Richardson v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance

GLICKMAN, Associate Judge,

dissenting:

The question in this appeal is whether the so-called “absolute pollution exclusion” precludes insurance coverage for injuries caused by indoor air pollution attributable to carbon monoxide from a building furnace. My colleagues in the majority conclude that the exclusion is limited to large-scale industrial pollution of the natural environment of the kind targeted by federal environmental laws. My colleagues therefore conclude that the exclusion does not apply to indoor air pollution that is not caused by an “industrial” polluter and that does not require “an environmental cleanup.” Ante at 337 & n. 39. As I hope to show, these conclusions are untenable, for they are contradicted by the language, the drafting history and the purpose of the exclusion — all of which, I fear, the majority misreads and misunderstands. The absolute pollution exclusion was drafted deliberately to cover injuries arising from all kinds of environmental degradation by pollutants, including the degradation of the air in non-industrial indoor environments. There is no warrant for imposing an artificial limitation on the types of pollution or polluter to which the exclusion applies.

What troubles me most about the majority opinion is not its mistaken conclusion, however, but the way the majority arrives at that conclusion. The language of the absolute pollution exclusion unambiguously denies coverage for injuries caused by indoor air pollution. The majority finds ambiguity in spite of the clarity of the language only by violating settled rules of insurance contract construction, resorting selectively to extrinsic historical “evidence,” and invoking subjective intuitions about “reasonable” coverage expectations. This approach is both methodologically flawed and inconsistent with past decisions of this court.

In Part I of the discussion that follows, I describe Ms. Richardson’s claim and set out the pertinent provisions of the absolute pollution exclusion. Then, in Part II, I analyze the coverage question before us. I begin the analysis, as I believe we must, with the language of the exclusion. Reading the exclusion in accordance with settled rules of construction compels the conclusion that the exclusion unambiguously precludes insurance coverage for all indoor air pollution claims — whether or not those claims allege what the majority would call *341 “traditional environmental contamination.” Ante at 338. Next, I address the majority’s twin rationales for ignoring the plain language of the exclusion in favor of a judicial rewriting, namely that (1) the exclusion employs “terms of art” that should be given a specialized meaning rather than their plain meaning, and (2) the exclusion is in need of a “limiting principle” to avoid absurd consequences. Neither rationale, I argue, is valid. Finally, I examine the majority’s rebanee on the history of the absolute pollution exclusion and its own notions of reasonableness to support its narrowing interpretation of the exclusion. I argue that the majority’s use of extrinsic evidence and its impbeit resurrection of the reasonable expectations doctrine to override unambiguous contract language are improper.

I.

A. Ms. Richardson’s Allegations of Indoor Air Pollution

According to Antoinette Richardson’s complaint, she suffered injuries as a result of indoor air pobution at the apartment building where she worked as a security guard. Between February 23 and March 9, 1995, Ms. Richardson aheged, “there were complaints about the smell of gas within the apartment complex, and specifi-caby apartment No. 204,” the location of the security office. “The cause of the smeb was traced to a furnace located in the furnace room of this apartment complex which emitted fumes into the apartment,” abegedly in violation of “environmental” regulations and other laws. The “fumes emanating from [the] leaking gas furnace” included “hazardous levels of carbon monoxide” which poisoned Ms. Richardson and caused her permanent brain damage.

Although the majority treats Ms. Richardson’s claim as though it does not involve pobution at ab, it does. “[P]obution has been defined as ‘[c]ontamination of air ... by the discharge of harmful substances.’ ” Certain Underwriters at Lloyd’s London v. C.A. Turner Constr. Co., Inc., 112 F.3d 184 , 188 (5th Cir.1997) (holding that release of toxic gas inside a tent constituted pobution within meaning of pobution exclusion) (dictionary citation omitted). Carbon monoxide is subject to extensive regulation as a known air pobu-tant, for example in the Clean Air Act, see, e.g., 42 U.S.C. §§ 7407 , 7476(a), 7512(2000), and the National Primary Ambient Air Quabty Standards for Carbon Monoxide, 40 C.F.R. § 50.8 (2002). As a substance whose “inhalation ... may reasonably be anticipated to cause death ... [or] physiological malfunctions,” carbon monoxide is also a “pobutant or contaminant” as defined by CERCLA. 1 See 42 U.S.C. § 9601 (33) (2000). “[T]he most commonly-known danger of carbon monoxide [arises from] breathing it in an enclosed space.” Matcon Diamond, Inc. v. Penn Nat’l Ins. Co., 815 A.2d 1109, 1113 (Pa.Super.Ct.2003). Indoor air pobution is a matter of widespread concern, which Congress recognized in 1986 when it passed the Radon Gas and Indoor Air Quabty Research Act to “gather data and information on ab aspects of indoor air quabty in order to contribute to the understanding of health problems associated with the existence of air pobutants in the indoor environment.” Pub.L. 99-499, § 403 (a)(1), 100 Stat. 1758 , 1759, reprinted in 42 U.S.C. § 7401 (2000). See also 24 C.F.R. § 982.401 (h)(2)® (estabhshing indoor air *342 quality standards for government housing, including the requirement that “[t]he dwelling unit must be free from dangerous levels of air pollution from carbon monoxide ... and other harmful pollutants”). One of the most celebrated indoor air pollution cases was decided by this very court. In Bahura v. S.E.W. Investors, 754 A.2d 928 (D.C.2000), employees of the Environmental Protection Agency sued the owners and managers of buildings housing the EPA’s national headquarters, claiming that the employees suffered neurological damage from “their inhalation at the workplace of allegedly contaminated indoor air” between 1986 and 1989. Bahura, 754 A.2d at 981 . The plaintiffs’ “sick building syndrome” injuries apparently were caused by inadequate ventilation of toxic chemicals used during building renovations. Id. at 932 . We commented that “[t]he evidence of serious environmental difficulties at the EPA’s own headquarters was widely publicized and came to the attention of Congress.” Id.

In this case the District Court found that “the carbon monoxide fumes acted as a pollutant by allegedly migrating through the gas line and out of two separate furnaces to injure people.” Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co. v. National REO Mgmt., Inc., 205 F.R.D. 1, 11 (D.D.C.2000). The court was unquestionably correct in recognizing this as indoor air pollution.

B. The Absolute Pollution Exclusion in the Standard Commercial General Liability Policy

The commercial general liability policy issued by Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company to the property manager of the apartment building where Ms. Richardson worked states in pertinent part that the insurance does not apply to:

F. Pollution

(1) “Bodily injury” or “property damage” arising out of the actual, alleged or threatened discharge, dispersal, seepage, migration, release or escape of pollutants:

(a) At or from any premises, site or location which is or was at any time owned or occupied by, or rented or loaned to, any insured;

Subparagraph[ ] (a) ... do[es] not apply to “bodily injury” or “property damage” arising out of heat, smoke or fumes from a hostile fire.

As used in this exclusion, a hostile fire means one which becomes uncontrollable or breaks out from where it was intended to be.

Pollutants means any solid, liquid, gaseous or thermal irritant or contaminant, including smoke, vapor, soot, fumes, acids, alkalis, chemicals and waste. Waste includes materials to be recycled, reconditioned or reclaimed.

This language is part of what is known as the absolute pollution exclusion.

II.

A. Applying the Accepted Rules for Construing Contracts of Insurance, the Absolute Pollution Exclusion Unambiguously Bars Coverage of Ms. Richardson’s Indoor Air Pollution Claim

Unlike the majority, I begin my analysis of the coverage question in this case by examining the terms of the absolute pollution exclusion; for “[a]n insurance policy is a contract between the insured and the insurer, and in construing it we must first look to the language of the contract.” Cameron v. USAA Prop. & Casualty Ins. Co., 733 A.2d 965, 968 (D.C.1999) (emphasis added). “The first step in the con *343 struction of [insurance] contracts is to determine what a reasonable person in the position of the parties would have thought the disputed language meant.” Id. at 970 (emphasis added; citation and internal quotation marks omitted). “The words used, even in their literal sense, are the primary and ordinarily the most rehable source of interpreting the meaning of any writing.” J. Parreco & Son v. District of Columbia Rental Hous. Comm’n, 567 A.2d 43, 46 (D.C.1989) (quoting Cabell v. Markham, 148 F.2d 737, 739 (2d Cir.1945) (Learned Hand, J.)) (emphasis added).

The words of a contract are “not ambiguous where the court can determine [their] meaning without any other guide than a knowledge of the simple facts on which, from the nature of language in general, [their] meaning depends.” Holland v. Hannan, 456 A.2d 807, 815 (D.C.1983) (quoting Burbridge v. Howard Univ., 305 A.2d 245, 247 (D.C.1973)). “A court will not torture words to import ambiguity where the ordinary meaning leaves no room for ambiguity.” Redmond v. State Farm Ins. Co., 728 A.2d 1202, 1206 (D.C. 1999) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). We do not “indulge in forced constructions.” Cameron, 733 A.2d at 968 . We take the words of a contract as we find them.

