CP Rail Says It Will Fight Inclusion in Quebec Cleanup Order

Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. said it will contest Quebec’s decision to add the railroad to an emergency decontamination order in the wake of the train disaster that killed 47 people in the province last month.

Quebec Environment Minister Yves-Francois Blanchet yesterday added CP Rail to the list of companies targeted by the order. The legal notice requires companies including Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway Ltd. to recover oil and other contaminants and submit a cleanup plan to the government.

“As a matter of fact and law CP is not responsible for this cleanup,” Ed Greenberg, a spokesman for Canadian Pacific, said in a telephone interview. “CP will be appealing.”

Canadian Pacific had carried the tank cars from North Dakota to Montreal, where it interchanged with Montreal, Maine & Atlantic.