Superfund and Natural Resource Damages

Publication Date: January 2001

Publisher: Library of Congress. Congressional Research Service

Author(s):

Research Area: Environment

Type:

Abstract:

The Superfund law gives government agencies that serve as natural resource trustees the authority to require responsible parties to make good the environmental harm they caused by restoring or replacing the injured natural resources, and by paying damages for the lost use of publicly owned resources. This is in addition to EPA's authority to require the cleanup of spills and contamination from hazardous substnce releases. Natural resource damages (NRD) has become an issue because of very large claims that have been filed, and because of the prospect of more of them. Key questions are (1) what costs should be included and how they should be measured; (2) who should bear the burden of proof in NRD cases (the rebuttable presumption question); and (3) when NRD cases go to court, should review be based solely on the compiled administrative record, or should the parties be permitted to introduce new evidence? This report will be updated as events warrant.