TL;DR
- The DOJ, acting for the EPA, sued Environmental Resource Holdings, LLC (“ERH”) on September 10, 2026, under Section 106 of CERCLA.
- The suit seeks to compel ERH to perform preparatory “Initial Remedial Work” at the Diamond Alkali Superfund Site in Newark, New Jersey.
- The site includes 17 miles of the Lower Passaic River, contaminated with dioxin, PCBs, DDT, and heavy metals dating back to Agent Orange-era chemical manufacturing.
- ERH says it inherited the liabilities of Diamond Alkali, Diamond Shamrock, and Occidental Chemical Corporation-NY through corporate transactions in September 2025.
- A 1992 New Jersey appellate ruling already found that ERH’s corporate predecessor intentionally and continuously discharged dioxin into the river for decades.
- The full cleanup remedies EPA has selected for the site are estimated at roughly $1.8 billion combined.
The question the complaint raises isn’t whether the river is contaminated. Courts settled that decades ago, actually! The question is whether the company that most recently agreed to own that liability will actually build what EPA says needs to get built.
The Facts
The Diamond Alkali Superfund Site centers on a former chemical plant at 80-120 Lister Avenue in Newark, New Jersey, and extends into the Lower Passaic River, the Newark Bay Study Area, and the surrounding contaminated sediment. EPA added the site to the National Priorities List in 1984, and has since split the cleanup into four “Operable Units” covering the old plant footprint, the lower 8.3 miles of the river, Newark Bay, and the full 17-mile tidal stretch of the river up to Dundee Dam.
Sediment in the lower river is contaminated with dioxins and furans, PCBs, PAHs, DDT, dieldrin, mercury, lead, and copper, according to the complaint. EPA’s studies found that the lower 8.3 miles hold the bulk of the contamination and act as a continuing source that recontaminates the rest of the river through tidal mixing.
Agent Orange on the Passaic
The contamination traces back to chemical manufacturing at the Lister Avenue plant. Beginning in the mid-1940s, Kolker Chemical Works, Inc. made chemicals and herbicides there. From the mid-1940s until 1969, the plant, operated in succession by Diamond Alkali Company and related entities, produced 2,4,5-trichlorophenol along with the herbicides 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T, ingredients used in the defoliant known as Agent Orange. Manufacturing that chemistry produces 2,3,7,8-TCDD, the most toxic form of dioxin, as a byproduct. According to the complaint, the plant’s operators discharged waste effluent containing that dioxin directly into the Lower Passaic River throughout the plant’s operating life.
Timeline
Kolker Chemical Works begins manufacturing chemicals and herbicides at the Lister Avenue plant.
Diamond Alkali and successor entities operate the plant, producing Agent Orange precursor chemicals and discharging waste effluent, including dioxin, into the river.
EPA places the Diamond Alkali site on the National Priorities List. The same year, Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Co. sues its insurers in New Jersey Superior Court.
After a 20-day trial, a New Jersey court finds that Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Co., as a matter of corporate policy, intentionally and continuously discharged dioxin and DDT into the river throughout its plant operations. An appeals court upholds the finding.
New Jersey sues Occidental Chemical Corporation-NY under the state’s Spill Compensation and Control Act. A state court later awards summary judgment, holding OCC-NY jointly and severally liable for the state’s cleanup costs.
EPA issues a Record of Decision selecting the OU2 Remedy for the lower 8.3 miles: capping, targeted dredging, habitat restoration, and long-term monitoring, at an estimated cost of $1.38 billion.
OCC-NY sues numerous other companies under CERCLA, seeking to recover and share cleanup costs.
A federal judge grants summary judgment finding OCC-NY liable under CERCLA as the legal successor to Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Co.
EPA issues a Record of Decision selecting an interim remedy for OU4, covering the upper 9 miles of the river, estimated at $441 million.
The remedial design for the OU2 Remedy is completed.
Environmental Resource Holdings, LLC represents that it has, through a series of corporate transactions, retained the liabilities of OCC-NY and its predecessors.
The remedial design for the OU4 Interim Remedy is reported as more than halfway complete.
DOJ files this complaint against ERH in the District of New Jersey, seeking to compel performance of preparatory cleanup work.