These principles are fohowed strictly when the contract is one of insurance. “Unless it is obvious that the terms used in an insurance contract are intended to be used in a technical connotation, we must construe them consistently with the meaning which common speech [i]mports.” Cameron, 733 A.2d at 968 ; see Pennsylvania Indem. Fire Corp. v. Aldridge, 73 App. D.C. 161, 162 , 117 F.2d 774, 775 (1941); accord, In re Estate of Corriea, 719 A.2d 1234, 1242 (D.C.1998) (“The INAPRO policy does not define ‘dishonest ... purpose or intent,’ and so we look to the meaning of the terms which common speech imports.”). This rule applies with special force to exclusions from coverage, because “it is the insurer’s duty to spell out in plainest terms — terms understandable to the man in the street — any exclusionary or delimiting policy provisions.” Cameron, 733 A.2d at 968 . If the insurer fails to do so, as by defining words meant to have a technical or special meaning, the words in an exclusion “should be given their common, ordinary, and it has been said their ‘popular’ meaning” — for the “vast majority” of policyholders are “not equipped to understand other than plain language.” Id. at 968, 970 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).

To honor this fundamental rule of construction faithfully in the case of the absolute pollution exclusion, we must do two things. Where the terms of the exclusion are defined explicitly in the policy, such as the term “pollutants,” we must follow the policy definitions, for it is “obvious” that those terms are “intended to be used in a technical connotation.” Where the terms are not defined explicitly, such as the terms “discharge, dispersal, seepage, migration, release or escape,” we must follow common usage, for it is not “obvious” that a technical usage applies to those terms.

If we follow these interpretive principles, we are compelled to say that the absolute pollution exclusion “admits of only one construction.” J. Parreco & Son, 567 A.2d at 46 . The exclusion unambiguously precludes coverage of Ms. Richardson’s claim that carbon monoxide fumes from a leaking furnace at the insured’s premises infiltrated her office there and injured her.

To begin with, the carbon monoxide fumes were “pollutants” within the meaning of the exclusion because that term is defined specifically to include “any” “gaseous” “contaminant,” specifically including “fumes.” See, e.g., Bernhardt v. Hartford *344 Fire Ins. Co., 102 Md.App. 45 , 648 A.2d 1047, 1051 (1994) (holding that carbon monoxide that leaked from a defective furnace and central heating system into tenants’ apartments “was a ‘gaseous ... irritant or contaminant’ and constituted ‘fumes’ and ‘chemicals’ within the clear language of the definition of ‘pollutant’ ”); see also Assicurazioni Generali S.p.A. v. Neil, 160 F.3d 997, 1000 (4th Cir.1998) (holding that carbon monoxide contamination at a hotel “plainly” fell within the definition of “pollutant”); Longaberger Co. v. United States Fid. & Guar. Co., 31 F.Supp.2d 595, 604 (S.D.Ohio 1998), aff'd 201 F.3d 441 (6th Cir.1999) (holding that the pollution exclusion “clearly covers the emission of carbon monoxide gas” from a defective furnace in residence of the insured).

Second, the leakage of the carbon monoxide from the building furnace into Ms. Richardson’s apartment constituted an “actual discharge, dispersal, seepage, migration, release or escape” of that pollutant within the meaning of the exclusion because we must give those undefined terms their ordinary meaning in common parlance. See, e.g., Bernhardt, 648 A.2d at 1051 (“[T]he bodily injury claimed by the tenants ‘arose out of the actual ... discharge, dispersal, ... or escape’ of the carbon monoxide, ‘at ... premises owned ... by the named insured.’ ”). To take the simplest ease, a standard dictionary meaning 2 of the noun “escape” is “leakage or outflow especially] of steam or a liquid [as in] trying to stop an escape of gas from a broken conduit.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 774 (1993). The same dictionary adds that a primary meaning of the verb “escape” is “to issue from confinement or an enclosure esp[ecially] by way of a break (as in a waterpipe) [or in] gas escaping from a main.” Id.

Third, focusing on the heading that introduces the exclusion, the contamination of the air in Ms. Richardson’s apartment by carbon monoxide was, in common parlance, “pollution” of her indoor environment. Since the policy does not define “pollution,” the word fairly may be said to convey to a lay reader that the exclusion is limited to harms arising from environmental degradation and not, for instance, every toxic tort or products liability claim regardless of environmental impact. 3 But as I have pointed out above, the concept of environmental pollution encompasses nonindustrial contamination of the air within an apartment, office, garage or other building as much as it does “what is commonly considered industrial environmental pollution.” Assicurazioni Generali S.p.A, 160 F.3d at 1000 ; see also Bern *345 hardt, 648 A.2d at 1051 (“[W]e are required to state the obvious — nowhere in this exclusion does the word ‘industry’ or ‘industrial’ appear. There simply is no such limitation.”); West Am. Ins. Co. v. Band & Desenberg, 925 F.Supp. 758, 762 (M.D.Fla.1996), aff'd 138 F.3d 1428 (11th Cir.1998) (holding that absolute pollution exclusion bars insurance coverage for “sick building syndrome” claim alleging injury caused by release or dispersal of contaminants from attic space of building into the indoor air supply); Essex Ins. Co. v. TriTown Corp., 868 F.Supp. 38 , 40-41 (D.Mass.1994) (holding that carbon monoxide emissions from an ice resurfacing machine inside a hockey arena were within the scope of the pollution exclusion). There likewise is no language linking the scope of the exclusion to any particular environmental laws or regulations, none of which is referenced in the policy. The drafters of the exclusion “encompasse[d) more than traditional conceptions of pollution.” Certain Underwriters at Lloyd’s London, 112 F.3d at 187-88 (quoting American States Ins. Co. v. Nethery, 79 F.3d 473, 477 (5th Cir.1996)).

The majority’s proposed limitations are not merely absent from the language of the pollution exclusion, they also are contradicted and hence foreclosed by that language. The exclusion states that it applies in the case of “any premises, site or location” owned or used by “any insured.” Those words negate any attempt to restrict the exclusion to waste sites and other industrial settings, or to industrial polluters. Thus, for example, when the majority states that the exclusion is “obviously focused on subjects similar to the cleanup of waste sites” and “has to do with the byproducts of the manufacturing process,” ante at 325, the majority is ignoring the express words of the exclusion. Similarly, when the majority distinguishes the present case because “the insured is not an industrial polluter but, rather, the manager of an apartment house,” ante at 336, the majority makes a distinction that the language of the exclusion expressly forbids. By its terms, the absolute pollution exclusion applies to pollution at apartment houses (“any premises”) and to pollution for which apartment house managers (“any insured”) are responsible.

The exclusion also states that it applies to the discharge of pollutants “at” as well as “from” any covered premises. This wording further negates any suggestion that the exclusion does not apply to indoor air pollution. “If the exclusion spoke only of discharges from a ... site, it could reasonably be argued that the words in question were ... applicable only to those instances in which a pollutant traveled beyond the ... site and into the atmosphere, water, or ground. The plain language of the exclusion belies such limited applicability, however; by its very terms the exclusion encompasses discharges that do not leave the ... site.” Madison Constr. Co. v. Harleysville Mut. Ins. Co., 557 Pa. 595 , 735 A.2d 100, 109 (1999). In a case arising out of an escape of carbon monoxide from malfunctioning equipment, the Third Circuit made the similar point that the pollution exclusion “does not use the words ‘into the atmosphere’ or in any way indicate that ‘environmental catastrophes’ are the conditions that trigger a bar of coverage under the exclusion.” Reliance Ins. Co. v. Moessner, 121 F.3d 895, 902 (3d Cir.1997). “In the absence of this language,” the court continued, “we will not construe the provision to create an ambiguity that does not exist.” M 4

*346 The “hostile fire” exception to the absolute pollution exclusion also signifies that the exclusion applies to purely indoor pollution of the kind at issue in this case. The hostile fire exception provides that the pollution exclusion does not apply to bodily injury or property damage arising out of “heat, smoke or fumes from a hostile fire,” i.e., a fire that “becomes uncontrollable or breaks out from where it was intended to be.” The exception ensures that the pollution exclusion does not gut insurance coverage for outbreaks of fire on the premises by excluding coverage for smoke and fume inhalation, smoke damage and similar claims, whether such harms occur on or off the premises. See, e.g., Associated Wholesale Grocers v. Americold Corp., 261 Kan. 806 , 934 P.2d 65, 77 (1997). The hostile fire exception “clearly applies to accidents that occur within a building and that do not result from what is commonly considered industrial environmental pollution.” Assicurazioni Generali, S.p.A., 160 F.3d at 1000 ; accord, William P. Shelley & Richard C. Mason, Application of the Absolute Pollution Exclusion to Toxic Tort Claims: Will Courts Choose Policy Construction or Deconstruction?, 33 Tort & Ins. L.J. 749 , 755 n. 31 (1998) (“The ‘hostile fire’ exception ... [constitutes] an implicit recognition that the Absolute [Pollution] Exclusion (to which the exception pertains) applies indoors as well.”) The hostile fire exception would be unnecessary if the pollution exclusion were limited as the majority contends to industrial environmental pollution (so-called “traditional” pollution), because ordinary fires and the smoke and fumes they generate do not fall within that category. It is particularly noteworthy that the hostile fire exception belies the majority’s attempt to construe the term “fumes” in the pollution exclusion to mean only fumes generated from industrial pollution, ante at 325-26; for the exception itself uses the term “fumes” in a way that is inconsistent with the majority’s reading.

