This property has a documented history as a bulk fuel distribution terminal going back to 1900. Historical insurance policies issued during those prior operations and through 1986 could fund a cleanup — and recover costs already spent.

Why Historical Insurance Policies May Be Accessible

Pre-1986 Commercial General Liability (CGL) policies were occurrence-based and did not contain an effective pollution exclusion in Washington. If contamination occurred while those policies were active, those historical insurance carriers may still have a legal obligation to fund the cleanup costs, even if the business closed or the property changed hands.

The contamination here traces directly to bulk fuel storage and distribution operations — Standard Oil, ARCO, and D&D Distributors/Phillips — that were active for decades before 1986, when occurrence-based Commercial General Liability policies carried no effective pollution exclusion. Documented petroleum releases in 1968 and 1984 fall squarely within the coverage window those policies were written to address. The projected scale of the ongoing remedy — 11,000 cubic yards of soil removal, groundwater extraction, vapor treatment, and long-term monitoring — represents the kind of multi-million-dollar cleanup expenditure that historical carriers from that pre-1986 period may be obligated both to recover and to fund as remediation continues.

Restorical's role is to locate viable historical policies, determine whether a successful coverage claim is possible, and assist our clients and their legal counsel to obtain insurance coverage. Restorical then manages the claim, including accounting, to ensure the cleanup is funded in a timely manner.