ELR Citation: ELR 20238
No(s). A-4652-08 (N.J. App. Ct. Aug 18, 2010)

A New Jersey appellate court held that liability under the New Jersey Spill Compensation and Control Act is not imposed if a party's only link to the discharge is through the passive migration of pre-existing contamination. Accordingly, the court affirmed a lower court decision dismissing a property owner's claims against a prior owner because the evidence did not permit a finding that there had been a discharge during the period of the previous owner's ownership. The lower court also properly dismissed the owner's common law claims and denied its motion to add a new common law claim on the ground that the six-year limitation period, which commenced in 1998 when the owner knew it had a basis for asserting claims based on contamination of the property, had expired when the complaint was filed.