ASARCO Pays $52 Million to Fund Environmental Cleanup At Former El Paso Smelter

ASARCO Pays $52 Million to Fund Environmental Cleanup At Former El Paso Smelter
Custodial trust established to pay for environmental remediation in the aftermath of bankruptcy

EL PASO – ASARCO, LLC today transferred $52 million into a custodial trust fund that will help finance environmental cleanup efforts at the company’s shuttered El Paso smelter. Under an agreement negotiated by the Texas Attorney General’s Office, a pre-selected trustee will be responsible for overseeing the environmental remediation fund and the cleanup strategy. Today’s transfer of funds concludes the Attorney General’s lengthy effort to secure funding for the significant clean-up effort that is expected at ASARCO’s former facility.

Roberto Puga of Project Navigator Ltd, a Los Angeles-based environmental consulting firm, will oversee the custodial trust and manage the multi-million dollar cleanup effort. As trustee, Puga is responsible for both the $52 million trust fund and the former smelter’s 422-acre site in downtown El Paso. Puga and his firm were selected by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

“The environmental cleanup trust fund established today marks the conclusion of the state’s lengthy, concerted effort to secure funding for environmental remediation at ASARCO’s 100-year-old El Paso smelter,” said Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. “Under the court-approved agreement, the ASARCO smelter has forever closed its doors. Equally important, more than $50 million has been secured to fund the environmental cleanup effort so that El Paso can move forward and work to revitalize this very unique downtown area.”

The Attorney General’s Office also secured a multi-million dollar payment for low-level radioactive waste cleanup at an ASARCO-owned state Superfund site in Southeast Texas. Under a separate settlement agreement that arose during the same bankruptcy case, ASARCO agreed to spend $29 million on the remediation of a low-lever radioactive waste facility near Houston.

Although ASARCO’s downtown El Paso smelter has been dormant since 1999, the facility has produced and refined heavy metals such as lead, copper, cadmium, and zinc for over 100 years. In 1999, the EPA and the Texas Attorney General’s Office charged ASARCO with unlawful recycling practices and improperly managing hazardous waste in violation of federal environmental laws.

The environmental cleanup trust established today first took shape in March, 2009, when a proposed joint settlement agreement between the EPA, the TCEQ and ASARCO was filed with the federal bankruptcy court. Later, the proposal was published in the Texas Register and the Federal Register. On May 11, 2009, state and federal environmental regulators, along with the U.S. Department of Justice representatives, made presentations about the agreement at a meeting that was open to members of the public. In June 2009, the bankruptcy court approved the settlement agreement, which was affirmed by the federal district court on Nov. 13.

Under the court-approved reorganization, ASARCO’s Arizona mines and its Amarillo refinery will continue to operate under new management. The El Paso smelter, however, will be permanently closed, the facility will be dismantled, and environmentally damaged property will be remediated with the custodial trust’s funds.