EPA Responsiveness Summary Now Available: Lower Basin Waste Consolidation Areas Siting Criteria

 Announcement from U.S. EPA:

EPA Responsiveness Summary Now Available:

Lower Basin Waste Consolidation Areas Siting Criteria

 

The Coeur d’Alene Trust is starting to look for places to site Waste Consolidation Areas, under EPA’s direction. WCAs are places where contaminated soil and sediment are stored. The waste material mostly comes from nearby cleanup sites. When WCAs are full, they are capped with clean material. WCAs are engineered and managed to contain the contamination safely over time. This reduces exposure and helps protect people and wildlife.

 

More cleanup projects are coming to the Lower Basin. The Lower Basin refers to the Lower Coeur d’Alene River Basin. It is the area along the Coeur d’Alene River valley, stretching from Enaville to Harrison. Cleanups will take place in select areas here over the next many years. The cleanup projects will help protect people’s health by removing soil and sediment contaminated with heavy metals like lead and arsenic. Several areas are needed to safely consolidate and store that waste. EPA’s goal is to have one or more Lower Basin WCAs ready by 2024. The WCAs will be placed close to cleanup projects, to reduce cost and roadway congestion.

 

In late July 2020, we checked in with you about a list of community criteria for siting waste repositories. In 2009, the Basin Environmental Improvement Project Commission’s Citizen Coordinating Council sponsored meetings where local communities helped develop these criteria. We asked what you think of the criteria, if they are still relevant, and if there are other issues to consider. The public input period ran from July 27 through September 30, 2020. We received 31 comments from 8 people, which we carefully reviewed and considered. We received input from local community members, the Sierra Club, the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, and the Kootenai Environmental Alliance. View the public’s input and EPA’s responses at: https://go.usa.gov/x7G8w.

 

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Project Webpage: www.epa.gov/superfund/bunker-hill