YPF hit with $14-bln lawsuit

BUENOS AIRES, July 27, 2018 – Argentina’s YPF is being sued for USD 14 billion for environmental damages caused by Maxus Energy, which it bought in 1995, local media reported Thursday.

A claim, filed against the NOC by the US company’s liquidation trust at the Bankruptcy Court of the District of Delaware, asserts that YPF should pay for environmental damage caused by a Maxus Energy subsidiary during the 1950s and 1960s when New Jersey’s Passaic River was polluted with pesticides and other chemicals.

The claim argues that YPF should be responsible for the cleanup costs, assessed at USD 261 million per square kilometre in 2012, as the NOC initiated bankruptcy filings on Maxus Energy’s behalf in June 2016.

“Contamination occurred several years before the acquisition,” YPF said in a statement. “The company will firmly defend any accusation that makes it liable to Maxus or its creditors.”

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