Spokane

More Lake Roosevelt pollution study needed
Early data meet standards for Superfund cleanup

Karen Dorn Steele
Staff writer

A new government study of heavy metals in Lake Roosevelt and the upper Columbia River recommends further work before any decisions are made on a Superfund listing.

The recommendation was prompted by high levels of zinc, cadmium and copper detected in shallow lake sediments and river shores between Inchelium and the Canadian border.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was pushed into action by the Colville Indian tribe, which petitioned for the study in 1999.

Based on data from 58 sediment samples fed into an EPA computer, the upper Columbia site already qualifies for Superfund listing, said Monica Tonel, site assessment manager for the EPA.

The highest pollution levels were found near the border. Most worrisome were zinc levels 60 times what's considered safe for aquatic life and fish.

"The lake is not a human health risk, and that is good news. But it is an ecological concern," said EPA engineer Cami Grandinetti.

However, Grandinetti cautioned that the data collected in the $350,000 study are sparse. The 58 samples tested -- one sample a mile -- isn't enough to make conclusions about the entire lake, she said.

"The numbers are elevated enough that we really need to look further at what critters are being affected," she said.

Other studies have pointed to pollution hazards in the lake, a 130-mile impoundment of the Columbia River behind Grand Coulee Dam.

A 1994 U.S. Geological Survey study found dioxins and furans in sport fish, and a 2001 Ecology study found high metals concentrations in lake sediments.

A mid-1990s health advisory told people to limit consumption of fish from the lake because of concerns over mercury; two years ago, that advice was revised to say that declining mercury levels in fish no longer posed a health risk.

EPA considers Teck Cominco's lead and zinc smelter in Trail, B.C., and the Celgar Pulp Mill in Castlegar, major sources of historic pollution. The Cominco smelter has recently made big environmental improvements that have significantly cut emissions of mercury and heavy metals.

Other potential American sources of heavy metals include mines in Stevens, Ferry and Pend Oreille counties and a lead smelter at Northport, which closed in 1922.

EPA and Washington state officials will decide next year whether to recommend a Superfund designation, said Dave Croxton, EPA's site cleanup manager in Seattle.

The decision to list the lake would be made at EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Other alternatives include an agreement with some of the polluters to pay for the cleanup themselves, or a cleanup directed by the Washington Department of Ecology.

EPA lawyers are reviewing whether the agency has the legal clout to go after Canadian polluters, Croxton said.

Money will be key to the cleanup decision, several officials said Monday at a meeting of the Lake Roosevelt Forum, a group formed by two tribes and several federal, state and local government agencies responsible for the lake's management.

Washington state has talked repeatedly with EPA about Lake Roosevelt, but is already strained with other cleanup obligations, said Guy Gregory, senior hydrogeologist with the Washington Department of Ecology's toxics cleanup program.

"The state has a $2.5 billion budget shortfall .... I don't think we'd do an investigation on the scale of Lake Roosevelt," he said.

Some people attending the meeting said they feared a Superfund listing would hurt fishing and recreation on the lake.

"Lake Roosevelt's water quality is clean and the mercury levels are declining. That also has to be told to the public," said one audience member.

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