Inga Caldwell is a member in the firm’s Environmental Department.

Experience

Having previously worked in-house at an environmental consulting firm, Inga brings a highly valuable and unique perspective to her practice that marries technical insight with legal know-how. Working closely with environmental consultants to anticipate, mitigate, and manage environmental liability risks, Inga counsels clients on a wide range of environmental matters. Her Superfund practice includes cost recovery, contribution, and insurance actions, negotiating consent decrees with USDOJ and USEPA, and sediment allocation, as well as the nuts-and-bolts of day-to-day management of active Superfund sites. Inga also advises clients on transaction, permitting compliance, and remediation projects.

Representative Matters

Superfund Sites

Inga has extensive experience in complex, multiparty Superfund sites and related litigation, including:

• Sediment Site Allocations. Representation of multiple potentially responsible parties (PRPs) in sediment site allocation negotiations.
• CERCLA Cost Recovery & Contribution Actions. Defense of CERCLA sections 107 and 113 claims, including in litigation related to the Passaic River.
• Consent Decrees. Negotiation of Consent Decrees with USDOJ and USEPA.
• Nuts & Bolts. Day-to-day management of Superfund Site trust funds, including acting as liaison between contractors, engineers and PRPs for implementation of remedial actions; drafting PRP organization agreements and joint defense agreements; negotiating USEPA oversight costs; and drafting trust fund reports on remediation and budget status.

Transactional Work

Inga’s transactional practice includes real estate acquisitions and divestments, redevelopment projects, corporate transactions, leasing, and financing. Inga conducts thorough yet efficient environmental due diligence, working closely with consultants and engineers to hone in on the potentially material risks for remediation, permitting, compliance, and health and safety issues and assist clients with developing environmental risk mitigation and management strategies.

Permitting Compliance

Inga advises clients on a wide range of environmental permitting matters that arise in construction, remediation, and operations. Her boots-on-the-ground practice includes site visits with the client and engineering team, preparing proactive compliance strategies and defending against regulator overreach.

Remediation Projects

With a special eye for smart pathways forward, Inga advises clients on managing contaminated properties to achieve business objectives. She vets and oversees consultants and engineers, advises on technical reports, manages ongoing compliance obligations such as reporting and financial assurance, and more, all with the goal of obtaining final agency closure.

Prior to joining Cole Schotz, Inga was the Associate Director of Environmental Law Programs at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law. Inga previously worked in-house at First Environment, where she supported forensic, toxic tort and environmental fate and transport experts. Inga also worked as an associate at N.W. Bernstein & Associates, LLC, a boutique environmental law firm, where she represented clients in litigation regarding CERCLA, RCRA, and the NY Navigation Law.

Networks & Affiliations

Inga is a Co-Chair of the Enforcement and Litigation Committee of the ABA Section on Environment, Energy, and Resources, and previously served as a Co-Chair of the Environmental Litigation and Toxic Torts Committee (2022-2023), Chair of the Constitutional Law Committee (2020-2021, 2021-2022), and Participant of the Leadership Development Program (2019-2020). Inga is also a member of the Environmental Law Institute’s Emerging Leaders Initiative.

Inga is an Adjunct Professor at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University where she teaches Science for Environmental Lawyers, Natural Resources Law, and Water Rights Law.

Education

Inga graduated magna cum laude from Vermont Law School in 2012. While there, she served as a Fellow of the Vermont Law School-China Partnership and a Production Editor of the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law. Inga graduated cum laude with a B.A. from Dartmouth College.