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D.C. Service Station To Pay Penalty To Settle Alleged Underground Storage Tank Violations

Release Date: 5/31/2001
Contact Information: Bonnie Smith (215) 814-5543

Contact: Bonnie Smith (215) 814-5543

PHILADELPHIA – The owners and operators of Ping Auto Center will pay a $15,000 penalty to settle alleged violations of underground storage tank regulations.

Chie Ping Wu and Ping Auto Center, Inc., at 2713 Good Hope Road, S.E, Washington, D.C., have settled the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s September 1999 complaint over violations of federal and District regulations designed to prevent, detect, and control underground leaks of petroleum and other hazardous materials.

The alleged violations involve four underground storage tanks (UST): one 8,000-gallon and two 6,000-gallon petroleum tanks, and one 500-gallon waste oil tank. EPA cited the station for violating leak detection and tank closure requirements for all four tanks, and failing to register the waste oil UST with the District.

In agreeing to the settlement, EPA took into account the station’s expenditure of over $40,000 to remove two abandoned 4,000-gallon underground storage tanks in the spring of 1999. According to documents provided by the settling parties, these tanks had been abandoned by the station’s prior owner, and were discovered during the 1999 removal and replacement of the three petroleum USTs at the facility.

With millions of gallons of fuel stored in underground tanks throughout the U.S., underground storage tank leaks pose a constant threat to land and water resources. EPA’s spill prevention regulations are designed to reduce the serious health and environmental risks of oil and petroleum product leaks and spills.