Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) has agreed to pay $20 million to settle the last of a series of lawsuits stemming from water poisoning linked to its natural gas transmission pipeline operations in the Mojave Desert northeast of Los Angeles. The agreement was finalized late in March, according to an Associated Press report.

The final settlement involved claims that 104 people had been exposed to water containing chromium 6, a possible carcinogen, used in PG&E gas pipeline system compressor operations moving supplies from the California-Arizona border to Northern California.

Two previous settlements totaled $628 million during the past 12 years. The first agreement in 1996 for $333 million inspired the movie “Erin Brockovich” four years later. A second major settlement for $295 million was reached two years ago (see Daily GPI, Feb. 7, 2006).

Lawsuits emerged in the early 1990s based on the development of tumors and other health problems among many local residents. By PG&E’s own admission, decades earlier the utility legally discharged wastewater containing chromium into the ground. The utility has publicly acknowledged that the water contamination never should have happened and, in 1987, when PG&E discovered what had happened, it contends that it “acted immediately” to address the problem.

The latest settlement involved people who lived in and around Hinkley, CA, a high desert small town about 130 miles northeast of Los Angeles, and not necessarily those living closest to the PG&E pipeline compressor station, who were the focus of the earlier lawsuits. The movie was named after the legal assistant (played by Julia Roberts) at a Southern California suburban law firm who single-handedly challenged PG&E, exposing alleged operating mistakes that led to the use of chromium in its pipelines.

PG&E officials confirmed that this is the last of the lawsuits related to the case in which the utility had dumped the chemical into unlined ponds before it knew of any dangers. The chemical allegedly seeped into local ground water from there.

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