EPA halts talks over toxic metals in Lake Roosevelt

SPOKANE — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday broke off talks with a Canadian smelter operator over who will pay to study the extent of toxic metals pollution in Lake Roosevelt.

The EPA will instead spend $5 million to $10 million over the next four years to study the pollution, and likely will pursue legal action against Teck Cominco Ltd. of Vancouver, B.C.

The company’s lead and zinc smelter at Trail, B.C., is considered the prime culprit in the pollution of the lake, which is the portion of the Columbia River behind Grand Coulee Dam.

"It’s clear that far and away the largest source of metal contamination to Lake Roosevelt is the Trail facility," said Tom Eaton, head of EPA operations in Washington state.

The smelter has dumped as estimated 10 million to 20 million tons of waste slag into the river, "which acts like a pipe into Lake Roosevelt," Eaton said.

As a Canadian company, Teck Cominco is not subject to U.S. environmental regulations, said Doug Horswill, Teck vice president.

But the company offered to spend millions on studies to determine the extent of the pollution and what can be done to contain it, he said Wednesday.

Teck Cominco has also maintained the pollution came from several sources and it shouldn’t be saddled with all the costs of cleanup.

The two parties have been meeting for nearly a year.

The EPA gave Teck Cominco until Dec. 16 to decide if it would voluntarily study ecological and human health risks in the lake. But the deadline was canceled when it became clear the company had no intention of performing an acceptable cleanup, Eaton said.

"We believe the studies they were proposing were not credible," he said.

EPA officials said they were hopeful that talks with the company could resume in the future.

Eaton said the EPA would perform the studies without taking the politically controversial step of listing the lake as a Superfund site. But the studies would be identical to those performed at Superfund sites.

Mike Gearheard, the EPA’s Superfund manager in the Northwest, said the agency is sensitive to concerns that a Superfund listing can be damaging to an area that depends on tourism.

More than 1 million people annually visit Lake Roosevelt, which is a national recreation area heavily used for boating, fishing, swimming and as a source of drinking water.

Last week, Washington state’s three Republican members of Congress sent the EPA a letter saying Lake Roosevelt should not be declared a Superfund site.

The EPA also wanted the international mining company to reimburse it for about $1.8 million spent on preliminary studies. Those studies looked at damage to a 130-mile stretch of the river from a century of slag dumping. Slag is a smelting byproduct rich in toxic metals such as lead, arsenic and mercury.

The metals-laced slag covers beaches near Northport. The state Department of Health says the beaches pose a health risk.

If the EPA studies determine that cleanup is necessary and the U.S. federal government pays for the work, the lake must be declared a Superfund site to be eligible for federal funds, Eaton said.

"We will be pursing legal action against Teck Cominco," he said, declining to provide details.

Eaton said the EPA studies would include officials from the state, Indian tribes and local governments.

The EPA would prefer that the responsible party pay for the cleanup, said Dave Croxton, the EPA’s cleanup manager in the Pacific Northwest.

Croxton said the studies will first determine the full extent of the contamination. Then they will assess the risks to people and wildlife, and then propose practical solutions.