Utah's US Magnesium named a federal toxic emergency cleanup site

Utah has a new Superfund toxic cleanup site, the magnesium-processing plant on the southwest edge of the Great Salt Lake.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected to make its decision on US Magnesium official on Wednesday in the Federal Register . In a news release Monday, the agency said the Tooele County plant was a risk to human health and the environment because of toxic wastes, including cancer-causing dioxins and hexachlorobenzene (HCB) and other dangerous byproducts. It is Utah's 24th Superfund site.

Company President Mike Legge said he could not respond to EPA's announcement because the company had not been notified about being added to the "National Priority List." He said US Mag, which

employs about 400, would "certainly challenge" the listing in light of the arguments the company put forward last year when EPA first said it was considering adding the company to the Superfund list.

"US Magnesium's comments," he said, "were factual and strong in refuting the fundamental assumptions made by the EPA in that listing proposal."

Legge has said previously that the plant is not a danger to workers or the environment. He also said the EPA's assessment of the site was flawed and did not meet the agency's own standards.

Superfund status now allows the EPA, with the help of the Utah Division of Environmental Response and Remediation, to order the company to clean up its 4,525-acre site. The tab is expected to run in the millions of dollars.

"The benefits of this designation extend well beyond the boundaries of the US Magnesium facility," said Gwen Christiansen, an environmental scientist with the federal Superfund program.

"The removal and containment of site contaminants will reduce health risks for those that work in the area," she added, "and will directly benefit wildlife, water quality and the overall health of the Great Salt Lake ecosystem."

Operators of the magnesium plant have been wrangling with state and federal regulators over hazardous byproducts for most of the three dozen years it has been extracting minerals from the lake and transforming them into magnesium and alloys used to strengthen metal.

Regulators say US Mag is dumping dioxin, and HCB into ditches outside the plant, along with an alphabet-soup of heavy metals and other toxic chemicals that put workers, the public and the environment at risk. Workers and birds have become sick because of the contaminants, and the site has flooded, the EPA said.

Around 100 people and organizations wrote to EPA last year in support of adding US Mag to the Superfund list. Objections were registered by the Tooele County Commission and the company, which provided a letter of nearly 150 pages and a box full of documents detailing why the company thought the listing would be wrong.

The company topped EPA"s national list of toxic polluters for years, but dropped off the top-100 ranking a few years ago, after updating its plant with $50 million in improvements. In 2007, the plant released nearly 4.6 million tons of toxic pollutants, making it fourth in Utah.

Jennifer Chergo, a Superfund coordinator for the EPA's Denver regional office, said there will be more opportunities for public input as regulators continue the "lengthy, thorough process" of investigating what needs to be done, analyzing the best alternatives for cleaning up the site and actually undertaking the cleanup.

She added that there is no link between the EPA"s nine-year-old hazardous waste lawsuit against US Mag and the Superfund designation.

"It's not related," she said. "It is a separate authority."

Chad Gilgen, a cleanup specialist with the Utah DERR, said his agency will play a supporting role.

"We want to protect human health and the environment," he said, "and Superfund is our tool to do that."

fahys@sltrib.com