Corporate Incompetence Case Study: Borghi USA, Inc. and Its Impact on Workers & The Environment

On April 12, 2022, a pipe inside the Borghi USA, Inc. facility in West Burlington, Iowa, ruptured, unleashing approximately 2,000 gallons of hydrochloric acid. As the corrosive liquid and its harmful fumes spread, the West Burlington fire and police departments were called to the scene.

They found a situation so dangerous—employees without proper protective equipment facing potentially explosive conditions—that they had no choice but to evacuate the 165 workers and shut the entire facility down.

This was the catastrophic, predictable result of a corporate culture that, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), operated for years with a shocking disregard for the most basic laws designed to protect its workers, the community, and the environment.

The Corporate Playbook: How the Harm Was Done

Borghi USA’s business of processing steel pipes involves a zinc electroplating process, a procedure that generates significant hazardous waste. Despite this, the company registered with the EPA in 2019 as a “Very Small Quantity Generator,” the lowest possible classification, suggesting minimal production of hazardous materials.

The reality on the ground, as discovered by EPA inspectors, was a sprawling, unmanaged, and illegal hazardous waste operation. The company was, in fact, a “Large Quantity Generator” that had been illegally storing hazardous waste on-site for at least 18 months—far beyond the legal 90-day limit. Inspectors found approximately 52 large totes, each capable of holding 275 gallons, filled with unknown liquids and left to deteriorate in a lot outside, with none of them properly labeled as “Hazardous Waste”.

The company’s failures were systemic:

• No Training: Facility personnel were never properly trained in hazardous waste management procedures or how to respond to emergencies.
• No Plan: The company had no contingency plan to minimize hazards from spills or fires, as required by law.
• No Equipment: At the time of the 2,000-gallon acid spill, the facility lacked the appropriate spill control equipment.
• No Coordination: The company failed to make any emergency arrangements with local fire departments or hospitals.

Borghi USA was operating not as a regulated industrial facility, but as an unpermitted hazardous waste treatment, storage, and disposal site in waiting. The 2022 acid spill was not a matter of if, but when.

A Cascade of Consequences: The Real-World Impact

The decision to ignore these fundamental safety laws has had profound and lasting consequences for the people who worked at Borghi USA and the land on which they worked.

Public Health & Safety

The most immediate victims were the 165 employees. By failing to provide training or proper safety equipment, the company treated its workers as disposable. When the acid pipe burst, it was first responders, not the company’s own procedures, that had to intervene to protect the workers from a situation spiraling out of control. The lack of a contingency plan or coordination with local hospitals meant that had there been serious injuries, the response would have been chaotic and delayed. This is a story of a workplace where the safety of its people was an afterthought.

Environmental Degradation

The 2,000 gallons of hydrochloric acid did not stay within the building’s walls. The corrosive liquid “flowed out of the facility, contaminating soil around the facility”. This turned an industrial accident into an environmental release, poisoning the land and creating a long-term hazard. The cleanup ultimately required shipping out seven large containers of corrosive liquid waste and 40 drums of corrosive solid waste, totaling thousands of pounds of contaminated material that had to be managed by a specialized environmental services company.

A System Designed for This: Profit, Deregulation, and Power

This is an analysis.

The story of Borghi USA is not just one of a single “bad apple” corporation. It is a harrowing illustration of the consequences of a neoliberal ideology that views environmental and worker safety regulations not as essential protections, but as burdensome impediments to profit. In this worldview, the cost of compliance—training workers, labeling waste, developing emergency plans—is a line item to be minimized or ignored.

The company’s decision to register as a “Very Small Quantity Generator” while operating as a “Large Quantity Generator” is a classic tactic in this playbook.

It’s an attempt to fly under the regulatory radar, to avoid the scrutiny and costs associated with proper hazardous waste management. This is the predictable outcome of a neoliberal system where enforcement is often reactive, not proactive, and where the penalties for getting caught are often seen as a manageable business risk. The real cost of this risk is not borne by the company’s balance sheet, but by the lungs of its workers and the health of the local ecosystem.

Dodging Accountability: How the Powerful Evade Justice

After a previous EPA order forced the company to finally inventory and properly dispose of its illegally stored waste, this new action was brought to address the full scope of the company’s violations. The outcome, however, is a shocking indictment of our system of corporate accountability.

Despite the litany of violations—the illegal storage, the lack of training, the failure to plan for emergencies, and the catastrophic 2,000-gallon acid spill that endangered 165 people and contaminated the environment—Borghi USA, Inc. will pay a civil penalty of $0.

The EPA conditionally agreed to this resolution because the company “demonstrated that it is unable to pay any penalty in this matter”. In other words, the evil corporation got away with it because they’re so ass at making money that they weren’t even able to afford the standard slap on the risk after endangering 165 human beings.

This is the ultimate failure of environmental justice: a corporation can engage in years of dangerous and illegal behavior, cause a major chemical release, and then claim poverty to escape all financial responsibility. The cost of their negligence is externalized, paid for by the health of their workers and the degradation of the environment.

Reclaiming Power: Pathways to Real Change

A $0 fine is basically a permission slip to continue fucking up. Preventing the next Borghi USA requires a system where the consequences for such profound negligence are unavoidable and severe.

This means implementing mandatory financial assurance rules that require companies handling large quantities of hazardous waste to be bonded or insured, so that an “inability to pay” is never an excuse. It requires empowering workers with stronger whistleblower protections and the right to refuse work in unsafe conditions without fear of reprisal.

It demands a regulatory system that is proactive and punitive, with fines that are designed to be a deterrent, not a negotiable business expense.

Conclusion: A Story of a System, Not an Exception

The case of Borghi USA, Inc. is a devastating window into the real-world consequences of late-stage capitalism’s disregard for human and environmental health. It is a story where a company can create a ticking time bomb, watch it explode, and then walk away from the financial wreckage, leaving its workers and community to deal with the fallout. The fact that a company can endanger 165 people, contaminate the earth, and pay nothing is a clear and painful illustration of a system that is engineered to protect capital, not people.

All factual claims in this article were derived from the public document: EPA Docket No. RCRA-07-2025-0078, In the Matter of: Borghi USA, Inc.

The article was written with references to this following EPA PDF document: https://yosemite.epa.gov/oa/rhc/epaadmin.nsf/Filings/7B44DA892AE6B62C85258CC9005369BF/$File/Borghi%20USA%20Consent%20Agreement%20and%20Final%20Order.pdf

One might also find this one interesting….: https://yosemite.epa.gov/oa/rhc/epaadmin.nsf/Filings/688EE44A545898A885258A29005DE2B5/$File/Borghi%20USA%20Consent%20Agreement%20and%20Final%20Order.pdf