ARKEMA SETTLEMENT ADMINISTRATOR FAQS AS OF APRIL 1, 2026
Q1. What is the Settlement About?
A. The Crosby Harvey Settlement Remediation Program involves, in part, testing and remediation (clean-up) of property in the Class Area defined by a 7-mile radius in and around the Crosby, Texas Arkema site.
To conduct the property testing (sampling), a contractor was selected through a competitive bidding process initiated by the Settlement Administrator’s August 8, 2024 delivery of a Request for Proposal to the list of potential bidders approved under the Settlement Agreement. Edge Science and Engineering (Edge) of Houston, Texas was selected as the sampling contractor, under the oversight of Robin Mann, a Professional Geologist licensed in the State of Texas in accordance with Texas Administrative Code 1§1002.252.
Edge was retained to sample exterior surface soil and interior settled dust from accessible portions of properties and structures determined by the Settlement Administrator to be eligible from within the 7-mile Class Area.
Q2. When will the properties be sampled by the Settlement?
A. Field sampling activities began on June 9, 2025, and continued through October 4, 2025.
Q3. What toxins are being tested for under the Settlement?
A. Dioxins/furans are mixtures of chemical compounds (congeners) that have similar chemical structures. Analytical data for soil and dust samples is reported as concentration for each individual dioxin and furan cogener.
A congener is an individual chemical within a family of similar chemicals. There are 75 dioxin congeners and 135 furan congeners, of which 7 dioxin and 10 furan congeners are considered particularly toxic. Congeners that contain the same number of chlorine atoms, regardless of where they are positioned, can be grouped together as a homologue class.
Q4. What work was performed for soil sampling under the Settlement?
A. For Personal Identification Numbers (“PINs”) with surface soil accessible for sampling, generally two composited surface soil samples were collected from each property. Soil sampling was conducted in general accordance with the Interstate Technology & Regulatory Council (ITRC) Incremental Sampling Methodology (ISM) whereby composite samples were collected as 30-point equivalent volume aliquot or increment samples from the upper 3-inches of soil below the overlying sod or litter layer in accordance with the project Sampling and Analysis Plan.
Surface soil sampling was directed to the ¼ to ½-acre area surrounding the home or occupied structure, when present. Generally, wooded areas with leaf-litter ground surfaces or dense overgrowth were not sampled. Additional samples were collected from larger properties. For properties larger than 1-acre, ICS/ISM Decision Unit (“DU”) dimensions were adjusted to larger than 0.25-acres. Additional soil samples were collected for larger properties based on field verification by the Settlement Technical Advisor.
Q5. What work was performed for interior dust sampling under the Settlement?
A. For PINs that included an inhabited structure, wipe samples were collected to assess the presence of dioxin in settled dust. Sampled interior surfaces included floors, particularly floor surfaces near entrances, and other accessible surfaces that may have been impacted by dioxins from settled dust or soil tracked indoors. Typically, six investigative field wipe samples were collected per structure, with limited deviations approved by the Settlement Technical Advisor to address unique structural configurations. Generally, samples were collected from the following locations in residential properties:
(1) floor child play area not bedroom,
(1) kitchen floor, OR points of ingress/egress from outdoors to indoors, including pets.
(1) bedroom floor youngest child,
(1) bedroom floor next oldest child;
(1) discretionary sample child touch surface OR additional points of ingress/egress from outdoors to indoors, including pets.
(1) discretionary sample from attic, basement, or other interior dust reservoir(s)
Dust wipe samples were collected by the methods in the approved SAP utilizing a clean laboratory-provided hexane moistened gauze wipe and template measuring 12-inches x 12-inches (1 ft²) to define the sampled surface area to collect sufficient sample volume to attain a minimum laboratory detection limit during analysis.
At the conclusion of each sampling day, soil and dust samples were submitted, under chain of custody record, to a Eurofins Built Environment Testing (Eurofins) of Houston Texas laboratory courier for analysis of dioxins and furans by U.S. EPA SW-846 Method 8290A using High Resolution Gas Chromatography / High Resolution Mass Spectrometry (HRGC/HRMS) for 19 dioxin and furan cogeners and homologues. Eurofins is accredited by the Texas Commission for Environmental Quality (TCEQ) Laboratory Accreditation Program to perform the analyses in Texas.