A Chain of Corporate Custody
ERH is not accused, in this complaint, of having discharged anything into the river itself. Its alleged liability is entirely a matter of succession. The complaint traces a chain of corporate entities, Kolker Chemical Works, Diamond Alkali Company, Diamond Shamrock Corporation, Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Company, and Occidental Chemical Corporation-NY, that DOJ says ERH acquired the liabilities of through transactions completed in September 2025. Under CERCLA’s strict liability framework, that lineage is what the government says makes ERH responsible today for contamination caused generations ago.
What makes that lineage unusual is how much of it has already been tested in court, well before ERH existed as a defendant in this matter.
Following a 20-day trial, a New Jersey court concluded that Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Co., as a matter of corporate policy, discharged dioxin, DDT, and other hazardous substances into the Passaic River continuously throughout its period of plant operations. An appeals court affirmed that conclusion.
Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Co. v. The Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 258 N.J. Super. 167 (1992)
A New Jersey state court awarded the State of New Jersey summary judgment against OCC-NY, holding the company jointly and severally liable under the state’s Spill Compensation and Control Act for the state’s cleanup and removal costs, and declared OCC-NY liable for the state’s future response costs as well.
New Jersey Dep’t of Envtl. Protection v. Occidental Chemical Co., Civ. No. L9869-05 (N.J. Super. Ct.)
A federal judge granted summary judgment finding OCC-NY liable under CERCLA as the legal successor to Diamond Shamrock Chemicals Co.
Occidental Chemical Corp. v. 21st Century Fox America, Civ. No. 18-11273 (D.N.J. Sept. 11, 2020)
The dioxin didn’t change hands in September 2025. The paperwork did.
What the Government Alleged and Requested
The current complaint alleges that ERH falls within the categories of liable parties defined by CERCLA Section 107(a), as either an owner or operator of the Lister Plant at the time hazardous substances were disposed of, or as a party that arranged for their disposal through the predecessor entities it says it now stands behind. It alleges that EPA’s delegate has determined there is, or may be, an imminent and substantial endangerment to public health or the environment from releases at the site, and that a defined package of preparatory work, referred to in the complaint as the “Initial Remedial Work,” is necessary before the larger dredging and capping phases of the OU2 and OU4 remedies can begin.
That Initial Remedial Work, as described in the complaint, consists of five items: building an Upland Processing Facility, building associated Upland Support Facilities, completing water column sampling to support dredging monitoring, completing air quality, odor, and noise monitoring ahead of construction, and completing fish and crab tissue sampling to support long-term monitoring after the cleanup.
DOJ is asking the court to hold ERH jointly and severally liable for that work under CERCLA Sections 106 and 107(a), to order ERH to actually perform it, and to award the United States its costs and fees.
What a Legitimate Fix Looks Like
Editorial analysisThe following is EvilCorporations.com’s editorial assessment, not a claim drawn from the complaint. It reflects the failure modes documented across three decades of litigation over this site: a cleanup repeatedly delayed while liability gets shuffled between corporate shells.
Regulatory Track
EPA’s remedy documents already specify what needs to happen physically at the site. The open question is enforcement cadence, ensuring that milestones like the Initial Remedial Work carry real deadlines and consequences, rather than allowing remedial design timelines to keep sliding as ownership changes hands.
Legislative Track
CERCLA’s successor liability doctrine is doing real work here, but cases like this one show how long it takes for that doctrine to catch up with a decades-old chain of custody. Congress could look at whether disclosure requirements around Superfund-linked liability transfers need tightening, so regulators know sooner when a new entity has taken on this kind of obligation.
Corporate Governance Track
Any company that voluntarily absorbs CERCLA liability through an acquisition is taking on an obligation to the public, not just a balance-sheet item. Boards overseeing that kind of transaction should be prepared to fund and staff remediation on EPA’s timeline, not the timeline that suits internal cash flow.
What Now?
Will decide whether ERH is liable for the Initial Remedial Work and whether to order it performed.
Continues to oversee remedial design for OU4 and implementation of the already-designed OU2 Remedy.
Has not yet filed a public response to the complaint; how it answers will clarify the scope of liability it is prepared to accept.
Currently has related appeals pending from the separate but connected Alden Leeds matter (Case No. 2:22-cv-07326).
The source document for this investigation is attached below.
Here’s a press release about this scandal from the Department of Justice’s website: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/proposed-125m-settlement-agreement-provides-critical-work-advancing-lower-passaic-river
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