EPA moves to crack down on dangerous coal ash storage ponds

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FILE - In this May 1, 2018, record photo, the Richmond, Va., metropolis skyline is seen successful the skyline down the ember ash ponds on the James River adjacent Dominion Energy's Chesterfield Power Station successful Chester, Va. In the archetypal first large enactment to code toxic wastewater from coal-burning powerfulness plants, the Environmental Protection Agency is denying requests by 3 Midwest powerfulness plants to widen operations of leaking oregon different unsafe ember ash retention ponds. (AP Photo/Steve Helber, File)

WASHINGTON – The Environmental Protection Agency is taking its archetypal large enactment to code toxic wastewater from coal-burning powerfulness plants, ordering utilities to halt dumping discarded into unlined retention ponds and velocity up plans to adjacent leaking oregon different unsafe ember ash sites.

Plants successful 4 states volition person to adjacent the ember ash ponds months oregon years up of schedule, the EPA said Tuesday, citing deficiencies with groundwater monitoring, cleanup oregon different problems.

Coal ash, the substance that remains erstwhile ember is burned to make electricity, contains a toxic premix of mercury, cadmium, arsenic and different dense metals. It tin pollute waterways, poison wildlife and origin respiratory unwellness among those surviving adjacent monolithic ponds wherever the discarded is stored.

The actions people the archetypal clip the EPA has enforced a 2015 regularisation aimed astatine reducing groundwater contamination from coal-fired powerfulness plants that has contaminated streams, lakes and underground aquifers.

U.S. ember plants nutrient astir 100 cardinal tons (90 cardinal metric tons) annually of ash and different waste.

The Obama medication regulated the retention and disposal of toxic ember ash for the archetypal time, including a request to adjacent coal-ash dumping ponds that were unstable oregon contaminated groundwater. The Trump medication weakened the Obama-era regularisation successful 2020, allowing utilities to usage cheaper technologies and instrumentality longer to comply with contamination simplification guidelines that are little stringent than what the bureau primitively adopted.

EPA Administrator Michael Regan said the actions announced Tuesday volition guarantee that ember ash ponds conscionable beardown biology and information standards and that operators of concern facilities are held accountable.

“I’ve seen firsthand however ember ash contamination tin wounded radical and communities,'' said Regan, a erstwhile North Carolina biology regulator who negotiated with Duke Energy what authorities officials accidental was the largest cleanup statement for toxic ember ash.

“For excessively long, communities already disproportionately impacted by precocious levels of contamination person been burdened by improper ember ash disposal,'' Regan said. “Today’s actions volition assistance america support communities and clasp facilities accountable. We look guardant to moving with our authorities partners to reverse harm that has already occurred.''

In abstracted letters sent Tuesday, EPA denied requests for extensions of ember ash permits by the Clifty Creek powerfulness works successful Madison, Indiana; James M. Gavin works successful Cheshire, Ohio; and the Ottumwa works successful Ottumwa, Iowa.

The Greenidge Generation works successful Dresden, New York, was ruled ineligible for an extension. The erstwhile ember works present uses earthy gas.

The H.L. Spurlock works successful Maysville, Kentucky, volition beryllium required to hole groundwater monitoring arsenic a information for continued cognition of its ember ash pond, the EPA said.

Lisa Evans, a elder lawyer for the biology radical Earthjustice, said the enforcement enactment "sends a beardown connection to manufacture that (compliance with the EPA rule) is not a paperwork exercise. It requires them to cleanable up these toxic sites.''

Frank Holleman, a lawyer for the Southern Environmental Law Center who has battled Duke Energy and utilities implicit ember ash disposal, said the enforcement enactment offers important protections for cleanable h2o nationwide.

"The EPA has sent a wide connection that (power works operators) cannot permission ember ash sitting successful primitive, polluting ponds crossed the country,'' helium said.

Utilities successful Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee and different states that are inactive storing ember ash successful leaking, unlined pits sitting successful groundwater and adjacent to waterways are among those affected by the decision, Holleman said.

Michelle Bloodworth, president and CEO of America's Power, a commercialized relation that represents coal-fired utilities, said the radical was reviewing the EPA's announcement. “On its look it doesn’t marque consciousness to unopen down prematurely ember plants that supply the information of on-site substance retention oregon service arsenic an alternate erstwhile prices of earthy state and different sources spike" oregon are not available, she said.

In a related action, EPA sent letters to operators of 4 existent oregon closed coal-fired powerfulness plants, saying they request to marque improvements to coal-ash sites to comply with EPA rules. The AES powerfulness works successful Puerto Rico and 3 closed plants — the erstwhile Beckjord powerfulness presumption successful Ohio, Tecumseh Energy successful Kansas and Gallagher Generating Station successful Indiana — each received EPA informing letters.

Coal ash retention and disposal goes backmost decades, but went mostly unregulated until a 2008 spill astatine a Tennessee Valley Authority powerfulness works successful Kingston, Tennessee. A containment dike burst and flooding covered much than 300 acres (121 hectares), dumped discarded into 2 adjacent rivers, destroyed homes and brought nationalist attraction to the issue.

In 2014, an estimated 39,000 tons of ember ash spewed into the Dan River aft a drainage tube moving beneath a discarded dump collapsed astatine a Duke Energy works successful Eden, North Carolina. The toxic sludge turned the stream grey for much than 70 miles (112 kilometers).

The EPA connected Tuesday reiterated its "consistently held presumption that aboveground impoundments oregon landfills cannot beryllium closed with ember ash successful interaction with groundwater.'' Limiting interaction betwixt ember ash and groundwater aft closure is captious to minimizing contaminants released into the situation and volition assistance guarantee communities adjacent the sites person entree to harmless h2o for drinking and recreation, the EPA said.

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