One of the most prominent issues in the Congressional debate over reauthorization of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA or Superfund) has been how to reduce "transaction costs" while at the same time fairly and expeditiously resolving liability disputes. This Dialogue asks: Would the allocation procedures proposed in last year's Superfund reauthorization bills meet those sometimes conflicting goals?

Earlier this year in KFC Western, Inc. v. Meghrig, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled that private parties may obtain restitution of the costs of cleaning up contaminated property under §7002(a)(1)(B) of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). The Ninth Circuit's ruling in KFC Western opened the way for private parties to use the RCRA citizen suit provision to recover their costs of investigating, studying, and cleaning up contaminated property from responsible parties.

It is said that nothing is constant except change. For industry trying to keep up with its environmental obligations, perhaps the more appropriate saying would be that nothing is constant except regulatory uncertainty. Under President Barack Obama, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has pursued wide-sweeping regulatory initiatives under virtually every major environmental statute. These include the Agency's groundbreaking efforts to monitor and regulate mobile and stationary sources of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.