Minnesota Ex Rel. Northern Pacific Center, Inc. v. BNSF Railway Co.

ORDER

JAMES M. ROSENBAUM, District Judge.

This ease presents an unusual, interesting, and unresolved question: Is an admitted polluter, which has, at the direction of a state’s environmental protection agency completed environmental remediation, required to perform a subsequent and more stringent remediation if the agency later raises its standards?

Defendant, BNSF Railway Company (“BNSF”) once owned and operated a railroad maintenance shop in Brainerd, Minnesota. At that facility, BNSF used products which contaminated the soil, turning it into a “brownfield,” as such properties are known. BNSF…