D&L Energy, sibling or parent company (depending on who you ask) to Hardrock Excavating, wants a judge to allow the company to be auctioned off in November. Hardrock/D&L’s owner, Ben Lupo, you may recall, was found guilty of instructing one of his employees to dump thousands of gallons of fracking wastewater down a drain that led to a creek that led to the Mahoning River near Youngstown, OH (see Youngstown Business Dumped >200K Gal of Untreated Wastewater). After investigating, the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) took away D&L and Hardrock’s permits to do business in Ohio (see OH Wastewater Dumper D&L Energy Gets Business Death Sentence).
D&L, not able to operate, is in bankruptcy and wants to sell off its remaining assets to satisfy what it says is over $5 million owed to creditors. However, the ODNR is saying “not so fast” to an auction. The ODNR is concerned D&L could shirk its responsibilities to clean up the mess they’ve made…
