Groundwater rights are less easily defined than those associated with either the riparian or appropriative doctrines and vary greatly across states and countries. They are even more easily exploited. As economist Zachary Donohew explains, “Differences in recharge rates, interaction with surface water and the size of groundwater basins makes groundwater rules difficult to apply across the board.”
Perhaps because groundwater rules are less explicitly defined, “Groundwater is more like an open-access resource, subject to wasteful extraction” (Donohew 91), as well as increased toxicity by corporations who exploit it. Groundwater takes center stage in both contemporary fictional and documentary films. In most fictional films, groundwater is exploited by large companies dumping toxic waste. Erin Brockovich (2000) heightens this approach, amplifying a real story of greed and fair use policies.
Based on a contemporary case against the Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Erin Brockovich (2000) dramatizes the fight to expose the energy company’s negligent leakage of toxic chromium 6 into groundwater and compensate area residents negatively affected by the poisoning of their drinking water. In 1996, as a result of the largest direct action lawsuit of its kind, spear-headed by Erin Brockovich and Ed Masry, the law firm for which Brockovich worked, the utility giant was forced to pay out the largest toxic tort injury settlement in US history: $333 million in damages to more than 600 Hinkley residents.
Erin Brockovich provides a sometimes exaggerated picture of Brockovich and her determination to unearth evidence to ensure the firm wins the case. But it also highlights some of the possible dangers associated with confusing groundwater principles. In Erin Brockovich groundwater rights become a public concern.
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