The further implication of the hostile fire exception is that the exclusion applies with full force to injuries caused by fumes emanating from a non-hostile fire. That is the case here — Ms. Richardson has not alleged, and there is nothing to suggest, that the fire in the furnace became uncontrollable or broke out from where it was intended to be. See Bernhardt, 648 A.2d at 1049 .

The arguments that the absolute pollution exclusion applies to injuries caused by indoor air pollution are sufficiently compelling that, in the end, they force the majority into a remarkable about-face. Implicitly repudiating virtually all the cases and premises on which it relies, the majority concedes that the absolute pollution exclusion “may well” bar coverage of indoor air pollution claims when “an insured produces carbon monoxide fumes during the manufacturing process” or when “sick budding syndrome” is present. Ante at 336 n. 39. With this concession, the majority’s position collapses. If the exclusion applies to claims of personal injury from indoor air pollution, then the exclusion does not bar coverage only (as the majority elsewhere in its opinion would have it) for the kinds of environmental degradation and cleanup costs on which CERCLA and similar legislation focused. And if the exclusion applies to indoor air pollution claims, it must apply to them regardless of the identity of the polluter or the source of the pollution. This conclusion is inescapable, because the exclusion by its terms applies to pollution, not polluters. The exclusion does not distinguish — it cannot fairly be read to distinguish — between *347 carbon monoxide poisoning inside an apartment complex and the same carbon monoxide poisoning inside an industrial complex; nor between carbon monoxide poisoning caused by a defective furnace and the same carbon monoxide poisoning caused by a defective industrial process. If the claim of carbon monoxide inhalation injury is the same in each case, the absolute pollution exclusion treats it the same. Coverage for Ms. Richardson’s claim does not turn on the fact that she was a security guard at an apartment building rather than a manufacturing plant.

B. The Majority’s Reliance on Supposed “Terms of Art” and a “Need for a Limiting Principle” to Find Ambiguity in the Absolute Pollution Exclusion is Misguided

The majority advances two textual reasons, which I now shall address in turn, why “the perceived clarity” of the absolute pollution exclusion is “superficial.” Ante at 329. First the majority contends that the use of “terminology of environmental law,” or “terms of art,” makes the exclusion ambiguous. Ante at 325-29. Second, the majority claims that the “unreasonable results” of a plain language reading require an adventitious “limiting principle.” Ante at 329-31. In each instance, the majority’s analysis is flawed; neither reason justifies its conclusion that the exclusion is ambiguous as applied to Ms. Richardson’s claim.

1. “Environmental Terms of Art”

In its effort to show that the absolute pollution exclusion is ambiguous, the majority argues that “the exclusion is replete with language used in environmental statutes and regulations of the kind that generated the absolute exclusion’s adoption.” Ante at 326. According to the majority, the definition of “pollutants” uses words that “collectively bring to mind byproducts of industrial pollution,” and the exclusion employs “terminology of environmental law” and other environmental “terms of art”. Ante at 325, 327 & 328. The majority concludes that the environmental terms “together create at least an ambiguity as to the intended meaning of the words used in the pollution exclusion clause.” Ante at 329.

I recognize that some other courts have accepted this “terms of art” argument (while other courts have rejected it). Compare Nautilus Ins. Co. v. Jabar, 188 F.3d 27, 30 (1st Cir.1999) (accepting “terms of art” argument) with Nat’l Elec. Mfrs. Ass’n v. Gulf Underwriters Ass’n, 162 F.3d 821, 825 (4th Cir.1998) (rejecting “terms of art” argument). But there are several things wrong with the argument. To begin with, it impermissibly ignores the longstanding rule governing the construction of insurance contracts in this jurisdiction. As stated earlier, “[ujnless it is obvious that the terms used in an insurance contract are intended to be used in a technical connotation, we must construe them consistently with the meaning which common speech [ijmports.” Cameron, 733 A.2d at 968 . The majority concedes that it is far from “obvious” that the terms in the pollution exclusion have a “technical connotation.” See, e.g., ante at 329 (“[Assuming, arguendo, that the word ‘fumes’ as used in the exclusion today appears on the surface to be unambiguous, a review of the entire clause and of its history and context suggests that the perceived clarity is superficial....”). The typical commercial general liability policyholder has no inkling of the “history and context” of the pollution exclusion, the arcana of environmental law, or the terminology of that esoteric field. Since the policy does not reference environmental law in any way, the typical policyholder cannot be expected to construe the pollution exclusion with refer *348 ence to that body of law rather than in its ordinary sense. See Shalimar Contractors, Inc. v. American States Ins. Co., 975 F.Supp. 1450, 1457 (M.D.Ala.1997), aff'd 158 F.3d 588 (11th Cir.1998) (holding that since pollution exclusion “should be given the meaning that a person of ordinary intelligence would reasonably think the language had,” its terms “cannot be defined by resort to the highly technical and specific definitions under environmental laws, such as those contained in the Code of Federal Regulations”). Nonetheless, the majority turns the settled interpretive rule on its head and embraces its diametrical opposite by actually preferring a technical connotation of the policy terms drawn from environmental law to the meaning which common speech imports.

The majority appears to be mistaken also in its major factual premise, at least judging by the evidence it adduces. The majority supposes that the key terms of the absolute pollution exclusion are drawn from or “reflect” the terminology of federal environmental laws such as the Water Pollution Control Act, 5 CERCLA, 6 RCRA, 7 and their implementing regulations. See ante at 826-27. That supposition is not accurate. When it was developed in the late 1960’s and first published in 1970, 8 the first incarnation of the pollution exclusion already denied coverage for harms caused by the “discharge, dispersal, release or escape of smoke, vapors, fumes, acids, al-kalis, toxic chemicals, liquids or gases, waste materials or other irritants, contaminants or pollutants.” (I have italicized the terms which the majority suspects derived from the federal laws). Congress did not enact CERCLA until 1980, however, see Pub.L. 96-510, 94 Stat. 2767 (1980), and RCRA did not come into being until 1976. See Pub.L. 94-580, 90 Stat. 2795 (1976). The insurance industry assuredly did not draft the pollution exclusion in (or before) 1970 with an eye to either of those laws.

It is true that the Water Pollution Control Act, which preceded the pollution exclusion of 1970, addressed the “discharge” of polluting matter into interstate waters. 9 *349 But this Act did not contain the other key terms of the exclusion — “dispersal,” “release,” “escape,” “irritant,” “contaminant.” The pollution exclusion therefore did not draw those terms from that Act or any of the laws that the majority cites. 10

Since the key terms of the absolute pollution exclusion were not taken from the laws that the majority cites, the meaning of those terms cannot be circumscribed by those laws. But to make that point is to touch on another peculiarity of the majority’s argument that should not go unremarked. Although the majority thinks that the absolute pollution exclusion should be interpreted in light of federal environmental laws, the majority makes no effort whatsoever to ascertain whether those laws are limited to industrial pollution or in fact might apply to non-industrial indoor air pollution. This omission undermines the credibility of the majority’s position— especially since federal environmental law in fact does address non-industrial indoor air pollution, as I have noted already in Section I.A of this dissent. This is not an idle point. Without belaboring it, and simply to illustrate, the requirements of CERCLA are by no means applicable only to industrial pollution. The definition of a “hazardous substance” in CERCLA, see 42 U.S.C. § 9601 (14), “makes no distinction dependent upon whether the substance’s source was industrial, commercial, municipal or household. Whether the substance is a consumer product, a manufacturing byproduct, or an element of a waste stream is irrelevant.” B.F. Goodrich Co. v. Murtha, 958 F.2d 1192 , 1200 (2nd Cir. 1992). Similarly, potentially responsible parties under CERCLA may include individuals, municipalities, universities, and other entities besides industrial polluters. Id.; see also United States v. Alcan Aluminum Corp., 990 F.2d 711 , 725 (2nd Cir. 1993) (holding that Cornell University may be liable under CERCLA). Moreover, “[qjuantity or concentration [of the hazardous substance] is not a factor either.” B.F. Goodrich, 958 F.2d at 1200. “[E]ven minimal amounts of pollution” are within CERCLA’s purview. Alcan Aluminum, 990 F.2d at 720.

