Teck Resources ordered to clean slag from Columbia River

A US federal court has ruled that Teck Resources must clean up contamination of the Columbia river.

Over a 65-year period Teck's smelter at Trail dumped at least 9 million tonnes of slag or smelter waste rock into the river, including metals such as lead, mercury, zinc and arsenic.

And while winning a court case is one thing, getting the clean-up underway is another matter.

But as Jim Pendowski, the toxic cleanup program manager with Washington State Department of Ecology, explains to Daybreak host Chris Walker, the government will push as hard as it can to get the clean up started.