WASHINGTON — Attorney General Brian Schwalb announced a massive settlement has been reached with national energy company Pepco on Tuesday. Pepco will pay $57 million for its role in polluting the Anacostia River. It's the largest environmental protection settlement in D.C. history
The company polluted the District's waterways and natural resources with toxic, hazardous chemicals for decades – causing historic environmental damage and threatening the health and safety of nearby communities, an investigation by the attorney general's office found.
The attorney general and other D.C. leaders said the settlement is a huge first step in cleaning up the Anacostia River, and addressing inequities for communities east of the Anacostia River in D.C.
According to the Attorney General's Office, Pepco must pay $47 million toward cleaning up the Anacostia River and $10 million in civil penalties. The company also must clean up contamination at its Buzzard Point and Benning Road facilities and investigate the current and historical environmental impacts of the company’s underground, District-wide system of transformer vaults. Additionally, Pepco will pay for the District to oversee this work.
A lengthy investigation, that cost close to $35 million to date, found that Pepco illegally polluted the District's waterways in three primary ways:
- Benning Road Facility: Releasing pollutants into the groundwater and soil and into outfalls that connect to the Anacostia River. From 1906 until 2012, Pepco owned and operated a power generating station at 3400 Benning Road NE. Since 2011, under District oversight, Pepco has been performing an environmental investigation into hazardous substance releases from the facility. The investigation found PCBs, petroleum, and other hazardous substances in the soil and groundwater at the facility and in the Anacostia River sediments adjacent to wastewater outfalls that drain the facility, posing an unacceptable risk to human health and the environment.
- Buzzard Point Facility: Releasing pollutants into the groundwater and soil and discharging pollutants into storm sewers that connect to the Anacostia River. Beginning in 1938, Pepco operated a power generating station at its Buzzard Point Facility, which is located near the confluence of the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers. During its many decades of operation at Buzzard Point, Pepco spilled or released petroleum and hazardous substances into the underlying soil and groundwater. Until 2013, at a rate of at least twice per month, Pepco intentionally pumped the pollutants in its containment structures – intended to prevent spills and leaks – into storm sewers that emptied into the Anacostia River. While internal company policy recognized that discharges to storm sewers should never occur, in practice the company continued to discharge pollutants into storm sewers for years.
- Transformer Vaults: Routinely pumping pollutants from its underground, District-wide electrical distribution system into storm water sewers that connect to District rivers and streams. To distribute electricity across the District, Pepco operates a system of approximately 60,000 below-ground vaults and manholes that are frequently filled with storm water runoff. The runoff contains polluted water from various sources, including Pepco’s own equipment. For decades, until 2008, Pepco regularly pumped this polluted water, including water contaminated with PCBs, petroleum, and sediment, from its vaults into nearby storm sewers that empty into the District’s rivers and streams.
“For far too long, District residents have been deprived of fully enjoying one of our greatest environmental resources – the Anacostia River – due to chronic, illegal, and intentional pollution. For decades, Pepco routinely discharged hazardous chemicals into soil, groundwater, and storm sewers, which fouled the Anacostia River, deprived us of the river’s many benefits, and endangered public health and safety. And as is too often the case, communities of color East of the River bore the brunt of the company’s illegal conduct,” said AG Schwalb. “Pepco is not, however, solely responsible for the pollution of the river, and it deserves credit for being the first responsible party to accept formal responsibility for its illegal practices. The Office of Attorney General will continue to fight for environmental justice, and today’s historic settlement will not only pave the way to accountability for every responsible party, but it will also hasten the restoration of the District’s most ecologically valuable watershed.”
In a press conference Tuesday, Schwalb pointed specifically at polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) which contaminated the soil, groundwater and Anacostia River. Some of the highly toxic pollutants Pepco discharged, like PCBs, take decades to break down and have remained in the river long after Pepco discharged them, resulting in long-lasting harmful effects to the environment and human health, potentially including neurologic developmental disorders, birth defects, and cancer.
D.C. leaders called it a historic victory for environmental justice.
“The long-term impacts of releasing toxic, hazardous chemicals pollutants into the Anacostia River has had disproportionate health-impacts on lower-income, Black residents in D.C.,” said Akosua Ali, President of NAACP DC. “This historic, $57 million settlement against Pepco for the Anacostia River contamination and cleanup is a significant step toward addressing the generational health-impacts of releasing hazardous, chemical pollutants for over 100 years.”
As a result of the investigation by the Office of the Attorney General, Pepco must:
- Pay $10 million in civil penalties.
- Pay $47 million for the District’s initial cleanup of the Anacostia River.
- Complete the following actions:
- Investigate and assess the risks that contamination from its Buzzard Point facility poses to human health and the environment and perform cleanups to eliminate those risks, as needed.
- Pay for or perform the cleanup of the Benning Road Facility, including areas in the Anacostia River adjacent to the facility where Pepco’s contamination has migrated.
- Investigate and assess the current risk and potential contamination caused by Pepco’s transformer vaults.
- Pay for the District’s costs to oversee Pepco’s investigative and cleanup work.
"We understand the importance of this work for the future of our communities," a Pepco spokesperson wrote in a statement to WUSA9. "We don’t just work here, we live here. Our families and our friends live here too. We remain committed to continuing our work with the District as well as other local agencies and community groups to improve the overall health of the Anacostia River."
OAG will continue to monitor Pepco to ensure that it does not attempt to pass these clean-up costs on to ratepayers.