environmental Strategist, between the lines: Reputational risk associated with environmental liabilities can devastate a business.
Besides reputational risk, environmental liabilities create financial stress due to clean up, legal costs, investigation costs, third party bodily injury, third party property damage, third party business income and much more. Since every business is impacted by environmental exposures and at least 90% of the businesses in the United States can’t afford to self-insure the environmental exposures impacting their operations, pollution liability insurance has proven to be a sound investment versus self-insuring.
Refrigerants make air conditioning and refrigeration possible.
What businesses do you work with that have this same environmental exposure as Trader Joes due to their use of refrigeration systems? Agriculture operations, food processors, restaurants, resorts, educational institutions, transportation / logistics companies, warehouses, convenience stores / gas stations, contractors that service refrigeration systems / HVAC, commercial real estate owners, medical facilities, laboratories, ice rinks and many, many more.
Trader Joe’s, the boutique supermarket chain known for its healthy and exotic foods, has agreed to a $500,000 settlement arising from leaky refrigeration systems that contribute to global warming under an agreement with the federal government.
The chain is expected to spend an additional $2 million over the next three years as part of a settlement announced Tuesday by the Justice Department and Environmental Protection Agency to improve the equipment at 453 stores nationwide. The stores have been leaking a coolant called R-22, which government attorneys say depletes the ozone layer and is a greenhouse gas. They had alleged the leak violates the Clean Air Act and federal stratospheric ozone regulations.
“Some of the refrigerants now in use by Trader Joe’s are up to 4,700 times more potent than carbon dioxide,” said Alexis Strauss, acting regional administrator for EPA’s Pacific Southwest region. “Today’s settlement will affect all of Trader Joe’s current and new stores to prevent the release of approximately 31,000 metric tons of carbon-equivalent greenhouse gases.”
National Director of Public Relations for Trader Joe’s, Alison Mochizuki, released the following statement regarding the settlement: “Trader Joe’s looks forward to working with the EPA in its mission to reduce air pollution and protect the ozone layer, and, with this agreement, has committed to reducing its emissions to a rate that matches the best of the industry.”
Trader Joe’s, based on Monrovia, Calif, becomes the third grocery chain to face concerns about refrigerant leaks. Previous cases have been filed against Safeway and Costco Wholesale for similar leaks of ozone-depleting refrigerants since 2013. All three companies are also being required to heighten their leak monitoring and recordkeeping, as well as electronic reporting to the EPA.