Public Interest Research Group of New Jersey, Inc. v. Hercules, Inc.

Hercules, Inc. (defendant) operated a facility in New Jersey for which federal and state agencies had issued discharge permits under the Clean Water Act (CWA). The permits limited effluent discharges of specified pollutants. Hercules was required by law to monitor, publicly report, and keep records relating to designated parameters, such as the kind of pollutant (e.g., “total residual chlorine”) and its characteristics (e.g., pH level). In March 1989, environmental organizations (the group) (plaintiffs) sent a notice letter to Hercules, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the state indicating the group’s intent to sue Hercules for permit violations. The notice letter listed 68 alleged discharge violations during a certain timeframe for specified parameters at two outfalls. After a 60-day waiting period, the group filed its complaint against Hercules, attaching a list of 87 discharge violations that omitted certain violations listed before and included over 30 new ones. A majority of the new violations pre-dated the notice letter, and all violations were of the same type as those included in the notice letter. In 1992, the group moved for summary judgment based on 114 pre- and post-complaint discharge violations, many of which were not listed in the notice letter but were of the same type as included in the notice letter, and related monitoring, reporting, and recordkeeping violations. Hercules argued that the group had failed to comply with the CWA’s 60-day notice provision as to discharge violations and related administrative violations that were not specifically included in the notice letter. The district court’s order allowed the group to proceed to trial on discharge violations that had been included in the notice letter and post-complaint discharge violations only. The group and Hercules appealed.