Negotiations between the Montana Department of Environmental Quality and Glencore on the future of the shuttered Columbia Falls Aluminum Co. plant site are ongoing, and the upshot of those discussions will be the subject of a public meeting next month.
While the DEQ continues to negotiate with Glencore, the Swiss-based commodities giant that owned CFAC, it recently responded to the DEQ’s administrative order on consent, a legal order detailing the company’s obligations for cleanup at the plant site.
Agency officials have been tight-lipped about the tenor of the negotiations, and whether the company’s response was agreeable to the draft order’s clean-up requirements.
Julie DalSoglio of the Environmental Protection Agency said the agency has allowed the negotiations to continue for months, but “if the negotiations fall through, the EPA will step in and recommend listing on the [National Priorities List],” a catalogue of hazardous waste sites in the United States eligible for long-term remedial cleanup under the Superfund program.
Recent reports from the DEQ and the EPA have shown the site is likely eligible for Superfund status. But while city officials in Columbia Falls have written letters in support of a cleanup, Flathead County commissioners have yet to take a stance on the issue.
Even in the absence of Flathead County’s support, DalSoglio said the EPA could move forward with listing given the strong interest by other stakeholders to move forward, as well as support from Gov. Steve Bullock.
Other questions at the fore of the issue include future uses of the CFAC property, including possible recreation and conservation issues. Those possible future uses will be discussed at the December public meeting.
DEQ’s administrative order, sent to the company in July, cites the EPA’s sampling and investigation of the plant due to its decades-long handling of hazardous materials, including cyanide and zinc. The potentially hazardous materials was discovered in soil, groundwater and surface water at the plant site and cyanide contamination found in sediment in the Flathead River.
The CFAC plant began producing aluminum in 1955, with production reaching 180,000 tons of aluminum by 1968. At its height, the plant employed 1,500 people and was central to the area’s economy.
When it shut down at the end of October 2009, the closure forced the layoff of nearly 90 workers as high energy prices and poor market conditions made operations unprofitable.
The draft order states that Glencore must pay for sampling, testing and analysis at the site, and reimburse the state for any costs associated with the sampling and investigation. The company must also post a $5 million bond to ensure the remedial work is completed, and could face fines of up to $10,000 per day if it fails to comply.