Avista Seeks Authority To Pay For Site Cleanup Old Coal Gasification Site Has Coal Tar On Its Grounds

Avista Utilities has asked Idaho and Washington regulators to sanction the spending of almost $900,000 on environmental studies for cleanup of an old coal gasification plant site in Spokane.

Avista rates analyst Ron McKenzie said Thursday that the staff of the Utilities and Transportation Commission has agreed to include Washington’s share of the known costs in an ongoing general natural gas rate increase request.

In Idaho, McKenzie said, the company has asked for an accounting deferral that would eventually roll its costs, plus 5 percent interest, into the next general gas rate case there.

Unknown costs in Washington also would be handled that way, he said.

Avista estimates that the cleanup costs could range anywhere from $309,000 to $34 million.

The company has been drilling exploratory holes on the former coal plant site at 111 N. Erie, now occupied by Brown Building Materials, for 14 months, said environmental compliance coordinator Hank Nelson.

Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad property across the Spokane River has also been tested, he said.

The gasification plant shut down in 1948 after almost a half-century of operations.

Avista acquired the six-acre site by way of a merger in 1958 and sold it to the Brown family in 1977. The company never operated the plant.

Nelson said contamination of the area turned up in 1997, when the Washington Department of Transportation did soil sampling as it considered rerouting Trent Avenue through the site.

He said Avista has submitted a remedial investigation report and a feasibility study to the Washington Department of Ecology.

Comments from Ecology are expected by late July, he said, after which the company, department, railroad and Brown will discuss how best to deal with coal tar left behind in the process of producing gas.

Ecology will draft the final cleanup plan, perhaps as soon as the end of the year, Nelson said.

Because coal tar readily binds to the sand underneath Brown Building Materials, he said, leaving the site as is may be the best solution.

The material does not mix with water and there is no evidence any has migrated off the property, Nelson said.

Avista spokesman Steve Becker said the $34 million cleanup estimate would entail removing most, if not all, of the soil from the site.

A similar site on the north shore of Lake Union in Seattle was excavated, backfilled and graded to become Gas Works Park, complete with some of the old equipment.

This sidebar appeared with the story: AT A GLANCE The plant’s past

The gasification plant, which was located in Spokane where Brown Building Materials now sits, shut down in 1948 after almost a half-century of operations.

Avista acquired the six-acre site by way of a merger in 1958 and sold it to the Brown family in 1977. Coal tar turned up on the site in 1997.

The material does not mix with water and there is no evidence any has migrated off the property, according to Avista.