“Under the terms of a settlement filed…in federal court, several oil companies will pay $1.5 million to the Environmental Protection Agency for costs it incurred while directing the investigation and cleanup of methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE), a gasoline additive, from a groundwater basin formerly used for drinking water by the City of Santa Monica, California… The agreement between the EPA and the oil companies follows eight years of investigation and cleanup under the Federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and California’s Porter Cologne Act. The MTBE contamination in the vicinity of Santa Monica’s drinking water wells came from at least 25 possible sources, most of which were gas stations in the Charnock Sub-Basin.”