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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Spokane River getting healthier, but controversy over discharge limits remains

Jason Peterson snaps a cell phone picture of the Spokane River Lower Falls during his luch hour, Feb. 29, 2016, in downtown Spokane, Wash. (Dan Pelle / The Spokesman-Review)

The Spokane River’s health is improving, say Washington state officials, who are touting declines in cancer-causing PCBs as a promising trend in reducing toxic pollution in the river.

Most of the river met state standards for polychlorinated biphenyls during late-summer monitoring in 2014 and 2015, according to the state Department of Ecology. The water sampling was done during low-flow conditions, when concentrations of the long-lived industrial pollutant would have been the highest, said Adriane Borgias, a water quality specialist for the agency.

But whether Spokane River fish are getting safer to eat remains an open question.

“Are we seeing a decrease in PCBs in fish tissue? Maybe,” Borgias said. “We’re seeing something, but it’s not statistically significant at this point.”

Borgias is heading a five-year collaborative effort to reduce PCBs in the Spokane River, which violates both state and tribal water quality standards. The task force includes two manufacturers, several environmental groups, local governments and health officials.

Borgias said the task force’s work is revealing how the widely dispersed pollutants end up in the river, resulting in real gains for water quality.

But court battles continue over the state’s 2010 decision not to require Spokane River dischargers to meet limits for PCBs in their wastewater. (One of the dischargers is Inland Empire Paper, a Millwood newsprint facility owned by Cowles Co., The Spokesman-Review’s parent company.)

Last year, U.S. District Court Judge Barbara Rothstein said the federal government erred in allowing the state to substitute the task force’s work for PCB limits in discharge permits. She ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to consult with the state and create a timetable for permit limits.

This week, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed appeals to Rothstein’s ruling by the state, Spokane County and Kaiser Aluminum.

“The courts are saying, ‘Sure, do the task force, but it’s not a substitute for crunching the numbers and putting enforceable limits into the permits,’” said local water attorney Rachael Paschal Osborn, speaking on behalf of the Sierra Club and the Center for Environmental Law and Policy, which challenged the state’s PCB cleanup plan.

The Spokane Tribe of Indians joined the lawsuit to protect tribal members who eat Spokane River fish, according to court documents.

The EPA has since filed a plan with the court that would require PCB limits in discharge permits by July 2030, if the river isn’t meeting water quality standards by then.

Osborn said the groups will appeal the 2030 timeline. That’s too long of a delay, she said.

PCBs once found in many products

PCBs are a stubborn problem. Once found in thousands of products from lipstick to cable insulation, the U.S. banned the manufacture of the synthetic compounds more than 30 years ago because of their link to cancer and other health problems.

But the durable PCBs are still found in air, water, soil and products made before the 1980s. They’re also present in some new items, such as imported dyes. And they can be created as a byproduct of manufacturing.

Because of the health risks they pose, PCBs are regulated in tiny amounts. Pregnant women who eat fish with high PCB levels have children at greater risk for delayed development and neurological problems.

The state’s water quality standard for PCBs is 170 parts per quadrillion, which is like finding 170 pennies in a land mass the size of Washington. The Spokane Tribe’s standard is even tougher at 1.3 parts per quadrillion, which is designed to protect tribal members eating a subsistence diet of nearly 2 pounds of fish daily.

In 2006, the state released a draft plan for reducing PCBs discharged into the Spokane River by 95 to 99 percent. But the wastewater discharges were only responsible for about 8 percent of the PCBs entering the river, state officials estimated.

The task force formed to track how PCBs were reaching the river. Dischargers were required to participate in the task force and to start monitoring and reporting the levels of PCBs in their wastewater. The state also kept the option of writing PCB limits into future discharge permits.

Determined to avoid green-washing

“The task force has done a lot of work to fingerprint what PCBs are out there and where they are coming from,” said Jerry White Jr., the Spokane Riverkeeper.

Along with Spokane County, the nonprofit river advocacy group was one of the instigators of the task force. Just targeting the pollution coming out of discharge pipes wouldn’t accomplish the widespread cleanup that was needed, he said.

Others in the international Waterkeeper Alliance initially questioned the Spokane Riverkeeper’s decision to participate in the task force.

“We’re clean-water advocates, and we are going out on a limb,” White said. “That’s doubles my determination to make sure this process is not green-washing. We feel pressure to make sure it will yield results.”

The task force is making “measurable progress,” according to an interim report.

Actions by members have kept 283 pounds of PCBs from reaching the river, the recent report said. Kaiser Aluminum was responsible for 250 pounds through a removal of polluted soils at its Trentwood facility.

“Our work is about finding those sources of PCBs and getting rid of them so they aren’t washing into the river,” said Borgias, the Ecology Department employee.

The report also cited Avista Utilities’ efforts to replace thousands of older transformers that contain small amounts of PCBs and the city of Spokane’s focus on stormwater management.

As Spokane River dischargers test and install new filtration technology to scrub phosphorus from their wastewater, higher volumes of PCBs are also being removed, the report said.

The city of Spokane received a grant to test new products for PCBs. They were found in items such as road paint, caulking and hydro-seeding mixes. Efforts to replace those products with PCB-free brands is part of the work, too, Borgias said.

“There’s been a prolific amount of progress,” said Dave Moss, Spokane County’s water reclamation manager. “Many PCBs have been removed from the aquifer and the river.”

Much of the PCB removal work is measured in grams, according the interim report.

The task force’s complete report is due in December.

The state has spent about $758,000 on the task force’s efforts. Osborn, the water attorney, questions whether taxpayers are getting their money’s worth.

She said it’s disingenuous for the task force to take credit for Kaiser’s cleanup, which was required by an earlier consent decree.

“If you look at what the task force has been doing over the last five years, it’s been holding a lot of meetings and getting a lot of money,” Osborn said. “The task force hasn’t actually done anything. That’s our contention.”

End goal is fish that are safe to eat

White’s goal is healthy fish. That will be the true test of the task force’s effectiveness, the Riverkeeper said.

For two decades, health advisories have encouraged people to limit the number of fish they eat from the Spokane River to protect themselves from toxins. PCB are stored in fat. So, fish have much higher levels than the water they swim in.

In other parts of the country, PCBs in fish tissue initially declined, then remained constant as the synthetic compounds repeatedly cycled through the food chain, White said.

PCBs are insidious in their ability to linger in the environment, which is why eliminating all sources to the river should be the eventual goal, he said.

“I hope the task force continues to beat this thing until we have clean fish,” White said. Anglers “shouldn’t have to be looking over their shoulders at fish advisories.”