The majority is also mistaken when it asserts as a fact that the words “smoke, vapor, soot, fumes, acids, alkalis, chemicals and waste” — the non-exclusive examples included in the definition of “pollutants” used in the absolute pollution exclusion— “collectively bring to mind byproducts of industrial pollution.” Ante at 325. The majority’s wish is the father of that thought. It is equally true that the words in question may “bring to mind” byproducts of agricultural pollution, municipal pollution, vehicular pollution, and virtually any other form of pollution — easily including pollution from improperly maintained furnaces or other causes (notably including poor waste disposal practices) in apartment, office, or other buildings of every description.

It is not a “coincidence,” ante at 328, that the words used in the pollution exclusion are words commonly used elsewhere in connection with pollution, including in environmental legislation. As the heading of the exclusion states, its subject is pollution, so naturally its drafters employed words that are associated with that subject such as “release,” “escape,” “dispersal,” and “contaminant.” But these words are not “terms of art” connoting only a specific type of pollution. 11 See National Elec. *350 Mfrs. Ass’n v. Gulf Underwriters Ins. Co., 162 F.3d 821, 825 (4th Cir.1998) (noting that the pollution exclusion “contains neither technical terms nor terms of art”). The terminology of the absolute pollution exclusion is as appropriate for discussing non-industrial indoor air pollution as it is for discussing industrial pollution or whatever else the majority may consider “traditional” environmental pollution. The drafters of the absolute pollution exclusion could have used words of limitation to exempt non-industrial indoor air pollution from its purview, but they did not do so. The implication is that they did not include the corresponding limitations either.

When the words of the absolute pollution exclusion are given their plain meaning, the exclusion is broad but it is not ambiguous. It applies unambiguously to all forms of environmental pollution, whether in or out of doors, on or off the insured’s premises, industrial or non-industrial, large-scale or small-scale, traditional or novel. Ironically, it is the majority that renders the exclusion ambiguous when it rejects its plain meaning in favor of a specialized meaning that is supposedly (if not actually) drawn from the complex body of the nation’s environmental laws and regulations. It is not helpful to be told that the pollution exclusion refers only to “traditional” polluters, ante at 338, or that the exclusion does not apply to “everyday activities gone slightly, but not surprisingly, awry.” Ante at 331. With respect, formulations such as these are so vague as to be meaningless. 12 The interpretive burden they will impose on policyholders, insurance companies, claimants and courts is staggering.

Consider Doerr v. Mobil Oil Corp., 774 So.2d 119 (La.2000), one of the leading cases that the majority expressly chooses to follow. See ante at 331. Doerr arose out of the discharge of hydrocarbons from a refinery into the Mississippi River and thence into the St. Bernard Parish water system. The Parish’s insurer invoked the absolute pollution exclusion in its policy to disclaim coverage of claims filed by thousands of persons who drank or otherwise used the water. On a plain language reading of the exclusion, I dare say everyone would agree that it applied to injuries arising from the “discharge” of hydrocarbons (“chemicals” and “contaminants,” and hence “pollutants”) into the river and their ensuing “dispersal” or “migration” into the Parish water system. The Supreme Court of Louisiana rejected a plain language reading, however. See Doerr, 774 So.2d at 135 . Like the majority here, the Louisiana court construed the exclusion to apply only to pollution of the sort targeted by CERCLA and other environmental laws. That construction, the court held, necessitates an extensive factual inquiry to ascertain whether the exclusion bars coverage in any given case, including the seemingly straightforward case before it.

To begin with, the court said, “the determination of whether an insured is a ‘polluter,’ is a fact-based conclusion that should encompass consideration of a wide *351 variety of factors,” including, “the nature of the insured’s business, whether that type of business presents a risk of pollution, whether the insured has a separate policy covering the disputed claim, whether the insured should have known from a read of the exclusion that a separate policy covering pollution damages would be necessary for the insured’s business, who the insurer typically insures, any other claims made under the policy, and any other factor the trier of fact deems relevant to this conclusion.” Id. “Second,” the court said, “the determination of whether the injury-causing substance is a ‘pollutant’ is also a fact-based conclusion that should encompass a wide variety of factors.” Id. Among the factors the court enumerated were “the nature of the injury-causing substance, its typical usage, the quantity of the discharge, ... whether the substance is one that would be viewed as a pollutant as the term is generally understood, and any other factor the trier of fact deems relevant to that conclusion.” Id. “Finally,” the court concluded, “the determination of whether there was ‘discharge, dispersal, seepage, migration, release or escape’ is likewise a fact-based conclusion that must result after a consideration of all relevant circumstances ... [including] whether the pollutant was intentionally or negligently discharged, the amount of the injury-causing substance discharged, whether the actions of the alleged polluter were active or passive, and any other factor the trier of fact deems relevant.” Id. at 135-86 .

Doerr’s elaboration of the consequences of the majority’s “terms of art” construction of the absolute pollution exclusion graphically demonstrates how that construction fails to clarify the exclusion and instead renders it ambiguous and unwieldy. One can only guess at the amount of unnecessary litigation the majority’s interpretation will engender. Having repeatedly told insurers that exclusions must be “spell[ed] out in plainest terms ... understandable to the man in the street,” Cameron, 733 A.2d at 968 , this court should reject a construction that so thoroughly contradicts that goal. “[Cjourts are enjoined not to create ambiguity where none exists.” Washington Props. v. Chin, Inc., 760 A.2d 546, 548 (D.C.2000).

2. The Need for a “Limiting Principle”

Aside from the supposed “use therein of industrial and environmental terminology,” the absolute pollution exclusion is ambiguous, the majority argues, “because, if its language is read ‘literally’ in the manner here favored by Nationwide, it leads to results that can fairly be characterized as unreasonable.” Ante at 328, 330. According to the majority:

To take but two simple examples, reading the clause broadly would bar coverage for bodily injuries suffered by one who slips and falls on spilled contents of a bottle of Drano, and for bodily injury caused by an allergic reaction to chlorine in a public pool. Although Drano and chlorine are both irritants or contaminants that cause, under certain conditions, bodily injury or property damage, one would not ordinarily characterize these events as pollution.

Pipefitters Welfare Educ. Fund v. Westchester Fire Ins. Co., 976 F.2d 1037, 1043 (7th Cir.1992), quoted ante at 329-30. 13

To avoid such absurd results, the majority contends, we need a “limiting principle” *352 that is not in the plain text of the pollution exclusion itself — what the majority calls “an external limiting principle.” Ante at 330. The correct external limiting principle, the majority concludes, is that the exclusion applies only to “traditional” industrial pollution. A few other courts (though not the Pipefitters court itself 14 ) have reasoned similarly, as the majority notes.

Reductio ad absurdum arguments frequently are untrustworthy, and this one should be examined with care. Cf. J. Parreco & Son, 567 A.2d at 46 (warning against judicial overeagerness to invoke the “absurd result” doctrine as a guide to construction). The question before the court is only whether the absolute pollution exclusion is ambiguous in its application to the facts of this case, not whether the exclusion would be ambiguous in its potential application to other facts. Accord, Pipefitters, 976 F.2d at 1044 . “The fact ... that terms of a policy of insurance may be construed as ambiguous where applied to one set of facts does not make them ambiguous as to other facts which come directly within the purview of such terms.” Couch ON Insuranoe 3D § 21:14, at 21-26 (citations omitted). It might be absurd to apply the pollution exclusion to a slip on spilled Drano or an allergic reaction to chlorine in a swimming pool, but that is not the inquiry before us. It is not absurd to apply the exclusion to indoor air pollution. Since the exclusion unambiguously does apply to such air pollution if its plain terms are given their ordinary English meaning, that is the end of the matter.

I do not rest with that point, however, because the majority’s reductio ad absur-dum argument fails on its own terms. The argument works only if (1) the pollution exclusion, when read literally, does apply to such events as slips on spilled Drano and allergic reactions to swimming pool chlorine; and (2) the limiting principle offered by the majority to avoid such application is a permissible and reasonable one. Neither of those requirements is met here.

