Court papers show any Arthur Kill damage claim waits on a study with no deadline. The money needs the Legislature's approval before restoration spending, and two of the three conservation easements Hercules promised were unsigned forms when the court approved the deal.
Hess has agreed to pay New Jersey $19.5 million to settle damage claims at its old Port Reading refinery. Left out of the deal: the Arthur Kill. The state alleges a 1969 crude oil spill at the site reached that waterway.
The agreement is one of two natural resource damage settlements that the state announced Oct. 5, payments for harm to the public's land, water and wildlife.
State officials valued the Hess deal and a $4.5 million settlement with Hercules together at more than $20 million.
The judgments behind those figures, which a state Superior Court judge in Middlesex County entered in August, attach conditions. Any Arthur Kill damage claim waits on a study with no deadline, and two of the three conservation easements Hercules promised were unsigned forms in the judgment the court approved.
The announcement named no restoration project, location or timeline for the money.
"Today's action reflects the Sherrill Administration's commitment to holding polluters accountable for damage to our state's precious natural resources," New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Ed Potosnak said in the announcement. Attorney General Jennifer Davenport said the deals "go beyond cleaning up past damages."
The Hess deal covers the refinery land, not the waterway beside it
Hess began refining and storing petroleum in 1958 on about 220 acres along the Arthur Kill in Woodbridge Township's Port Reading section. Buckeye Partners bought the property in 2013, and a Buckeye affiliate still runs it as a petroleum storage facility. Chevron acquired Hess in July 2025, the Hess judgment says.
The state's largest alleged discharge came from a tank failure in October 1969. That spill of 8 million gallons of crude oil reached the Arthur Kill by way of Smith Creek, which ran through the property, the state alleges.
Homes are about 1,200 feet northwest of the refinery, according to the state's 2018 complaint.
Hess had 30 days from the judgment's Aug. 20 entry to pay, and the deal carries no admission of fact, fault or liability. Hess also agreed to keep carrying out its cleanup duties at the site.
The judgment's definition of natural resource damages includes the cost of assessing the injury; DEP restoration office costs; attorneys', consultants' and experts' fees; and interest, along with compensation for injured natural resources. It sets no split among them.
The judgment excludes what it calls offsite claims, for damage to waters and sediment beyond the property, and it names the Arthur Kill and the lower stretch of Smith Creek. The state agreed not to bring any new damage claim over those waters until trustees, the agencies that act for the public in such cases, finish a formal damage assessment.
The trustees must also decide Hess's liability in a process Hess can join. The judgment sets no deadline for either step.
Any later suit must include other responsible parties, the judgment says.
The announcement said the state "reserves the right" to sue "a larger set of defendants" later. The Attorney General's office has not named those defendants or offered a timetable.
One federal damage study already takes in the Arthur Kill.
In February 2020, federal trustees released a final plan to assess injuries tied to the Diamond Alkali Superfund site, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced. The agency said the site takes in Newark Bay, the Arthur Kill, the Kill Van Kull and 17.4 miles of the Passaic River. Assessments at sites that large "often take years to complete," it said.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration lists DEP among the trustees in that case. DEP has not said whether that work would meet the Hess judgment's condition.
An older settlement could also shape any Arthur Kill claim. Hess kept the right to argue that a December 2013 judgment in the state's Passaic River pollution case already resolved the offsite claims, in whole or in part, the Port Reading judgment says.
That 2013 judgment counted the Arthur Kill as part of the Newark Bay Complex, a state appeals court said in 2024. It settled the signing parties' damage liability there, subject to a cap and a reopener.
The two cases differ. Hess told federal securities regulators in 2022 that the state's Passaic River claims against it involve alleged releases at a Newark petroleum terminal it used to own.
Spending the money takes an act of the Legislature
The Hess judgment sets no terms for how the state spends the $19.5 million.
A 2017 amendment to the state constitution does. Natural resource damage recoveries go into a dedicated account, and the Legislature must appropriate the money. The first priority for restoration spending is the immediate area where the damage occurred; the second is the same water region.
The account can also pay the state's legal costs of bringing these cases.
Voters approved the amendment that November, 1,093,448 to 490,763.
In July, the governor signed a law sending $111.6 million in natural resource damage money to DEP for projects that restore habitat, buy land and oversee restoration work, the governor's office said.
The law names the cases behind the money. Hess and Hercules, whose judgments came in August, are not among them.
A 2023 DEP administrative order leaves project choices "in the sole discretion of the Commissioner as Trustee."
DEP has not said when it will seek an appropriation for the Hess and Hercules money, or for which area.
Legal costs move on a different track. The current state budget lets the state budget director, in consultation with the Attorney General, draw "such amounts as are required" from the account to pay those costs.
Reviewing the same language in 2018, the Legislature's Office of Legislative Services noted that it "does not provide a cap."
The state Division of Law said in 2018 and 2021 that it expected fees for outside natural resource damage lawyers to rest on a "contingency fee percentage of the dollars recovered," subject to appropriation.
Kanner & Whiteley, a Louisiana firm on the division's pre-qualified list for that litigation, appears in both judgments as special counsel to the Attorney General. Neither judgment states its fee, and the Attorney General's office has not disclosed its fee terms in these cases.
