50 years of pollution cleanup to be celebrated next week

KELLOGG –– The Environmental Protection Agency will host a special ceremony commemorating 50 years of health and environmental work in the Silver Valley and discussing what’s next.

The EPA, along with partnering agencies the Basin Environmental Improvement Project Commission (BEIPC), the Department of Environmental Quality, Panhandle Health, and the Coeur d’Alene Tribe have spent the past five decades working in concert to reclaim and remediate more than a century’s worth of mine waste. 

The Bunker Hill Superfund Site wasn’t designated by the EPA until 1983, but the events that kickstarted and put the area under a microscope began ten years prior. 

In September 1973, a fire at the Bunker Hill Mine Smelter’s baghouse destroyed the smelter’s main pollution prevention. When the decision was made to operate the smelter without replacing the damaged baghouse, it released more than 800 tons of lead and other toxic heavy metals into the air over the next 11 months before it was shut down. 

These contaminants were deposited in the surrounding communities, hillsides, rivers, and streams. According to EPA, this was the worst lead poisoning event in United States history.

This kicked off years of testing blood-lead levels in the children of the Silver Valley, some of the results being the highest in record history, according to the CDC. 

“The cleanup didn’t start 50 years ago, but the baghouse fire brought to light the need for the cleanup,” BEIPC Executive Director Sharon Bosley said. “Since that time, there have been a lot of improvements made to restore the area.” 

Over the past 50 years, several state and federal agencies have worked exclusively on rectifying the pollution. This includes remediating thousands of residential yards, removing waste material from abandoned mines, remediating and re-foresting the hillsides, replacing roads, and taking these contaminated materials to repositories where they can be sealed, buried, and capped to prevent further contamination. They have also completed several large projects to restore waterways and streambanks, continuously treat contaminated mine discharge water, and restore fish and wildlife habitats. 

One of the larger projects, the recent expansion, and upgrade at the Central Treatment Plant in Kellogg, has yielded significant results that will be discussed at the ceremony 

“They’re seeing a great reduction in phosphorus, lead, cadmium, and zinc,” Bosley said. “They will also be showing attendees a 30-year trend in the reduction of these heavy metals.”

Among the other topics that will be discussed is the future of the cleanup efforts. 

Because of annual flooding and water runoff from the hillside, the cleanup efforts were expanded into much of the areas adjacent to the Coeur d’Alene River, including what is commonly referred to as the lower basin – the areas between Cataldo and down along the river as it flows toward Lake Coeur d’Alene. 

Because of the flowing water, pollutants were carried downstream and into floodplains where they were deposited – damaging farmlands, as well as fish and wildlife habitats. 

“I believe that there will be significant discussion about how things started during the cleanup and how they are going now and where they are going,” Bosley said. 

The commemoration of 50 years of work in the Silver Valley is open to the public and will be held Wednesday, May 15, at 4 p.m. at Noah’s Loft at Silver Mountain.