The owner of a sprawling, long-shuttered aluminum plant in Columbia Falls has agreed to pay $57.6 million to mitigate pollution associated with decades of aluminum smelting.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released a statement Tuesday applauding an agreement with Columbia Falls Aluminum Company that outlines the cleanup objectives for one of northwestern Montana\u2019s largest industrial sites.<\/p>\n
The agreement comes nearly a decade after the EPA added the Columbia Falls Aluminum Company site to the National Priorities List<\/a>, also known as the Superfund list. Under the agreement, CFAC will be responsible for mitigating toxic byproducts such as arsenic, fluoride and cyanide at the site, which was Flathead County\u2019s largest employer in its 1970s heyday. Much of the waste will be consolidated at the site and capped with material designed to prevent pollutants from contaminating the surrounding soil and water.<\/p>\n Cyrus Western, the former Wyoming legislator who now oversees EPA\u2019s Region 8 office headquartered in Denver, described the development as a \u201csignificant milestone\u201d that will facilitate site redevelopment.<\/p>\n \u201cIn coordination with our federal, state, local and industry partners, EPA is advancing effective, protective solutions that safeguard human health and the environment,\u201d Western said in a July 7 press release<\/a>. <\/p>\n About half of the smelting facility\u2019s total footprint \u2014 the most polluted portion \u2014 is incorporated in the Superfund site. Developers have big plans for other areas of the site outside the official Superfund boundary. A 78-acre parcel area south of Aluminum Drive called Teakettle Heights is slated for a 421-unit residential development<\/a> that would include a mix of apartments, townhomes and single family homes. Due to contamination concerns, the project developer plans to tie into city water rather than using groundwater to supply the units with water.<\/p>\n The 647-page agreemen<\/a> t between CFAC and EPA is not yet final. It will be subject to a 30-day public comment<\/a> period and another round of review by the U.S. District Court in Missoula before it\u2019s considered officially adopted. As with other sites on the EPA\u2019s Superfund list, the analysis and clean-up for the CFAC site is more of a marathon than a sprint. It\u2019s not uncommon for the EPA and the corporations that own Superfund sites \u2014 which include some of the most polluted landscapes in the country \u2014 to spend decades addressing contamination concerns associated with legacy industrial operations.<\/p>\n Columbia Falls became an aluminum smelting powerhouse in the 1950s due to its proximity to the hydroelectricity dams situated up and down the Columbia River Basin, which provided the site\u2019s first owner, Anaconda Copper, with cheap, plentiful power.<\/p>\n Swiss commodities giant Glencore purchased the CFAC property in 1999. Glencore will put $57.6 million in a fund dedicated to the federal government\u2019s \u201cpast and future response costs\u201d as well as future costs the Montana Department of Environmental Quality incurs. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \n Sign up for Morning Wire:<\/strong> \u201cThe start of active cleanup activities is a positive step toward addressing environmental impacts at the site and reflects a shared commitment by CFAC and local, state and federal partners to position the area for long-term and sustainable reuse,\u201d Glencore President Cheryl Driscoll said in the EPA press release.<\/p>\n
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