Two of the three Hercules easements were unsigned when the court approved the deal
For Hercules, the bill is $4.5 million, plus up to $50,000 toward DEP's easement-review costs, which resolves damage claims tied to a suit the state brought in 2007 against the onetime chemical and munitions maker. The state kept its Delaware River damage claims, and the settlement does not take up Hercules's cleanup duties, the announcement said.
The 2007 suit concerned the Parlin property in Sayreville. The state and Hercules agreed to resolve potential claims at three more sites, in Gibbstown, Kenvil and Chester, the judgment says.
Hercules, too, admits no fault or liability in the deal. The state's promise not to pursue the settled claims takes effect only after Hercules pays and carries out its other obligations, including the easements.
Hercules also agreed to conservation easements, deed restrictions that protect land, on more than 600 acres in three parts of the state, according to the announcement.
The deed for the largest parcel, about 300 acres on the Old Bridge-Monroe line, carries a July 27 date, and the Borough of Sayreville, not Hercules, granted it.
DuPont and Hercules each held a one-third interest in the Duhernal water project until 2016, when they conveyed it to the borough. That transfer agreement obligates Sayreville to grant the easement for Hercules, the deed says.
The borough reserved the right to keep producing and moving water there, and the deed "conveys no additional right of access by the general public to any portion of the Property."
The borough water system draws from Duhernal wells, according to its 2025 water quality report.
The other two deeds were unsigned forms in the judgment, which lets Hercules complete and file them later. The state has not said whether Hercules has since signed or filed either one.
The Gibbstown form covers about 110 acres of a larger Hercules tract in Greenwich Township. When Hercules signs, it would state that, to its knowledge, cleanup of known contamination on the parcel meets the standards of a 2018 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency cleanup decision.
On the wider Superfund site, EPA said in a January 2025 review that construction of the remedies for two of the site's three parts "has not yet been initiated."
EPA's site page says Hercules agreed in 2020 to design and carry out that cleanup and that design sampling is underway.
The Kenvil easement, roughly 235 acres in Roxbury, waits on its own cleanup. Hercules has 90 days after the site's licensed cleanup professional gives a final sign-off to deliver its paperwork.
The draft deed lists the land's former lots, among them Block 6701, Lots 1, 4 and 5.
In February, the Roxbury Township Council referred Block 6701, Lots 1, 4 and 5 for a study of whether the area needs redevelopment, its resolution shows.
Some basics are not yet public. Both judgments gave the companies 30 days from entry to pay. Those deadlines fell in September, and the state has not said whether either payment arrived.
Nor has it disclosed how much of either payment covers legal, consulting and DEP office costs.
For Port Reading, the next step on the Arthur Kill belongs to the trustees. Until they finish a formal damage assessment and decide Hess's liability, the state has agreed not to bring a new damage claim over the waterway.
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Sources
Borough of Sayreville, 2025 Consumer Confidence Report (2026)
Hess Corp., quarterly report on Form 10-Q (May 5, 2022)
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Damage Assessment, Remediation and Restoration Program, Lower Passaic River and Greater Newark Bay case page (May 18, 2026)
New Jersey Attorney General's Office and New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, "AG Davenport, DEP Commissioner Potosnak Announce Two Natural Resource Damages Settlements" (Oct. 5, 2026)
New Jersey Constitution, Article VIII, Section II, paragraph 9, natural resource damages dedication (effective Dec. 7, 2017)
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Administrative Order 2023-08, "Natural Resource Restoration Policy" (March 14, 2023)
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection v. Hercules LLC, consent judgment and Appendix A conservation easement deeds, Superior Court of New Jersey, Middlesex County, No. MID-L-8749-07 (Aug. 10, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection v. Hess Corp., complaint, Superior Court of New Jersey, Middlesex County, No. MID-L-004579-18 (Aug. 1, 2018)
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection v. Hess Corp., consent judgment, Superior Court of New Jersey, Middlesex County, No. MID-L-004579-18 (Aug. 20, 2026)
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection v. Hexcel Corp., opinion, Superior Court of New Jersey, Appellate Division, No. A-1189-22 (April 19, 2024)
New Jersey Department of State, Division of Elections, official results, Public Question 2 (Nov. 29, 2017)
New Jersey Division of Law, approved special counsel lists, natural resource damages litigation (accessed Oct. 6, 2026)
New Jersey Division of Law, request for qualifications for natural resource damages special counsel (Aug. 2, 2018)
New Jersey Division of Law, "Request for Qualifications for Special Counsel for Natural Resource Damages Litigation" (May 17, 2021)
New Jersey Governor's Office, "Governor Sherrill Signs Legislation" (July 30, 2026)
New Jersey Legislature, P.L.2026, c.27, Fiscal Year 2027 Appropriations Act, natural resource damages legal-costs language (June 30, 2026)
New Jersey Legislature, P.L.2026, c.57, appropriation of dedicated natural resource damages revenues (July 30, 2026)
New Jersey Office of Legislative Services, "Analysis of the New Jersey Budget: Department of Environmental Protection," fiscal year 2019 (April 2018)
Roxbury Township Council, Resolution 2026-050 (Feb. 24, 2026)
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Hercules Inc. (Gibbstown Plant) Superfund site profile (accessed Oct. 6, 2026)
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, "Third Five-Year Review Report for Hercules, Inc. (Gibbstown Plant) Superfund Site" (Jan. 22, 2025)
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, "Agencies to study natural resource injuries at Superfund site in Newark" (Feb. 10, 2020)
Photo: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers