Department of Justice sues Campbell Soup for pollution in Ohio

The U.S. government has filed a lawsuit against The Campbell Soup Company, accusing the company of polluting a river that flows into Lake Erie. According to the Justice Department, Campbell has been violating pollution limits at its northwestern Ohio plant since 2018.

The lawsuit was filed just hours after two environmental groups brought similar suits against the company. These suits seek to have the court fine Campbell for more than 5,000 violations and require the company to upgrade its plant’s wastewater treatment facility.

The pollutants identified in the water coming from Campbell’s plant include bacteria and E. coli.

“The toxic algae in Lake Erie is hardly the kind of soup that Ohioans want from a company like Campbell,” said John Rumpler, a program director for Environment Ohio, one of the advocacy agencies involved in the lawsuits. Details: https://t.co/ngDqMYxi7o

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“We commend Campbell for its willingness to work cooperatively with us and the federal government to forthrightly address its longstanding compliance problems rather than spend its time litigating,” said Josh Kratka, a senior attorney at the National Environmental Law Center, which represents the citizen groups. “Filing our lawsuit today will simply enable us to move forward quickly should negotiations break down later.”

This lawsuit follows similar legal actions filed by two environmental groups, with expectations that both cases will be combined.

Environment Ohio and Lake Erie Waterkeeper aim to stop what they describe as years of illegal wastewater discharges from Campbell’s Napoleon plant, which releases over 5 million gallons of wastewater daily into the Maumee River, flowing into Lake Erie about 45 miles upstream of Toledo.

“Western Lake Erie is plagued annually by toxic algal blooms, and pollution flowing into the lake from the Maumee River is a primary culprit,” explained Sandy Bihn, who has served as the Lake Erie Waterkeeper since 2004.  “Campbell Soup’s persistent violations of its legally mandated limits on discharges of phosphorous and other organic pollutants are only making the problem worse.”

In a statement to CBS News, Campbell Soup said it had “taken a number of steps to improve our existing wastewater management operations and will continue to take immediate action to address this issue.”

“We have capital investments planned to resolve this issue permanently,” the company added. “We will continue to work with regulators and other stakeholders to improve our operations and comply with all environmental regulations.”