquisition response costs.
- The court remanded for further proceedings, including determination of recoverable costs consistent with its interpretation.

## Legal Principles

- CERCLA § 107(a)(1) imposes liability on the current “owner and operator” for “all costs” of removal or remedial action incurred by government entities, without a temporal carveout based on when costs were incurred.
- A court may not read into CERCLA a limitation that restricts a current owner’s liability to post-acquisition costs when the statute imposes comprehensive liability on owners as a class of potentially responsible parties.
- CERCLA’s structure permits the government to seek recovery from any potentially responsible party and leaves equitable allocation among responsible parties to contribution actions rather than limiting the government’s cost recovery.
- HSCA’s current-owner liability provisions are interpreted in parallel with CERCLA’s owner-liability scheme and similarly reach pre-acquisition response costs.
- Equitable concerns about imposing strict liability on later purchasers are addressed through contribution mechanisms and private transactional risk allocation, not judicially created temporal limits.

## Conclusion

The Third Circuit ruled that current ownership triggers liability under CERCLA and HSCA for the full amount of governmental response costs at a contaminated site, regardless of whether those costs were incurred before or after the owner acquired the property.


Pa. Dep’t of Envt’l Prot. v. Trainer Custom Chem., LLC, 906 F.3d 85 (3d Cir. 2018)