Canberra taxpayers are picking up the $1.72 million tab for extinguishing the 2011 Mitchell fire and monitoring the decontamination effort.
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''The ACT government provided an emergency response to the Mitchell fire,'' a spokesman for the Environment and Sustainable Development Minister, Simon Corbell, said. ''These services are provided to the ACT community and generally are not provided on a cost-recovery basis.''
Just over $1 million was spent by the Environment and Sustainable Development Directorate on the subsequent clean-up, waste disposal, staff overtime and tests to determine what contamination had occurred at the Energy Services Invironmental plant in Dacre Street.
A further $683,000 was spent by Territory and Municipal Services and the cost to the ACT Emergency Services Agency of responding to the fire was $133,000 (excluding normal salary costs).
''Approximately $500, comprising overtime and two ASIC (Australian Securities and Investments Commission) searches were incurred by the Office of Regulatory Services,'' the spokesman said. ''This cost excludes the salary costs of WorkSafe ACT staff.''
One of the worst industrial accidents in the ACT in recent times, the fire broke out just after 11pm on September 15, 2011, and was not brought under control until 10am the following day. It was not completely extinguished until 10am on Saturday, September 17, in an effort that used up all supplies of fire fighting foam in the territory.
The Energy Services Invironmental operation processed electrical transformer oils containing polychlorinated biphenyls. These are chemicals that can cause health problems and which Mr Corbell said were ''persistent pollutants of the environment''.
Fears the Mitchell smoke plume could be toxic resulted in the suburb, along with Exhibition Park, being completely evacuated. At the height of the blaze residents within a 10-kilometre radius were told to stay indoors and not use their airconditioners.
Nineteen months on, the clean-up is all but complete, according to Mr Corbell's office. ''All fire-damaged material has been removed,'' the spokesman said.
''The concrete slab has been cleaned and the EPA (Environment Protection Authority) has given in-principle approval to reconnect the site to the stormwater [collection service] and is awaiting test results before a final approval is issued. Any residual contamination is likely to be minor. The lessee has yet to undertake a detailed environmental assessment, as required by the Environment Protection Order, and are waiting for the adjacent fire-damaged building to be demolished to enable this work to be undertaken.''
The assessment will determine what, if any, additional work needs to be carried out before the site can be redeveloped.
While tanks remain at the site, they were brought in after the fire to contain potentially contaminated stormwater run-off.
Correction: This article initially incorrectly said the overtime cost was $500,000 and the total cost was $2.35 million.
