Proposed Consent Decree Places EPA in Charge of Creating PCB Cleanup Plan for Spokane River
Beginning in 2011, litigation led by the Sierra Club and then joined by the Spokane Tribe in 2013 has sought to force development of a PCB Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) for the Spokane River. A TMDL is often called a water clean up plan. Grounded in the Clean Water Act, it’s a tool to develop a pollution budget to assure water quality standards for rivers are met. Once in place, permitting and other tools are used to assure discharges into the river system are within acceptable pollutant limits.
In the proposed consent decree, EPA will issue a PCB TMDL by September 30, 2024. It will cover 19 water segments on the Spokane River, Little Spokane River and Lake Spokane that are defined as “PCB-impaired.”
Click here for proposed consent decree. Click here to comment on the proposed consent decree. Comments are being accepted until January 3, 2022. Per the federal register notification, “Unless EPA or the Department of Justice determine that they should not consent to this proposed consent decree, the terms of the proposed consent decree will be affirmed and filed for entry by the Court.”
Background
PCBs are a concern because human consumption of fish and wildlife containing them can cause skin rashes, reproductive disorders, and neurological and behavioral problems. They are also a probable human carcinogen.
Unfortunately, ridding them from the environment is very difficult. Also their chemical structure allows them to persist in the environment for decades and thus continue to accumulate in the lipids (fats) of fish and other animals.
PCBs were first produced in 1927, commercially manufactured in 1929, and banned in 1979. They are a human-made compound used in transformers, capacitors, paint additives, lubricants, adhesives, and many other applications. PCBs were commonly used in these products because they do not burn, break down or conduct electricity.
Regulatory Pathways
The proposed consent decree is the latest twist in a tangled regulatory process. In 2006, the Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) drafted but never completed the Spokane River PCBs Total Maximum Daily Load: Water Quality Improvement Report.
Rather than complete the report and cleanup plan, Ecology worked with EPA and others to adopt alternative strategies such as direct-to-implementation, adoption of water quality variances, and participation in the Spokane River Regional Toxics Task Force (Task Force), a group with a goal to “develop a comprehensive plan to bring the Spokane River into compliance with applicable water quality standards for PCBs.”
Regardless of regulatory approach, a central concern has been how to meet PCB water quality standards with available technology. Further, EPA has not approved a water sampling technology that would enable dischargers to detect whether the water quality standard is being met.
The consent decree resolves disputes over the best method of developing and adopting a PCB cleanup plan for the Spokane River. In developing the plan, EPA will utilize extensive research accumulated to date and account for positive effects accruing through multi-million dollars investments in treatment plants and stormwater mitigation that have occurred over the past decade.
The consent decree, however, is silent on the role Ecology and other stakeholders will play in EPA’s development of the cleanup plan. It is also silent on the role of the Task Force. For the two-year biennium that ends in June 2023, the Task Force has received Washington state funds to research, monitor and address PCBs in the Spokane River.
Click here for a list of links and resources related to the complex topic of addressing PCBs on the Spokane River.