{"id":48595,"date":"2021-12-06T17:52:15","date_gmt":"2021-12-07T01:52:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=48595"},"modified":"2021-12-06T17:52:15","modified_gmt":"2021-12-07T01:52:15","slug":"pipeline-co-sentenced-for-largest-inland-oil-spill-29-million-gallons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cjnotebook.com\/?p=48595","title":{"rendered":"Pipeline Co. Sentenced for Largest Inland Oil Spill \u2014 29 Million Gallons"},"content":{"rendered":"
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NORTH DAKOTA<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"The pipeline company responsible for the discharge of 29 million gallons of oil-contaminated \u201cproduced water\u201d \u2013 a waste product of hydraulic fracturing \u2013 was sentenced Monday to pay a $15 million criminal fine<\/span><\/p>\n

U.S. District Court Judge Daniel M. Traynor in Williston also ordered Summit Midstream Partners LLC to serve a three-year period of probation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Summit Midstream plead guilty to criminal charges that it violated the Clean Water Act, as amended by the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, by negligently causing the discharge into U.S. waters in 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n

It also admitted that it deliberately failed to immediately report the spill to federal authorities as required. <\/span><\/p>\n

More than 700,000 barrels were discharged thereby contaminating Blacktail Creek and nearby land and groundwater. <\/span><\/p>\n

By law, the federal fines, in this case, will go to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund used to respond and clean up future oil spills.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSummit is being held criminally accountable for its crimes of negligently discharging more than 29 million gallons over more than 4 months and then knowingly failing to report the discharge,\u201d said Assistant Attorney General Todd Kim of the Justice Department\u2019s Environment and Natural Resources Division. \u201cSummit gave misleading and incomplete statements to the government about the duration and size of the spill. Through the civil and criminal cases, Summit is being held responsible for its misconduct and must implement more rigorous environmental management to prevent and detect future spills as a condition of probation.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A detailed statement of facts has been filed in court and is publicly available\u00a0here<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

According to the factual admission agreed to by the company, \u201cSummit\u2019s negligence included the design, construction and operation of the Marmon Water Gathering System pipeline, as well as the negligent failure to find and stop the spill after learning of objective signs of a leak.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Summit started pipeline operations without meters at both ends of the pipeline to conduct \u201cline balancing\u201d or otherwise having a reliable leak detection system in place. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEven after the company learned of major drops in pressure and volume \u2013 objective signs of a leak \u2013 the company negligently continued operations and thus caused millions of additional gallons to be discharged into U.S. waters without learning the cause or pausing operations,\u201d according to the joint factual statement.<\/span><\/p>\n

The criminal fine is in addition to a $20 million civil penalty imposed on Summit Midstream Partners LLC and a related company, Meadowlark Midstream Company LLC, to resolve civil violations of the Clean Water Act and North Dakota water pollution control laws. <\/span><\/p>\n

On Sept. 28, the civil consent decree was approved by the U.S. District Court for the District of North Dakota.<\/span><\/p>\n

The criminal investigation was conducted by EPA\u2019s Criminal Investigation Division. EPA\u2019s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, EPA Region 8, the North Dakota Department of Environmental Quality, the North Dakota Industrial Commission, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Department of Interior and the North Dakota Department of Game and Fish provided assistance to the criminal investigation.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NORTH DAKOTA The pipeline company responsible for the discharge of 29 million gallons of oil-contaminated \u201cproduced water\u201d \u2013 a waste product of hydraulic fracturing \u2013 was sentenced Monday to pay a $15…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48596,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-department-of-justice"],"yoast_head":"\nPipeline Co. 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