Read literally, the pollution exclusion applies to pollution. That is what its heading says. By saying so, the exclusion gives the ordinary reader to understand in no uncertain terms that it does not apply to events that do not involve pollution — even if those events do happen to involve interactions with substances that are capable of acting as contaminants or irritants. But as the Seventh Circuit itself said in discussing the hypothetical slip on spilled Drano and the allergic reaction to chlorine in a swimming pool, “one would not ordinarily characterize these events as pollution.” Pipefitters, 976 F.2d at 1043 . Indeed one would not, and so one who reads the absolute pollution exclusion “literally” would not read it to apply to such events. To put it another way, by incorporating an explicit restriction to occurrences that involve pollution, the plain text of the exclusion contains the “limiting principle” that the majority thinks is needed. 15

*353 Since the text of the exclusion contains the necessary limiting principle, there is no justification for going outside the text to look for one. But the alternative limiting principle that the majority and some other courts adopt is unacceptable for additional reasons. To be acceptable, a proposed limiting principle at least must be consistent with the text of the exclusion and clear enough in its meaning to furnish real interpretive guidance. A limitation to industrial or “traditional” environmental pollution meets neither of these minimal conditions. As I have explained above, such a limitation is contrary to the text of the exclusion and is too vague to be useful. The majority’s limiting principle is thus neither permissible nor reasonable.

C. The Majority’s Use of Extrinsic Evidence to Construe the Absolute Pollution Exclusion Is Improper, Incomplete, and Inaccurate

For all its importance, the issue of whether the language of the absolute pollution exclusion is genuinely ambiguous is not the majority’s primary focus. Rather, the majority starts out from the premise that the exclusion “cannot be construed in the abstract, ie., without an understanding of the business and regulatory context in which the policy of which it is a part was written.” Ante at 314. Accordingly, the majority undertakes to examine “how the clause here at issue came into being.” Ante at 314. The majority finds that the original pollution exclusion was revised in order to protect insurance companies from “a potentially vast and unforeseen liability for major environmental disasters” 16 and “the staggering retroactive pollution cleanup costs imposed by” CERCLA. 17 Given those purposes, the majority draws the conclusion that the exclusion was never intended to apply to a claim like Ms. Richardson’s, or, indeed, “to anyone other than an active polluter of the environment” 18 (to quote yet another inscrutable formulation of which the majority approves). In light of these determinations, the majority deems the absolute pollution exclusion ambiguous and construes it to apply only to “traditional” industrial pollution of the environment.

I have three main objections to the majority’s exposition of the history and purposes of the absolute pollution exclusion. First, I think the majority misapplies the principle that permits limited consideration of extrinsic evidence of the circumstances surrounding the making of contract to ascertain “what a reasonable person in the position of the parties would have thought the words meant.” 1010 Potomac Assocs. v. Grocery Mfrs. of Am., Inc., 485 A.2d 199, 206 (D.C. 1984). The majority’s approach, which is modeled on what courts in some (by no means all) other jurisdictions have done, is the antithesis of what this court has held is required in cases of this type. Second, this court is not in a position in the present case to examine and draw meaningful conclusions from the circumstances attending the development of the *354 absolute pollution exclusion, for we have no detailed factual record before us to go on. Third, considered properly, the extrinsic evidence that is available to us indicates that the absolute pollution exclusion was drafted so as to preclude insurance coverage for claims arising out of indoor air pollution, and the regulatory history shows that the insurance industry did not mislead state regulators into thinking otherwise.

1. Extrinsic Evidence is Relevant Only to Determine the Objective Meaning of the Language Used in the Pollution Exclusion

This court often has insisted that an unambiguous insurance contract “speaks for itself and binds the parties without the necessity of extrinsic evidence.” Cameron, 733 A.2d at 968 (quoting Corriea, 719 A.2d at 1239 ). “If a policy [of insurance] is plain and unambiguous, the court will construe it without reference to any acts or conduct of the parties thereto which evince their interpretation of such contract.” Bolle v. Hume, 619 A.2d 1192, 1197 (D.C. 1993) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). These principles accord with generally accepted rules of contract interpretation. “Extrinsic evidence of the parties’ subjective intent may be resorted to only if the document is ambiguous.” 1010 Potomac Assocs., 485 A.2d at 205 . “If the document is facially unambiguous, its language should be relied upon as providing the best objective manifestation of the parties’ intent.” Id. “[Ijntent is properly an objective, not subjective, issue.” Dodek v. CF 16 Corp., 537 A.2d 1086, 1093 (D.C.1988).

On its face the absolute pollution exclusion unambiguously applies to Ms. Richardson’s indoor air pollution claim. There is nothing absurd or contrary to law or public policy about such an application, which numerous courts in other jurisdictions have endorsed. 19 The foregoing principles of contract interpretation therefore counsel against consideration of extrinsic evidence of the subjective intent behind the exclusion.

It is true that in construing a contract, “the court looks to ‘what a reasonable person in the position of the parties would have thought the disputed language meant.’ ” Christacos v. Blackie’s House of Beef, Inc., 583 A.2d 191, 194 (D.C.1990) (quoting 1010 Potomac Assocs., 485 A.2d at 205 ). To support its investigation of the history of the pollution exclusion, the majority relies on the corollary principle that “extrinsic evidence may be considered to determine the circumstances surrounding the making of the contract so that it may be ascertained what a reasonable person in the position of the parties would have thought the words meant.” 1010 Potomac Assocs., 485 A.2d at 205-06 (citations omitted); accord, Christacos, 583 A.2d at 194 ; see also Intercounty Constr. Corp. v. District of Columbia, 443 A.2d 29, 32 (D.C. 1982). The principle is sound, but I think the majority misapplies it in this case.

In the first place, this is a principle that is rarely applicable in the ease of insurance contracts such as the one now before us, because the terms of those contracts are not negotiated between the insurer and the policyholders who purchase them. Whatever special meanings the words of the policy may be thought to have within the milieu of the insurance industry are unlikely to be known to policyholders from outside that milieu when they purchase the policy. That is one of the reasons why we *355 presume that the words of an insurance policy are given the meaning they have in ordinary discourse rather than any technical meaning known only to the insurer. We would not invoke the “surrounding circumstances” principle to override this presumption if doing so led to an interpretation that disfavored the policyholder. The same should hold true regardless of whose ox is gored. As this court has long insisted, in construing insurance policies, “[t]he clear meaning will be adopted whether favorable to the insured or not.” Medical Serv. of the District of Columbia v. Llewellyn, 208 A.2d 734, 736 (D.C.1965).

Secondly, the test of what a reasonable person in the position of the parties would have thought the contract language means remains an objective one. The surrounding circumstances are relevant only to determine how a reasonable person who knows all that the parties knew would read the language of the contract. In most cases, including the present one, evidence of surrounding circumstances will be relevant only when the words used in the contract had a meaning in the particular commercial context, trade milieu, or the like that differs from their meaning in common usage. Evidence of such a differing meaning may show that the words are ambiguous or may override the ordinary meaning of the words. But this is a principle of limited applicability. It authorizes a court to use extrinsic evidence of how the words used in a contract were understood, objectively, in the context in which the contract was made. It does not authorize using extrinsic evidence of the parties’ subjective intentions or purposes to override the objective meaning of those words in that context.

A case that may serve to illustrate and clarify this somewhat subtle point is Carey Canada, Inc. v. Columbia Cas. Co., 291 U.S.App.D.C. 284 , 940 F.2d 1548 (1991). 20 At issue in that case was whether an “asbestosis” exclusion in insurance policies excluded all asbestos-related disease claims from coverage. The district court found that “asbestosis” is a medical term that unambiguously refers to “a single, specific disease caused by the inhalation of asbestos fibers.” Id., 291 U.S.App.D.C. at 291 , 940 F.2d at 1555 (citation omitted). This implied that the asbestosis exclusion did not bar coverage for other asbestos-related diseases. Countering this finding, however, the district court found from extrinsic evidence of the parties’ negotiations that they intended to use the term “asbestosis” generieally to exclude coverage for all asbestos-related diseases. Id. On appeal the D.C. Circuit held that basic contract interpretation principles did not permit this approach, because such extrinsic evidence is admissible “only where the contract language is in fact ambiguous.” Id., 291 U.S.App.D.C. at 293 , 940 F.2d at 1557 . Rejecting the insurance companies’ contention that the court could find the term “asbestosis” ambiguous from evidence of the parties’ negotiations or course of dealing, the court explained that “objective evidence — a showing that anyone who understood the context of the contract would know it could not mean what an unskilled reader would suppose it to mean — is required.” Id. (citations omitted). Such objective evidence of an ambiguity, the court said, would have to be found in the customs and usages of the insurance industry or the public record at the time the parties entered into their contract. “To hold otherwise,” the court added, “without objective evidence of ambiguity, could defeat *356 the intent of the parties to abide by the terms of the contract and to indemnify the insureds for asbestos-related claims other than those for the specific disease asbestosis, allowing one party to create ambiguity where none exists.” Id,., 291 U.S.App.D.C. at 294 , 940 F.2d at 1558 . Accordingly, the court remanded the case to the district court for that court to determine whether there was any evidence “to establish that ‘asbestosis’ was objectively susceptible to more than one fixed usage and hence was ambiguous in the insurance industry at the time of the making of the contracts.” Id. at n. 4.