Q6. When will the incentive payment be mailed for the sampling portion of the Settlement?
A. The payments were mailed in November 2025. Please note that this payment is for your participation in allowing the Settlement to sample your soil. This does not mean that you qualify for remediation.
Q7. When will the sampling results be mailed out?
A. Sampling results will be distributed to all participating Claimants at the same time. Our estimated projection is mid-2026. Due to the sampling of properties, we must get approval by the Court to lower the sampling baseline in order to have properties to remediate.
Q8. When will the remediation portion of the Settlement begin?
A. The remediation phase will begin when we have approval from the Court. We will then mail your soil and/or house sampling results to you with a remediation plan. If your property is remediated, your remediation payment will be paid at the end.
Q9. Is the claims office open if I have questions or need to bring something in?
A. Yes. The claims office is located at the Staybridge Hotel in Baytown. The phone number is 832-339-0096.
ARKEMA SETTLEMENT ADMINISTRATOR UPDATE
The Settlement was approved June 6, 2024, and the Approval Order is posted on this website in the Pleadings and Important Documents Tab.
The Settlement became effective July 7, 2024, and the Defendants have funded the Settlement.
Following a Claim Form mail out to the Class Members, and sign-up town meetings at the Crosby VA Hall in October and November, 2024, between 500 and 600 properties in the Class Area have signed up to be tested for dioxin contamination.
We are compiling a master list of the signed-up properties and are plotting them on a GPS map.
We will provide the results to the 3 dioxin testing bidders to obtain their best and final offers.
We plan to select the dioxin testing company in January 2025, with testing to begin shortly thereafter.
For more information regarding the Settlement, and for a copy of the Claim form and FAQs regarding the Property Remediation Program, please click on the following link:
If you have any questions, please email us at settlement@crosbyharveysettlement.com.
Ed Gentle
Settlement Administrator
NOTICE OF CLASS ACTION SETTLEMENT
To all residents and real property owners at any
time since August 30, 2017, located within a 7-mile
radius of the Crosby Arkema Inc. Chemical Plant.
A proposed class action settlement has been reached with Arkema Inc. (“Defendant”), regarding fires that occurred at its facility located at 18000 Crosby Eastgate Rd., Crosby, Texas 77532, during Hurricane Harvey in late August and early September 2017. The settlement resolves a lawsuit entitled Wheeler, et al. v. Arkema Inc., Case No. 4:17-cv-2960 (the “Lawsuit”), United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas (the “Court”). The Court authorized this notice.
See Pleadings and Important Documents tab to see a more detailed Class Notice of the terms of the settlement, answers to frequently asked questions, and other information about the Lawsuit.
If you are a member of the Class and currently own real property located within a 7-mile radius of the Crosby Arkema Inc. Chemical Plant, you will be eligible to have your real property tested for dioxin compounds, if you so request. Depending on the results, you may be eligible to have dioxin compounds removed from your real property. Additionally, all Class Members will have the opportunity to participate in a study that will track the potential for future development of certain diseases in the community. The settlement makes more than $20 million available for property testing removal, and an additional $1.7 million for the disease study.
You have the right to object to the settlement. Your objection must be received by April 22, 2024. For details on how to object, visit the settlement website at crosbyharveysettlement.com.
The Court will hold a final approval hearing on June 6, 2024, at 10 a.m. to consider whether to approve the settlement. Class Counsel will ask the Court to award them $8,500,000 in Attorneys’ Fees, as well as lawsuit expenses, and an incentive award to the individuals who started the Lawsuit. These funds are in addition to the amounts available for property testing and remediation and the disease study. You may appear at the hearing, but you do not have to.
All available information regarding the property characterization, remediation, and health study that currently exists is available in the Settlement Agreement and Long Form notice, which are available on this Settlement Website. However, this Settlement is not yet finalized. The Final Approval Hearing will be held on June 6, 2024. As such, work regarding the property characterization, remediation, and health study cannot yet begin. When additional information becomes available, it will be posted to this Settlement Website. Please check this Settlement Website periodically or contact the Settlement Administrator or Class Counsel for updates.