[CPEO-MEF] PERCHLORATE: "Pomona [CA] wins $48 million in groundwater pollution case"

[Lenny Siegel <LSiegel@cpeo.org>]

Pomona wins $48 million in groundwater pollution case

By STEVE SCAUZILLO
San Gabriel Valley Tribune (CA)
September 10, 2021

A federal jury awarded the city of Pomona $48 million in damages to be paid by a foreign corporation for contaminating its groundwater with a toxic chemical mixed with fertilizer and sold to citrus farmers for decades.

On Sept. 7, the city won its case against the American subsidiary of a multi-billion dollar Chilean company, Sociedad Química y Minera de Chile, known as SQM. The case, which began in 2011, bounced between courts until the city won after presenting its full argument recently in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.

The jury found fertilizer shipped from the Atacama Desert of Chile in the 1930s and 1940s and mixed into the soil of Pomona’s fertile ground contained sodium nitrate, a common enhancement, but also perchlorate, a chemical that causes thyroid damage and wreaks havoc with crucial hormones at high doses and can interfere with childhood development.

…

For the entire article, see
https://www.dailybulletin.com/2021/09/10/pomona-wins-48-million-in-groundwater-pollution-case/

—

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director
Center for Public Environmental Oversight
A project of the Pacific Studies Center
LSiegel@cpeo.org
P.O. Box 998, Mountain View, CA 94042
Voice/Fax: 650-961-8918
http://www.cpeo.org
Author: DISTURBING THE WAR: The Inside Story of the Movement to Get Stanford University out of Southeast Asia - 1965–1975 (See http://a3mreunion.org)

_______________________________________________
Military mailing list
Military@lists.cpeo.org
http://lists.cpeo.org/listinfo.cgi/military-cpeo.org