The majority in this case does not present extrinsic evidence that the words of the absolute pollution exclusion had a different objective meaning in the insurance industry (or other relevant context) when the exclusion was adopted from their meaning in common usage today. So far as appears, those words had the same meaning there and then as they do here and now. The majority uses extrinsic evidence differently, to show what kinds of pollution claims led the insurance industry to revise the old exclusion and propose the new “absolute” one. At best this is simply evidence of the insurance companies’ subjective purposes and intentions. The “ambiguity” that the majority then discovers is simply that the exclusion is broader than necessary to preclude coverage for the gargantuan pollution claims that motivated the insurance industry to adopt the exclusion. As a matter of logic, this does not show an ambiguity; it is not even surprising, for given their experience with judicial interpretations of the earlier, qualified pollution exclusion, see infra, insurers had powerful reasons to be over inclusive rather than under inclusive in their draftsmanship. Contract provisions are often drafted broadly in order to achieve simplicity of application and avoid disputes over close cases, and so that they address novel and unforeseen situations in addition to the specific circumstances that gave rise to them. The majority’s assumption that the meaning of the absolute pollution exclusion is limited by the specific historical circumstances that gave rise to it thus embodies a logical fallacy. But the more fundamental point is that the principle that extrinsic evidence is relevant to show the circumstances under which a contract was made does not justify the majority’s use of that evidence to show subjective intent on the insurance companies’ part.

Of special concern is the majority’s broad suggestion that “[statements made by representatives of the insurance industry to obtain approval of proposed policy language can ... be quite significant” in construing the language. Ante at 316. In line with this premise, the majority supports its narrow construction of the absolute pollution exclusion by insinuating that the industry misled insurance regulators about the true scope of the exclusion. See ante at 334-35 (asserting that there is “at least some indication” that insurers “sang a tune markedly different from” their present position, and “question[ing] whether [the exclusion] would have been approved by regulators in the District and in other jurisdictions without, at least, a clearer exposition of the effect of the exclusion”). Without saying so explicitly, the majority is invoking the controversial “regulatory estoppel” doctrine that was introduced in Morton Int'l, Inc. v. Gen. Accident Ins. Co. of Am., 134 N.J. 1 , 629 A.2d 831 (1993). In Morton, the New Jersey Supreme Court refused to construe the “sudden and accidental” language in the qualified pollution exclusion of 1973 (not the present absolute exclusion) in accordance with its plain meaning because the court found that insurers had induced regulators to approve the exclusion by misrepresenting its import. Id. at 876.

*357 This court has never approved the regulatory estoppel doctrine. Although the majority fails to mention it, “the overwhelming majority of state and federal courts ... to have considered the issue have unequivocally rejected Morton and the regulatory estoppel argument, primarily on the basis that extrinsic evidence is not permitted to vary the terms of a clear and unambiguous pollution exclusion provision.” Employers Ins. of Wausau v. Duplan Corp., No. 94 Civ. 3143 (CSH), 1999 WL 777976 , *14, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15368 , at *48—49 (S.D.N.Y. September 30, 1999) (citations omitted). That, of course, is the general rule that this jurisdiction follows. Nonetheless, for myself, I am not so sure that I would reject the Morton approach in its entirety. It makes considerable sense to me that insurance policies should be construed consistently with any regulatory conditions under which they were approved for issuance. But I would reserve decision on whether to adopt some form of the regulatory estoppel doctrine as an exception to the general rule (and, if so, on the precise articulation of that doctrine in this jurisdiction) until we have a case that actually presents the question. This is not that case, for as I discuss infra, we have no evidence that the insurance industry misrepresented the current absolute pollution exclusion to any regulators in the District of Columbia or elsewhere. 21 The statements in the majority opinion that appear to endorse the regulatory estoppel doctrine are non-binding dicta.

2. The Majority’s Use of Extrinsic Evidence is Inappropriate Given the Absence of an Adequate Factual Record

Even if it were proper in this case to consider extrinsic evidence probative of the intent behind the absolute pollution exclusion, the record before us is deficient in such evidence. It does not contain, for example, sworn testimony or affidavits by the drafters or other parties involved in the development and approval of the exclusion. The record likewise is virtually devoid of potentially relevant documentary evidence, such as drafts and other internal ISO documents that might shed light on the intended scope of the exclusion, authoritative explanatory memoranda issued contemporaneously with the exception, or the records of regulatory proceedings in which the exception was approved.

Lacking such evidence, the majority relies for the most part on second-hand sources: judicial opinions from other jurisdictions, articles in professional journals, and even the assertions in the briefs submitted by the parties and amici. These selective, interpretive, and often highly opinionated sources may agree on the broad outlines of the history of the absolute pollution exclusion, but they disagree on the all-important details. 22 As jurists *358 we have an obligation to exercise considerable caution in relying on these often untested materials, for we are ill-equipped to evaluate the evidence they cite or whether they provide a complete and accurate historical picture. The following section may be taken to illustrate my point.

3. The Limited Evidence We Do Have Shows That the Drafters of the Absolute Pollution Exclusion Meant It to Reach Indoor Pollution Claims

Setting aside my qualms about the admissibility and the adequacy of the extrinsic evidence that has been made available for our consideration, I think that the majority misinterprets that evidence when it concludes that the absolute pollution exclusion was intended to address only industrial or “traditional” environmental pollution. The drafting history of the exclusion rebuts that interpretation, and there is no evidence that District of Columbia or state regulators were led to believe otherwise.

The original pollution exclusion, in widespread use between about 1973 and 1985, stated that:

This insurance does not apply ... (f) to bodily injury or property damage arising out of the discharge, dispersal, release or escape of smoke, vapors, soot, fumes, acids, alkalis, toxic chemicals, liquids or gases, waste materials or other irritants, contaminants or pollutants into or upon land, the atmosphere or any water course or body of water; but this exclusion does not apply if such discharge, dispersal, release or escape is sudden and accidental.

Ballard & Manus, supra note 8, at 613 (citing ISO Form GL 00 02, Ed. 01-73). The Insurance Services Office (ISO) introduced the absolute pollution exclusion to replace the original exclusion in 1985. The ISO explained that the breadth of the new exclusion was intentional:

Given that recent court interpretations of the “sudden and accidental” pollution exclusion have found a great degree of coverage that was never intended nor contemplated in the rates, the drafters of the new pollution exclusion consciously used broad terms to ensure that coverage intent would be upheld. The new exclusion is designed to exclude all pollution damages except those arising out of products, completed operations and certain other off-premises emissions. 23

Kimber Petroleum Corp. v. Travelers Indem. Co., 298 N.J.Super. 286 , 689 A.2d 747, 753 , cert. denied, 150 N. J. 26, 695 A.2d 669 (1997) (quoting attachment to February 6, 1986 letter from the ISO to insurance company members of its General Liability Committee). In another publication, the ISO emphasized that the new pollution exclusion “is intended to be all inclusive and, therefore, does not contain any specific exceptions, per se, such as the ‘sudden and accidental’ exception in the former *359 exclusion which all but totally emasculated the intent of the exclusion.” M 24

Importantly for present purposes, the drafters of the absolute pollution exclusion did not eliminate only the “sudden and accidental” language of its predecessor. In seeking to be “all inclusive,” the drafters also replaced the qualifying phrase “into or upon land, the atmosphere or any water course or body of water,” with broader language such as “at or from any premises, site or location which is or was at any time owned or occupied by, or rented or loaned to, any insured.” Numerous courts have held that the former phrase limited the original exclusion to pollution of the external natural environment as opposed to pollution of the interior of a building. The New York Court of Appeals, for example, held that “the three places for discharge contemplated by the policy exclusion — into or upon land, the atmosphere, or any water course or body of water-read together support the conclusion that the clause was meant to deal with broadly dispersed environmental pollution” and not pollution in a confined or indoor space. Continental Cas. Co. v. Rapid-American Corp., 80 N.Y.2d 640 , 598 N.Y.S.2d 966 , 609 N.E.2d 506, 513 (1998); accord, Essex Ins. Co. v. Avondale Mills, 639 So.2d 1339, 1342 (Ala.1994); see also C.H. Heist Caribe Corp. v. American Home Assur. Co., 640 F.2d 479, 483 (3d Cir.1981). Similarly, the Supreme Court of Illinois reasoned that the original pollution exclusion did not apply to indoor air pollution because “the atmosphere” meant “the external atmosphere which surrounds the earth,” not “the multiple, diverse internal environs or surroundings of individual buildings.” United States Fid. & Guar. Co. v. Wilkin Insulation Co., 144 Ill.2d 64 , 161 Ill.Dec. 280 , 578 N.E.2d 926, 933 (1991); accord, Board of Regents of the Univ. of Minn. v. Royal Ins. Co. of Am., 517 N.W.2d 888, 892-93 (Minn.1994); see also National Standard Ins. Co. v. Continental Ins. Co., No. CA-3-81-1015-D, 1983 WL 407975 , *8, 1983 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13111 , at *22 (N.D.Tex.1983). The deliberate removal of the phrase “into or upon land, the atmosphere or any water course or body of water” signifies that the exclusion now does apply to indoor air pollution. See Board of Regents, 517 N.W.2d at 893 (“[M]ost importantly, in defining what is being polluted, the exclusion does not use language descriptive of the natural environment only.”); accord, Moessner, 121 F.3d at 902 ; Shalimar Contractors, 975 F.Supp. at 1456 ; Band & Desenberg, 925 F.Supp. at 762 . 25

