Avista, Kaiser to split cost of PCB study
Consent decree addresses cleanup of chemical behind Upriver Dam
Karen Dorn Steele
Staff writer
An Avista subsidiary and Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical Corp. have agreed to split the estimated $240,000 cost for a study to determine how to clean up dangerous PCBs lodged in sediments behind Upriver Dam.CONSENT DECREE
For reviewThe proposed consent decree can be reviewed at the Argonne County Library, 4322 N. Argonne Road; the Spokane Public Library, 906 West Main; and at the Ecology's Spokane office, 4601 N. Monroe.
A proposed legal consent decree with the Washington Department of Ecology was announced Thursday. The public has 30 days to review it.
The agreement must also be approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware handling Kaiser's Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization. A hearing on a motion to authorize Kaiser to enter into the consent decree is scheduled Nov. 26.
The proposed agreement ''avoids a potentially costly dispute about allocation of responsibility at this time,'' Kaiser's attorneys argue in a motion to the bankruptcy court filed Tuesday.
Neither company is admitting liability under terms of the consent de
cree. Without the agreement, the department could have issued unilateral enforcement orders, triggering an expensive legal battle.
Another potentially liable party, the Liberty Lake Sewer and Water District, declined to enter into the consent decree negotiations, said Flora Goldstein, the department's acting regional director.
The department is happy to have an agreement in place for cleaning up a five-mile stretch of the Spokane River above Upriver Dam, Goldstein said.
The feasibility study will be completed by the end of 2004.
Highly toxic PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, are a group of synthetic chemicals used in coolants, lubricants and insulating fluids.
PCB manufacture ceased in the United States in 1977 after the chemicals were linked to environmental damage and human health problems, including chloracne, jaundice and liver damage.
Ingestion of contaminated fish is a prime exposure route. A fish advisory issued for the Spokane River in March 2001 warns people to avoid or strictly limit consumption of fish caught behind Upriver Dam because of PCBs found in fish tissue.
Avista Development Inc. and Kaiser own two of the facilities linked to PCB contamination in the river.
On June 1, 2001, the Department of Ecology notified Kaiser, Avista and Liberty Lake Sewer District that it had found industrial PCBs in fish, sediment and water in the upper Spokane River.
Under Washington's Model Toxics Control Act, companies responsible for pollution must pay to clean it up.
PCBs were discharged in industrial wastewater from the Spokane Industrial Park, seven miles upstream from Upriver Dam. Avista is the successor to Penzer Development Corp, former owner of the industrial park.
Kaiser owns and operates the Kaiser Trentwood rolling mill six miles above the dam. The facility has a permit to discharge industrial waste water to the river, and has been working to reduce PCB levels in the wastewater.
Additional PCBs have been found underneath the Trentwood plant, the consent decree says.
The Upriver Dam sediments also contain heavy metals from a century of mine wastes that have washed downstream from Idaho's Silver Valley.
In a recent cleanup plan for the Coeur d'Alene Basin, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed using its Superfund authority to clean up the mine wastes.
The PCB study results will be incorporated with the EPA's work on heavy metals, Goldstein said.
The department is also studying how and where PCBs are entering the river so steps can be taken to stop the releases.
The public can review the proposed consent decree at the Argonne County Library, 4322 N. Argonne Road; the Spokane Public Library, 906 West Main; and at the Department of Ecology's Spokane office, 4601 N. Monroe St.