U.S. Sues Du Pont Over Lead in Fuel
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WASHINGTON — The Justice Department Wednesday filed an $8.2-million suit against E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., charging that between 1983 and 1986 the company helped produce gasoline containing excessive levels of dangerous lead at a New Jersey refinery.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, 2,200 tons of excess lead was injected into gasoline--and eventually released into the air--in the largest violation of the 9-year-old federal law that is phasing down the use of lead.
Du Pont said the complaint is “without merit” because the company merely supplied the lead additive and did not participate in the production of the gasoline.
The suit, filed in a New Jersey federal court, named Du Pont as a refiner of leaded gasoline at a facility in Carteret, N.J., and accused the firm of violating the EPA’s limit of 1.1 gram of lead additive per gallon of gasoline.
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