# COMINCO ALASKA INC
> **Judicial** · FY1993 · — · Final Order With Penalty
## Case
- **Activity ID:** `54889`
- **Case Number:** 10-1993-0310
- **Type:** Judicial
- **Lead:** EPA
- **Outcome:** Final Order With Penalty
- **Penalty assessed:** $1.70M
- **Cost recovery:** —
- **Compliance action $:** $3.54M
- **Multimedia (multi-env):** N
## Defendants
- Cominco Alaska Inc (complaint) (settlement)
## Summary

The Cominco Alaska Inc., Red Dog Mine is 90 miles NE of Kotzebue, Alaska. The mine is an open pit mine and is the world's largest lead/zinc mine. All ore is milled on-site into a lead/zinc concentrate that is hauled to a Port on the Chukchi Sea. The ore is stored at the Port site most of the year until ice in the Chukchi Sea melts in the Spring and ships may reach the Port. The mine and the Port site both have NPDES Permits. The most significant violations at the mine are NPDES Permit effluent violations, mostly heavy metals. The violations are based largely on DMRs. There are about 198 effluent limit violations at the mine. There are also about 611 violations of the CWA for unpermitted discharges from a Tent Camp used by contractors in the Summer. Cominco never requested an NPDES Permit for that site. There are also about 196 unpermitted Winter discharges. Cominco's NPDES Permit only authorizes discharges from May through October to Red Dog Creek. However, EPA program staff may have told the company it could discharge November through April, if it complied with a State-issued Winter discharge Permit. The company has been in almost constant violation of its NPDES Permit at the Port site since it began operations there in 1989. There are about 1186 BOD and TSS effluent violations shown on DMRs. There are also a number of lesser permit violations. The other major violation at the Port Site is diesel fuel spill that occured there in July 1993. This spill was of about 20,000 gall

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*Source: [EPA ECHO](https://echo.epa.gov/) · MORVS · CC0 1.0*