*360 I am aware of no evidence that insurance regulators in the District of Columbia or elsewhere were misled into thinking that the absolute pollution exclusion is inapplicable to indoor air pollution or is otherwise narrower than its plain language states. In Kimber Petroleum, the New Jersey intermediate appellate court reviewed insurance industry pronouncements contemporaneous with the introduction of the exclusion and found to the contrary:

Here, unlike in Morton, the insurance industry candidly acknowledged that the absolute pollution exclusion would totally prohibit coverage for pollution-related damages, allowing only for very narrow exceptions. We find no evidence that the insurance industry misled regulators. Rather, they consistently maintained that the absolute pollution exclusion clause excluded all pollution-related damages except for those falling within the completed operations and products hazards coverage 26 if such coverage was purchased by the insured.

689 A.2d at 754 . The court accordingly rejected the effort to apply the regulatory estoppel doctrine of Morton to the absolute pollution exclusion. The New Jersey Supreme Court denied review. See Kimber Petroleum Corp. v. Travelers Indem. Co., 150 N.J. 26 , 695 A.2d 669 (1997).

It is particularly noteworthy that the Commissioner of Insurance for the District of Columbia does not contend that the Department of Insurance was misled in any way when it approved the absolute pollution exclusion for use in the District. The Complex Insurance Claims Litigation Association (CICLA), an insurance industry organization participating in this appeal as an amicus, has attached as exhibits to its brief what it represents was the 1985 correspondence from the ISO submitting the exclusion to the District’s then-Superintendent of Insurance for approval. CIC-LA points out that nothing in the correspondence suggested that the exclusion was inapplicable to indoor air pollution claims or was limited to industrial or what the majority calls “traditional” environmental pollution. The Commissioner does not dispute this point.

According to the Commissioner’s brief, the Insurance Department staff that reviewed the proposed absolute pollution exclusion was “trained and experienced in insurance business practice and procedure.” This trained and experienced staff was authorized to disapprove the exclusion if its terms were “inequitable” or contrary to legal requirements. See D.C.Code § 35-1531 (1981), recodified as amended at D.C.Code § 31-2502.27 (2001). Especially given the close scrutiny then being paid to pollution insurance by the insurance industry and insurance regulatory bodies, it is significant that the staff approved the absolute pollution exclusion without objection or qualification. Evidently the staff did not find the broad language of the exclusion ambiguous or misleading to the common reader. The fact that, in the District of Columbia and elsewhere, expert insurance regulators approved the language of *361 the absolute pollution exclusion without change is a strong reason for this court to accord that language its plain meaning and a strong reason for us not to indulge in our own open-ended exploration of the history and intent of that language. We are not the insurance regulators in this jurisdiction.

I reemphasize my view that we have no cause in this case to examine extrinsic evidence to interpret the insurers’ intent behind the absolute pollution exclusion, and that we do not have a proper record on which to do so in any case. But if such examination is to be made, I think a fair reading of the available extrinsic evidence shows that the pollution exclusion was intended to apply to all forms of pollution, including indoor air pollution.

D. Reasonable Expectations of Insureds

Before concluding this dissent, I think it important to point out one other respect in which the majority opinion deviates from governing precedent. Animating the majority opinion, I think it fair to say, is the view that “[a]n injury caused by a faulty furnace is the very kind of risk for which a CGL [commercial general liability] policy would be expected to provide protection.” Ante at 333. Underscoring that point, the majority exaggerates the impact of a straightforward reading of the absolute pollution exclusion — for instance, by mistakenly claiming that “[a]lmost any mishap at an apartment complex” could be denied coverage, and by quoting one court’s alarmist view that the insurance policy would be rendered “virtually meaningless” to the insured. Id. The majority seems to be suggesting that even if the exclusion unambiguously does cover indoor air pollution claims, it should be interpreted not to do so in order to satisfy the reasonable coverage expectations of persons who purchase general liability insurance without reading the exclusion. Indeed, this “reasonable expectations” doctrine is the explicit premise of many of the cases on which the majority relies. See, e.g., Regional Bank of Colo. v. St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 35 F.3d 494, 497-98 (10th Cir.1994) (invoking reasonable expectations doctrine of Colorado law to find insurance coverage for injuries caused by exposure to carbon monoxide from a faulty heater, “regardless of whether or not” the pollution exclusion in the policy was ambiguous).

Past cases of this court have squarely rejected this interpretation of “the doctrine of reasonable expectations.” See Chase, 780 A.2d at 1131-32; Smalls v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 678 A.2d 32, 35 (D.C.1996). As we held in those cases, while ambiguous policy provisions may be construed in a manner “consistent with the reasonable expectations of the purchaser of the policy,” unambiguous provisions will be “enforced ... as written, so long as they do not violate a statute or public policy.” Chase, 780 A.2d at 1131-32 (quoting Smalls, 678 A.2d at 35 ; citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Where “the ... exclusion ... is clear and unambiguous .... there is no legal basis for considering whether it was consistent with [the policyholder’s] reasonable expectations.” Smalls, 678 A.2d at 35 . “[T]he reasonable expectations doctrine is not a mandate for courts to rewrite insurance policies and reallocate their assignment of risks between insurer and insured.” Chase, 780 A.2d at 1132.

III.

I dissent because the majority opinion disregards or misapplies settled legal principles and conflicts with controlling precedent. Instead of construing the absolute pollution exclusion according to the plain meaning of its terms, the majority unjusti *362 fiably embraces a technical and forced construction, thereby finding ambiguity where none exists. The majority compounds this error by resorting improperly to extrinsic evidence to qualify unambiguous policy language, by engaging in dubious appellate fact finding on a deficient record, and by misreading the history that we have. Finally, the majority wrongly exalts policyholders’ uninformed expectations of insurance coverage over the clear language of an exclusion from that coverage. By doing these things, the majority thwarts the purpose and overrides the meaning of the clause.

I would abide by the governing legal principles that the majority disregards. I would accord paramount importance to the text of the absolute pollution exclusion. I would follow common usage and read the exclusion as it is written. I would not try to reconstruct the history of the exclusion to restrict its meaning or second-guess the insurance regulators who approved the exclusion as it is. I would hold that the absolute pollution exclusion unambiguously precludes insurance coverage for indoor air pollution claims such as the one Ms. Richardson has presented.

. The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 9601 etseq. (2000).

. This court has found dictionaries to be helpful in construing the words of insurance policies according to their common meaning. See, e.g., Chase v. State Farm Fire & Cas. Co., 780 A.2d 1123 , 1128 n. 2 (D.C.2001); Corriea, 719 A.2d at 1242-43 . "Although courts should not make a fortress out of the dictionary ... it is useful to have one around.” Washington Metro. Area Transit Auth. v. District of Columbia Dep’t of Employment Servs., 731 A.2d 845 , 848 n. 3 (D.C.1999) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

. Introductory clauses and headings may be helpful in construing an insurance policy because they furnish the reader with a frame for what follows. In Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co. v. Schilansky, 176 A.2d 786, 787-88 (D.C.1961), for example, this court relied in part on a policy's title and subtitles to determine its meaning. See also International Multifoods Corp. v. Commercial Union Ins. Co., 309 F.3d 76, 85 (2d Cir.2003); Mazzaferro v. RLI Ins. Co., 50 F.3d 137, 140 (2d Cir.1995) ("A contract of insurance must be read as a whole, including any introductory clause or heading, to determine the intent of the parties.”) (quoting Save Mart Supermarkets v. Underwriters at Lloyd’s London, 843 F.Supp. 597, 607 (N.D.Cal.1994)); Scarborough v. Travelers Ins. Co., 718 F.2d 702, 708 (5th Cir.1983).

