Cite as: 516 U. S. 479 (1996)
Opinion of the Court
Justice O'Connor delivered the opinion of the Court.
We consider whether § 7002 of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (RCRA), 42 U. S. C. § 6972, authorizes a private cause of action to recover the prior cost of cleaning up toxic waste that does not, at the time of suit, continue to pose an endangerment to health or the environment. We conclude that it does not.
I
Respondent KFC Western, Inc. (KFC), owns and operates a "Kentucky Fried Chicken" restaurant on a parcel of property in Los Angeles. In 1988, KFC discovered during the course of a construction project that the property was contaminated with petroleum. The County of Los Angeles Department of Health Services ordered KFC to attend to the problem, and KFC spent $211,000 removing and disposing of the oil-tainted soil.
Three years later, KFC brought this suit under the citizen suit provision of RCRA, 90 Stat. 2825, as amended, 42
Massachusetts, and William L. Pardee, John Beling, and Karen McGuire, Assistant Attorneys General, Jeremiah W. Nixon, Attorney General of Missouri, and James Layton, Joseph P. Bindbeutel, and Douglas E. Nelson, Assistant Attorneys General, and by the Attorneys General of their respective jurisdictions as follows: Bruce M. Botelho of Alaska, Calvin E. Holloway of Guam, Chris Gorman of Kentucky, Frankie Sue Del Papa of Nevada, Tom Udall of New Mexico, Darrell V. McGraw, Jr., of West Virginia, Robert A. Butterworth of Florida, Carla Stolla of Kansas, Richard P. Ieyoub of Louisiana, Deborah T. Poritz of New Jersey, Dennis C. Vacco of New York, and James E. Doyle of Wisconsin; for the State of Louisiana through its Department of Transportation and Development by William M. Hudson III, Edgar D. Gankendorff, Lawrence A. Durant, James M. Bookter, and Charley Hutchens; for the Bi-State Development Agency of the Missouri-Illinois Metropolitan District by Timothy W. Burns, Jerome M. Organ, John Fox Arnold, and Nelson G. Wolff; and for Kaufman and Broad Home Corp. et al. by William N. Kammer and Robert C. Longstreth.
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