DuPont fined $12 million for deadly gas release in Texas

June 2, 2023

Source: Courthouse News

Excerpt: 

HOUSTON (CN) — DuPont pleaded guilty to Clean Air Act violations in federal court Monday and was fined $12 million for a 2014 chemical release at its Houston-area plant that killed four workers, prosecutors said.

In addition to the fine, E.I. DuPont de Nemours Inc. agreed to make a $4 million community service payment to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation for projects that benefit air quality around Galveston Bay.

DuPont manufactured pesticides at the plant in La Porte, an industrial city near the Houston Ship Channel, which drains into Galveston Bay. But it idled the facility after the fatal incident before it was closed and sold in 2021.

A DuPont spokesman referred questions about the plea deal to Corteva Agriscience, a company spun out from the 2017 merger of Dow Chemical Company and DuPont that took over DuPont’s line of agricultural products, including pesticides, involved in the 2014 tragedy.

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