. I address in Part II.C.3, infra, the significance of the deliberate omission of the phrase "into or upon the land, the atmosphere or any *346 water course or body of water” in the development of the absolute pollution exclusion.

. The majority attributes the phrase "discharge ... of pollutants” to the Water Pollution Control Act, 33 U.S.C. §§ 1251 et seq. (2000). Ante at 326.

. The majority identifies CERCLA and its implementing regulations as the source of “release,” "escape,” “dispersal,” and "contaminant,” among other terms. Ante at 326-27.

. The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 6901 et seq. (2000). Citing West Am. Ins. Co. v. Tufco Flooring East, Inc., 104 N.C.App. 312 , 409 S.E.2d 692, 699-700 (1991), the majority locates the word "discharge” in RCRA. Ante at 327.

. The pollution exclusion first came into widespread use as an endorsement to the 1970 commercial general liability form issued by the Insurance Services Office. Insurers began incorporating the pollution endorsement directly into their standard commercial general liability policies as exclusion “f” in 1973. See Shelley & Mason, supra, at 752; see also Nancer Ballard & Peter M. Manus, Clearing Muddy Waters: Anatomy of the Comprehensive General Liability Pollution Exclusion, 75 Cornell L. Rev. 610 , 625-27 (1990).

.The language in the Water Pollution Control Act that the majority cites, contained in 33 U.S.C. §§ 1251 (a)(1), 1251(a)(3) and 1362(16), dates from the 1972 amendments. See Pub.L. 92-500, § 101 (a)(1), (a)(3), 502(16), 86 Stat. 816 , 887 (1972). However, the original version of the Water Pollution Control Act, enacted in 1948, contains several references to the “discharge” of pollutants. See Pub.L. 80-845 § 2 (d), 62 Stat. 1155 , 1156-57 (1948).

Since the case at bar concerns air pollution, I will add for the sake of thoroughness that the federal Clean Air Act also used the term "discharge” prior to 1970, see, e.g., Pub.L. 86-635 § 8 , 73 Stat. 646 (1959), as did the Air Quality Act of 1967. See Pub.L. 90-148, §§ 103(e), 108(d)(1)(A), (g), (j)(l), 111, 81 Stat. 485 , 487, 494-99 (1967).

. Nor, evidently, did the key language derive from the pre-1970 Clean Air and Air Quality Acts.

. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 2359 defines a "term of art” as "a word or phrase having a specific signification in a *350 particular art, craft, or department of knowledge: a technical term.”

. Elsewhere the majority is disturbingly (perhaps also revealingly) coy about how it construes the absolute pollution exclusion. For example, when the majority finally states its conclusion, it “hold[s] that the purpose of the absolute pollution exclusion was to bar coverage for environmental degradation and for cleanups mandated by CERCLA and similar legislation.” Ante at 333. I could agree with that formulation myself — except that the majority does not mean what it says, because the rest of its opinion engrafts limitations on the term "environmental degradation” (e.g., it must be "industrial” or "conventional” or "traditional”) that are meant to rob it of its full meaning.

. Similarly, the majority asserts that “read literally, the exclusion could apply to bodily injury if a liquid 'contaminant,' e.g., vinegar (acetic acid) or lemon juice (citric acid), accidentally seeped or migrated or escaped, i.e., spilled, on the floor of a private dwelling and if a house guest were to slip and fall.” Ante at 331 n. 31.

. The Pipefitters court found it unnecessary to determine "to what extent, or even whether,” to embrace a limiting principle of the sort the majority in the present case adopts. Id., 976 F.2d at 1044 .

. I might add that even if the word "pollution” in the caption is discounted, it still would be unreasonable to read the exclusion as applying to a slip on spilled Drano or an allergic reaction to the chlorine in a swimming pool. The spilled Drano is not acting as an irritant or contaminant under any definition of those terms when a person merely slips on it because it is a liquid. And in ordinary usage one would not speak of the utilization of chlorine to disinfect a swimming pool as a "discharge, dispersal, seepage, migration, release or escape” of that substance. The majority’s suggestion that the chlorine might be said to "seep” into a swimmer’s *353 body, ante at 330 n. 29, is a creative but perverse way to read the exclusion. The common reader is credited with common sense. "Policy language is not genuinely ambiguous unless it is susceptible of more than one reasonable interpretation.” Chase, 780 A.2d at 1127-28 (emphasis in the original) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

. Ante at 320, quoting Kent Farms, Inc. v. Zurich Ins. Co., 140 Wash.2d 396 , 998 P.2d 292, 295-96 (2000).

. Ante at 317, quoting Essex Ins. Co. v. TriTown Corp., 863 F.Supp. 38, 39-40 (D.Mass. 1994).

. Ante at 318, quoting Doerr, 774 So.2d at 127 .

. See generally Claudia G. Catalano, Annotation, What Constitutes “Pollutant,” "Contaminant,” "Irritant,” or "Waste” Within Meaning of Absolute or Total Pollution Exclusion in Liability Insurance Policy, 98 A.L.R. 5th 193 (2002).

. Although this case applied the law of Illinois and Florida rather than the law of the District of Columbia, the legal principles involved appear to be the same in all three jurisdictions.

. The majority cites a reported vignette in which an insurance company representative told the Texas State Board of Insurance in 1985 that "no one would read” the absolute pollution exclusion to deny coverage "every time a bottle of Clorox fell off a shelf at a grocery store.” Ante at 334. As my earlier discussion of the Drano example makes clear, that statement is neither misleading nor contrary to the industry’s current interpretation of the exclusion.

The majority's implication that regulators were not given a "clear[] exposition” of the reach of the absolute pollution exclusion is pure speculation. As I discuss infra, we have little evidence of what regulators were told, but what we do have indicates that they were told explicitly that the exclusion was intentionally broad.

. This is no idle concern. The available journal articles on the subject, for instance, are typically written by attorneys who make no bones about the fact that they regularly represent either policyholders or insurance companies in coverage disputes. As might be expected, the scope of the absolute pollution *358 exclusion is the subject of tendentious (and often highly rhetorical) debate among these authors. See John N. Ellison, Richard P. Lewis & Brian T. Valery, Recent Developments in the Law Regarding the “Absolute” and “Total” Pollution Exclusions, 13 Envtl. Claims J. 55, 55 (2001); Shelley & Mason, supra at 749; Jeffrey W. Stempel, Reason and Pollution: Correctly Construing the “ABSOLUTE” Exclusion in Context and in Accord with Its Purpose and Party Expectations, 34 Tort & Ins. L.J. 1 , 1 (1998); John A. McDonald, Decades of Deceit: The Insurance Industry Incursion into the Regulatory and Judicial Systems, Coverage, Nov./ Dec. 1997 at 3; Edward Zampino, Richard C. Cavo & Victor Harwood III, The Sophist’s Maze: The Polluters' Revision of the History of the “Total” Pollution Exclusion, 8 Mealey’s Litig. Rep.: Ins. 1 (Sept. 27, 1994).

. The exceptions mentioned are inapplicable to the case at bar.

. The majority finds it "difficult to believe” that the absolute pollution exclusion would have effected "such a major reduction in coverage ... without any evident announcement describing the character of the change and without any adjustment of the insured’s premiums.” Ante at 334. As the ISO statements indicate, however, there was an announcement (indeed, the development of the absolute pollution exclusion to quell the consternation in the insurance industry was well-publicized), and part of the expressed reason for the new absolute exclusion was to redress the perceived expansion of coverage beyond what had been "contemplated in the rates.” That is, from the industiy’s perspective, the "major reduction in coverage” was mainly to return to the coverage the industry thought it had offered under the former, qualified pollution exclusion. Given that rationale, and the lack of industry experience on which to draw, it is understandable if the absolute pollution exclusion was not accompanied by an immediate adjustment of premiums.

. Without disputing that the phrase "into or upon land, the atmosphere or any water course or body of water” limited the scope of the former exclusion to pollution of the external environment, a few courts nevertheless have characterized the deletion of that phrase as "insignificant.” Tufco Flooring, 409 S.E.2d at 700 . According to these courts, "[t]he omission of the phrase only remove[d] a redundancy in the language of the exclusion that was present in the earlier pollution exclu *360 sion clause,” inasmuch as "the operative policy terms 'discharge,' 'dispersal,' 'release,' and 'escape' are environmental terms of art” that signified the same thing. Id.; accord, American States Ins. Co. v. Koloms, 177 Ill.2d 473 , 227 Ill.Dec. 149 , 687 N.E.2d 72, 81-82 (1997). This "redundancy” argument is faulty, however, precisely because, as explained above, the words used in the exclusion are not "terms of art” that connote only external pollution. The deliberate removal of the one phrase in the exclusion that did have such a connotation was, therefore, not "insignificant” at all.

. The completed operations and products hazards coverages are not applicable to the case at bar.