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This website is authored by Lester Levy, Esq.
a founding member of JAMS.

  • About
    • About Lester Levy
  • The Basics of Environmental Mediation
    • What types of Environmental Cases can be mediated?
    • The Benefits of Environmental Mediation
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  • Case Studies
    • Case Study 1: Objectivity as Resolution Tool Provided Through A Neutral Expert
    • Case Study 2: Working Together
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    • Case Study 5: How Communication Both Causes and Ends Conflict
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You are here: Home / Archives for contamination

Using ADR to Resolve Mass Environmental and Toxic Tort Cases

January 25, 2016 by Lester Levy Leave a Comment

Mediation-Alternative-Dispute-ResolutionThere has been a lot of news recently about large-scale releases of contaminants into the air, water and soil, which have affected large numbers of people and their property.  One such example is the discovery of high concentrations of lead in Flint, Michigan’s drinking water system.  Another is the ongoing release in Southern California of large volumes of natural gas into the soils below the homes of residents living there.  Other examples include the oceanic release of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, and the widespread property damage caused by hurricanes Sandy and Katrina to many thousands of people living in their paths.

In each of these cases, a single event or series of related events caused harm to a large number of people.  As a general matter the types of harm suffered are similar but the degree of these harms differs among the affected population.  In court, these cases may be filed as class actions or coordinated mass torts (possibly MDLs) and present an enormous challenge to our already overburdened court systems, which can result in substantial delays in resolving them.

Mediation and other ADR processes have repeatedly proven to be enormously valuable as a means for resolving these mass toxic tort claims as well.  ADR provides a way to condense many years of expensive litigation into a precise, cost-effective, and efficient process that provides fair and individualized compensation to thousands of people that were affected by an accidental release or other tragedy.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Mediation vs. Litigation Tagged With: ADR, alternative dispute resolution, contamination, environmental disputes, environmental mediation

A Crisis in New Jersey with Underground Storage Tanks

December 16, 2015 by Lester Levy 1 Comment

underground storage tanksNew Jersey Public Television (NJTV) recently completed a broadcast of a three-part expose on the dangers and difficulties stemming from as many as 100,000 underground storage tanks that remain in the ground throughout the state.  In very stark terms the NJTV report warns that some of the sites are “nightmares” and “environmental ticking time bombs”, posing an immediate threat of contamination from seepage into ground water and basements in heavily populated areas.

These old storage tanks, both above and underground, are from homes, gas stations and dry cleaning sites – closed or currently in operation – where the chemicals have leaked over time.  The chemicals include fuel, PCP (dry cleaning fluid) or VOCs like degreasers and other chemicals used in automotive or other manufacturing sites.  As storage tanks are prone to corrosion, some of the chemicals have leaked into the soils and then leached into the groundwater.  This is true of almost every tank that was built or installed more than ten to fifteen years ago, when the technology was changed to build tanks with several layers of protection.  Often neighboring businesses’ tanks release chemicals into the soil which then leaches into the groundwater and combine to form “plumes” of contamination in the ground water, which flow with the groundwater in underground channels to other properties.  One of the main concerns is that these plumes of contamination can reach areas where drinking water wells draw water from the contaminated groundwater or where the chemicals in the plume “off gas” as vapor upwards through the soil into buildings and homes.  These scenarios present very real risks to human health and welfare.

All expletives aside, the problems and risks stemming from these buried and abandoned underground storage tanks perfectly illustrate the reason we need a new approach to solve long-standing environmental cleanup problems.  As the NJTV reporters observed, the NJ Department of Environmental Protection is simply overwhelmed by the magnitude of the problem.  Given budget limitations and the protracted legal process involved when regulators move to compel cleanup, the NJ DEP has essentially been performing radical triage, focusing its resources on the situations needing immediate attention, which likely will result in the vast majority of these storage tanks remaining in the ground – and the contamination remaining in the groundwater — for many years to come. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Mediation vs. Litigation Tagged With: contamination, environmental mediation, New Jersey pollution, NJTV, waste storage tanks

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About Me

lester-levy

I strongly believe in the value of mediation – said another way, environmental mediation really works. I would go even further: I believe that environmental disputes are perfectly suited to the mediation process – perhaps more so than any other area of legal practice. I have formed these views after mediating environmental cases for more than 20 years, throughout the United States, and having worked with thousands of lawyers, companies, insurance carriers, regulatory agencies and courts. My … Read more

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Lester Levy

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