DOJ Rule Reviving SEPs Raises Questions About Third-Party Payments

The Justice Department’s (DOJ) new push to restore the use of supplemental environmental projects (SEPs) in settlements appears to also open the door to allowing payments to non-governmental third parties, though sources are questioning how broadly it will be implemented in part because EPA’s SEP policy bars such payments. While it appears that DOJ wants to allow payments to third parties in SEPs, that practice would conflict with EPA’s own SEP policy, which was revised in 2015 and explicitly bans...