Smelter must pay tribes’ legal bill, court says

The owner of a Canadian smelter must pay the Colville Tribes about $8.3 million for legal fees and environmental studies related to ongoing litigation over the smelter’s discharges into the Columbia River, a recent court ruling said.

The tribes sued Teck Resources in 2004 over historic pollution from the smelter in Trail, British Columbia, that traveled into Washington. The state of Washington later joined the suit.

The Aug. 12 ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Lonny Suko doesn’t address clean up costs or restoration work, issues which still must be decided by the court.

Teck Resources has spent $75 million on environmental risk assessment studies in the Upper Columbia under a voluntary agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, company officials said last week.