NL Industries/Taracorp/Golden Auto

Overview

A secondary lead smelter ran at this St. Louis Park, Minnesota site from 1940 to 1982, recovering lead from battery fragments and containers. The smelting operations left elevated lead levels in air, soil, and groundwater. EPA added the site to the National Priorities List (NPL), the federal Superfund roster, in September 1983.

Lead is the main contaminant of concern. It was found in on-site and off-site soils and poses an unacceptable risk to human health and the environment under EPA's assessment. Contaminated groundwater was also a focus of cleanup efforts.

NL Industries agreed in 1985 to conduct cleanup under a Consent Order with EPA and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA). The cleanup plan included installing an asphalt cap over most of the site and setting up long-term groundwater monitoring. A separate investigation found that off-site soils did not need active cleanup, though institutional controls were later added in 2009 to limit land use in those areas. On-site remedial construction finished in September 1995, and EPA deleted the site from the NPL in May 1998. The most recent five-year review was completed in January 2025.

The site was redeveloped in the mid-2000s as the Highway 7 Business Center, an industrial and commercial office and warehouse complex owned by Real Estate Recycling and its subsidiary, Highway 7 Business Center LLC. The old asphalt cap was replaced with building footings, foundations, parking areas, and green space with clean soil. As of December 2024, five businesses on the site employed 177 people and generated an estimated $8,560,000 in annual sales revenue.

Despite the redevelopment, some cleanup goals have not been fully met. Physical construction is complete across the entire site, and contaminated groundwater migration is stabilized with no discharge to surface water. However, EPA currently has insufficient data to confirm that human exposures are fully controlled. Zoning restrictions and other institutional controls remain in place to prevent residential development and reduce exposure to residual lead in site soils. Community members with questions can contact the EPA staff assigned to the site.