It’s good to hear – at least preliminarily – that Lake Roosevelt is safe for recreational purposes. An Environmental Protection Agency review found that 12 of 15 beaches turned up safe levels for the contaminants that were tested, as long as exposure doesn’t exceed two weeks.

But the review doesn’t speak to the larger issue of whether the more than 90 years of Columbia River contamination is cause for a major cleanup. Still to be studied is whether the beaches are safe for more extensive uses, such as gathering food and eating fish.

The governments of the United States and Canada recently announced a framework for studying the long-term pollution from Teck Cominco’s massive smelter, just north of the border in Trail, British Columbia. The breakthrough was two years in the making, after the Colville Confederated Tribes sued the company and the state of Washington joined the lawsuit. Teck Cominco has agreed to put up $20 million for an EPA-led study of heavy-metal contamination of the Columbia River.

Nobody disputes that the company is responsible for dumping black slag, a byproduct of processing lead and zinc, into the river. The practice was halted in 1995. By then, the amount spilled was the equivalent of a dump truck an hour for 60 years. Canadian regulators approved of the dumping, figuring the Columbia River would dilute the slag. Instead it has built islands and beaches and coated the bottom of Lake Roosevelt.

But whether the contamination merits a cleanup and whether EPA can impose U.S environmental laws on a Canadian company are under dispute.

The lawsuit is the first that seeks to impose Superfund rules on a foreign company. Teck Cominco maintains that it isn’t bound by those rules and notes that it had dumping permits from its government. In 2004, U.S. District Court Judge Alan McDonald ruled that the lawsuit could go forward. An appeal is pending with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The news that Teck Cominco has agreed to finance a study averts an international showdown, for now. But EPA regional administrator Michael Bogert might be overstating matters when he says, “The Bush administration is avoiding years of inefficient litigation and beginning the restoration of the river basin.”

The accord doesn’t resolve who would pay for a cleanup.

The question of applying laws across borders is complicated and goes beyond this case. Montana and Alberta are battling over irrigation rights on a couple of rivers. Manitoba fears the polluting of a river and lake because of drainage activity in North Dakota. British Columbia and Alaska are at odds over possible pollution from a B.C. mine.

The two nations need to work out a comprehensive framework to settle such disputes, putting an end to continual ineffectual litigation. Cross-border polluters should not be given a pass.