The Columbia Falls Aluminum Company (CFAC) will pay US$57.6 million to clean up pollution at its long-shuttered smelting plant in northwestern Montana.

Under an agreement announced by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the company will mitigate hazardous industrial byproducts, including arsenic, fluoride, and cyanide.

Workers will consolidate most of the hazardous waste at the industrial site and secure it with a protective cap to stop contaminants from leaking into the local soil and water.

The decision arrives nearly ten years after the location joined the federal Superfund list. EPA Region 8 Administrator Cyrus Western said that this settlement creates a pathway for future redevelopment of the former industrial facility.