A defunct pulp mill near the coastal Washington city of Aberdeen is now in the hands of the Environmental Protection Agency. Earlier this month, EPA personnel began to clean up Cosmo Specialty Fibers, which sits on the south bank of a bend in the Chehalis River in Cosmopolis. The tourist mecca U.S. Route 101 runs right alongside it, and anyone who drives past will see rusty and leaking machinery that demonstrates decades of neglect. The tiny community here has long depended on the plant as its economic engine. Its future now hangs in the balance.
Originally built by Washington timber giant Weyerhaeuser in 1957, then converted from paper grade products to specialty wood pulp in 1962, the site has a long history of timber production. The current owner is a businessman from the United Kingdom, Richard Bassett, who has shared bold plans to find new investors, restart the mill and generate future prosperity for Cosmopolis. But the company owes Washington state at least $2.3 million in fines due to severe site neglect and failing infrastructure. It is also the only major carbon emitter in the state that has failed to obtain the required state permits; these carbon allowances would cost an additional $508,000 at recent market auction rates.
The state Department of Ecology remains in charge of the property, but called in the EPA to help with hundreds of thousands of gallons of waste left behind by the owners. The mill last shut down in 2022. Alison Meyers, a supervisor for spill response in the state’s southwest region, told KNKX that since then, it has continued to deteriorate.
“It no longer has power. It no longer has water. That means that there is no active fire suppression system on the site. There is not full time staff or security. So, you know, the maintenance tasks aren't being done,” Meyers said.
She said the lack of security has also allowed some vandalism on site, leading to additional spills.
“So it's just, over time, slowly deteriorated, and that's why we're now starting to take action, to do some removal of oil and hazardous materials,” she said.
The EPA began a “time-critical removal action” of the hazardous waste at the site on Aug. 3. Technicians found about 700,000 gallons of hazardous chemicals, many of them held in dozens of leaking tanks. It’s mostly red liquor — an acid left over from pulp processing.
“Our process is going to be to open up the tanks from the tops and to drop in a pump, one of our pumps, and use hosing and piping that we attach to the pumps,” said Tom Vroman, an on-scene coordinator for the EPA in Cosmopolis.
The crew will suction the hazardous waste out and remove the chemicals while disturbing as little of the deteriorating machinery as possible.
Vroman also helped clean up the site at the pulp mill in Longview, Washington, about 100 miles from Cosmopolis, where a tank imploded in May, instantly killing 11 workers. The Longview tank was hot, and he said even though the exact cause of that tragedy has yet to be determined, the Cosmopolis mill site feels safer because there is no power, no heat and no pressure.
“Because things are at ambient temperatures and pressure, and we're using our own infrastructure, so to speak, to move these chemicals around, we're minimizing any risk of a release,” Vroman said.
The EPA expects its cleanup to take about five months, through the end of the year. After that, the state Department of Ecology will remove oils and develop a long-term cleanup plan.
The state will investigate which of the several former owners — including Weyerhaeuser — may be on the hook for cleanup costs.
