Ecology’s Air Quality Assessment Concludes Air Monitors Needed in Northport

 

by Jamie Paparich

Ecology has conducted eleven independent studies in our area evaluating smelter contamination between 1992 through 2017.  The Dpt. of Ecology surprised me because their studies were scientifically, technically, and logically well thought out and conducted with total accuracy.  The most significant difference between Ecology’s studies, as compared to the other agencies, was simple; they were ethical and honest. They did not slant their results, or blame “data gaps” as a recurring reason as to why their studies could not be completed, and they did not manipulate the wording to make it seem the results of their research were not something Northport residents, Teck, or their agencies should be concerned with; referring to Northport as an “intermediate health hazard”.

Ecology’s assessment states the facts, the actual levels of toxins found, and the dangers they pose to residents who are chronically exposed to these levels.

Ecology has repeatedly proven they worked for us, to protect us.

In the four air monitoring studies they conducted between 1992 and 1998, each of the studies concluded that arsenic and cadmium levels were consistently way above the acceptable source impact level (ASIL) set by the EPA.  Ecology provided their findings to the EPA because it conducted these studies to provide the EPA with information on whether or not they should allow Teck a renewed air permit for a new source (Kivcet smelter.)  Ecology’s results provided accurate reasons for not allowing Teck a new air permit.  Instead, the EPA approved the new permit, and Ecology’s air monitoring results were never discussed or shared with anyone, including residents who were impacted by the air.

In 2007, Ecology sampled sediments in Lake Roosevelt and the upper Columbia River.  Their results concluded that widespread industrial slag could forensically be tied to Teck Resources and that it had contaminated the soil and water from Lake Roosevelt up through the Columbia River to the Canadian border.  In 2006, Teck, under the supervision of the EPA, began a remedial investigation of the area.  The study is still ongoing.  What the EPA and Teck have accomplished from an eleven year study is not a fraction of what Ecology’s 2007 study accomplished.

2012 Ecology conducted soil and sediment sampling in upland, nonresidential areas.  Teck and the EPA were conducting similar testing.  The levels of lead, arsenic, zinc, cadmium, and mercury Ecology discovered were so high they petitioned the EPA to fast-track sampling of residential soil, fearing residents exposed to these heavy metals at levels this high, specifically children, were in more danger than originally thought.

The EPA pushed Ecology’s petition through, and Teck conducted a sampling of 74 properties in 2014 and removed contaminated soil from 14 residential properties and one tribal allotment in 2015.  In 2016, they began a second round of soil sampling for residential property.  The results of this sampling have not been published.    This would not have been accomplished without Ecology.

Residents of Northport have long worried that it is the air that continues to trigger the several rare health issues a large majority of residents have been diagnosed with.  When Teck began their remedial investigation under EPA supervision, we repeatedly requested air monitoring.  It was always pushed to the back burner, or we were told there was no funding or no evidence to support more monitoring was needed….even though the monitoring done of the air by Ecology between 1992-1998 showed levels of arsenic 200 times higher than safety standards. Levels of cadmium were 18 times higher than safety standards.

In working with the Citizens for a Clean Columbia (CCC), Ecology listened to and agreed with our concerns.  They explained that there were so many old studies to go through, dating as far back as 1931, and so many missing years not monitored that it would be a complicated analysis to conduct.  After discovering Teck had an air monitor in Northport from 1992 – 2009 they requested those monitoring results. They then collected air monitoring results Teck had collected near the Canadian border from 2007-2014.  Armed with studies done on our air in 1931, from 1992 through 2007, and the border monitoring through 2014, Ecology asked their Air Quality Program specialists to use this data to evaluate conditions in the upper Columbia River valley and assess whether more air monitoring is needed.

Their assessment concluded that additional air monitoring in the upper Columbia River valley is necessary. 

Ecology will now share their analysis with the EPA and Teck, requesting additional air monitoring be done as a part of either Teck’s remedial investigation or the EPA Human Health Risk Assessment. If the EPA and Teck agree to this, Ecology will work with the EPA and public health officials to assess health concerns further once additional monitoring is performed and data is collected. 

Without this data the human health risk assessment the EPA is required to conduct of the area would be no different than the assessments the DOH and the ATSDR conducted in 2004, invaluable, inaccurate, and a waste of more time and money.

Northport residents who continue to be diagnosed with the rare, similar health issues that plagued the two generations before them do not have any more time to waste.

A special thank you to The Washington State Department of Ecology, specifically John Roland and Chuck Gruenenfelder. 

“An underdog never loses, they find a different way to win the fight.”

– Unknown

UPDATE: 2025

The Epa did not take Ecology’s advice to conduct current, accurate air monitoring in and around Northport for their Human Health Risk Assessment, nor did Teck want to conduct any for their Remedial Investigations (obviously). So the results of the EPA’s final draft of the HHRA basically conclude that due to uncertainties caused by data gaps (such as new air monitoring), the residents of Northport are most likely safe, but due to their uncertainty of the uncertainties….they were not certain.

In 2024, the EPA was able to get the Upper Columbia River site designated as a Superfund site, if they do not use some of the funding for new air monitoring, then something is fundamentally wrong with how the EPA operates and, as they have shown us for over three decades, their bad judgment and unwillingness to do anything they absolutely are not required to do costs lives.