Appeals Court Affirms Union Carbide Clean Water Fine

After two trials, seven years and thousands of pages of court documents, a lawsuit against Union Carbide may be over.

The Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a decision by a lower court in Courtland Company v Union Carbide.

In a 14-page unpublished opinion, a three-judge panel affirmed the U.S. District Judge John T. Copenhaver Jr.’s decision to fine Union Carbide $200,000 for violating the Clean Water Act.

Courtland sought significantly higher penalties for Union Carbide’s contamination of groundwater and streams surrounding its property in South Charleston.

The appeals court found that Copenhaver had not erred in his decision, writing that the 100-year-old judge was “thorough, detailed, rational and patient.”

In addition to the civil penalty, Union Carbide is cleaning up the South Charleston site under state supervision and applied for a stormwater discharge permit it previously lacked.

Courtland originally brought its case to the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of West Virginia in 2018.

In response to Copenhaver’s ruling last year, Union Carbide, a subsidiary of Dow Chemical, said it was “confident the court correctly rejected the Courtland Company, Inc.’s demands for excessive penalties and excessive remedial efforts.”

Union Carbide then said it would continue to work with the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection to remediate the site.

Courtland has until Oct. 20 to request a rehearing with the full Fourth Circuit.

The most recent ruling was delivered unanimously by a three-judge panel consisting of judges Paul Niemeyer, Steven Agee and Julius Richardson.

In oral arguments last month, the judges seemed skeptical of Courtland’s case and deferential to Copenhaver, who has served on the federal bench for half a century.

Copenhaver, who turned 100 last month, was appointed in 1975 by President Gerald Ford.