Legal
Tetra Tech Agrees to $97M Pact to Settle San Francisco Navy Base Cleanup Suit
Hunters Point Naval Shipyard housed the Naval Radiological Defense Laboratory until 1969, and the site is still being cleaned today.
Photo cropped from the original by Cmichel67/CC BY-SA 4.0
Consulting firm Tetra Tech EC Inc. agreed to pay $97 million as part of a deal to settle civil claims brought by federal authorities who accused the firm of wrongdoing in its environmental cleanup work for the U.S. Navy of the former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in San Francisco.
The unit of Pasadena, Calif.-based Tetra Tech Inc. provided radiological remediation services between 2003 and 2014 at the site, which, from 1948 to 1969 hosted the Naval Radiological Defense Laboratory that was used for decontaminating ships exposed to atomic weapons testing and researching the effects of radiation, according to the Navy.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency classifies Hunters Point as a Superfund site, and the Navy-led cleanup is continuing at parts of the 443-acre shuttered site. A portion of it was transferred to the City of San Francisco for redevelopment in 2004, with efforts to build residential units in process since about 2011.
Whistleblowers and federal authorities later accused the firm of disposing of contaminated soil into trenches on the site and misrepresenting the source of soil samples it submitted for testing during its work. Two former Tetra Tech EC managers were sentenced to prison terms for falsifying records, and the company blamed "rogue" employees at the time.
The settlement agreement and consent decree between the firm and U.S. Dept. of Justice resolve federal claims under the False Claims Act and Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act, known as the Superfund law.
Tetra Tech did not comment on the case to ENR but said in a Jan. 17 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it made the deal “to avoid the delay, uncertainty and expense of protracted litigation” and noted that it did not admit any liability.
The firm also noted that the settlement does not resolve other claims brought by private plaintiffs related to the cleanup. Also, in December a federal judge ruled against Tetra Tech in a suit it filed against CH2M Hill Inc., now part of Jacobs. Tetra Tech had accused the firm and other consultants of producing “junk science” reports related to its work at Hunters Point.
Continuing Cleanup
In its latest report on the cleanup published last summer, Navy officials wrote that they were still conducting testing to verify radiological remedies were implemented correctly. They were also in the process of remediating mercury found in groundwater at part of the site, investigating additional chemicals of concern detected in some areas and evaluating the discovery of radiological objects excavated at part of the site that officials had not previously considered to be radiologically impacted.
Last September, EPA and Navy officials shared plans to remove and remediate the remaining contaminated soil on one of the site’s parcels.
“Under the plan, the Navy will address sediments surrounding the former shipyard using proven techniques to reduce contamination and will help the health of the San Francisco Bay,” said Danielle Janda, base closure manager for Hunters Point, in a statement at the time.
