MPCA sues Elgin gas station over gasoline leak that polluted town’s water supply

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency is suing the owner of an Elgin gas station, claiming the site’s petroleum storage tanks leaked thousands of gallons into the soil and the town’s water supply.

According to the lawsuit filed Wednesday in Olmsted County District Court, MPCA officials first responded to reports of the smell of gasoline emanating from a storm sewer near the Cenex gas station on Second Avenue Northeast on March 28, 2022.

Investigators discovered gasoline leaving a storm sewer and flowing into Dry Creek and continuing to a nearby trout stream. The MPCA later tracked it to the Cenex station.

MPCA officials requested records to determine whether the gas station’s leak detection and prevention equipment was in compliance. The station’s electric line leak detector — which is supposed to shut down the pump if a leak is detected — was displaying an error message showing it had lost communication with the control panel.

According to log sheets kept by the gas station, the line leak detector showed on Dec. 17, 2021, that it had been one day since the fuel line had passed the leak level of 0.2 gallons per hour. Then, on Jan. 15, on the 30th day since passing the 0.2 gallons per hour test, the detector shut down the pipe as required by state regulations.

The lawsuit then states gas station staff must have started hitting the “reset” button on the line leak detector each day so the regular unleaded fuel line could stay in operation. The gas station went 41 days without a passing leak test result before the error code appeared; from that point, the leak tests weren’t happening at all.

On March 30, 2022, the MPCA met with an underground storage tank inspector, who found the submersible pump controller switch was stuck in the “on” position, the lawsuit states. That meant the pump “was constantly pumping gasoline without interruption.”

The line leak detector and pump controller switch were replaced, and the new, functional equipment shut the line down.

During site cleanup, all the piping for the underground storage tanks were removed. The faulty line that was taken out of service was found to have a dime-sized hole in it. Another line that remained active had an eighth-inch hole, court documents state.

The MPCA estimated those holes had been leaking petroleum into the surrounding soil “for many years.”

Contractors found that petroleum had saturated the soil anywhere from 8 to 14 feet in depth, but not all of it could be removed due to the placement of storage tanks and other infrastructure at the site.

In October, a resident of an apartment adjacent to the Cenex station submitted a complaint saying they smelled gasoline coming from their tap water. That prompted the Minnesota Department of Health to give everyone in the building bottled water.

Residents of that apartment building were also told to limit showers and open their windows while showering “due to the expected presence of high levels of petroleum contaminants in the water.”

The MPCA began looking for groundwater contamination as well. The agency found petroleum had contaminated the local drinking supply with chemicals such as benzene and toluene present in levels that exceeded MDH limits.

On Nov. 15, the MPCA ordered the Cenex station to remove all of its storage tanks and recover all contaminated soil and petroleum floating in the groundwater, but the lawsuit claims the station “failed to comply with any and all parts of the Administrative Order.”

The MPCA stepped in to remove the tanks on Nov. 21 and began removing contaminated soil from the site. According to the lawsuit, the agency has removed more than 3,100 tons of soil and more than 4,500 gallons of petroleum so far.

An emergency declaration remains in place “due to the ongoing threat to public health and safety.”

The civil complaint charges the gas station’s ownership company, Gurek Inc., and the company’s CEO, Tejinder Singh, with failing to comply with an administrative order and state environmental protection laws; oil and hazardous substance violations; underground storage tank violations; water quality violations; and being a public nuisance.

Several counts carry hefty per diem fines, adding up to a maximum of $70,000 for each day the gas station is out of compliance.

The MPCA is also asking a judge to order Singh to reimburse the agency for its response to the leak and repay its legal costs.

The seven total charges in the complaint – which can be found at the bottom of this article – are the following:

• Failure to comply with MPCA’s administrative order and the state’s environmental protection statutes
• Oil and hazardous substance violations
• Underground storage tank violations
• Wateru quality violations
• Public Nuisance
• Reimbusement of MPCA response costs
• Litigation expenses