The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has approved an Interim Record of Decision that would cap rather than extract radioactive slag, buried phosphorus, and heavy metals that remain at the site of the former FMC Corp. elemental phosphorus complex west of Pocatello, Idaho.
From 1947 to December 2001, FMC operated the world’s largest elemental phosphorus plant until it was shut down. All of its structures, including four massive electric furnaces, have been torn down and removed. Since 1990, that site and adjacent property – where the J.R. Simplot Co. continues to operate a phosphate fertilizer plant – have been designated the Eastern Michaud Flats Superfund site. Unlike the Simplot plant, the FMC plant operated within the Fort Hall Indian Reservation boundaries in Power County.
Shoshone-Bannock tribal officials had urged that the FMC waste be removed rather than left on the property for fear it would contaminate the nearby Portneuf River, which runs through the reservation. They have argued that the billions of dollars in profits that FMC made from its elemental phosphorus plant should be spent on completely cleaning up the property.
After receiving hundreds of comments about the plan, EPA announced the “cap and retention” cleanup strategy at a special meeting April 13 in the Chubbuck City Council chambers. Officials said the existing property poses risks to people and the environment.
The plan, which will be funded by FMC, calls for capping major sections of the property. Installing extraction and treatment wells downstream would capture runoff pollutants. Drilling wells and actual removal of dirt are expected to take a year to start.
EPA will negotiate with FMC to forge a consent decree and draw up engineering and design plans for the cleanup. Once that is finalized, FMC will hire contractors to design and implement the project, which will be monitored by EPA.
The first EPA Record of Decision (ROD) regarding the FMC property was signed in 1998. Shoshone-Bannock opposition to a plan that calls for capping the waste has delayed reaching an interim ROD for more than a decade.
Tribal officials have called the EPA plan short-sighted, but EPA officials counter that removing all the waste would be prohibitively expensive and dangerous. As a concession to the tribes, EPA will fund a third party of experts to examine whether it is feasible to remove and treat the waste. EPA officials have said the undertaking will require removing large volumes of earth, plus special precautions to minimize surface runoff and air pollution. Hauling in clean soil and contouring hills near the property will involve hundreds of acres. It is estimated the entire remediation project could take up to four years. The extraction wells could be installed before the capping.
FMC ponds used to manage wastewater were capped and closed under a 1999 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) consent decree. In 1998, FMC paid $11.9 million – at that time the largest civil penalty settlement ever – under a 1976 hazardous waste law. It also had to cap the ponds, which had caught fire at times over the decades. Construction of the pond caps was completed by 2005.
Power County lost its major tax base when the FMC operation shut down. Plans call for the property to be developed commercially and industrially after the property is cleaned up.