Groundwater Contamination From Toxic Coal Ash Confirmed In At Least 22 States

The clearest picture yet of coal ash contamination in the United States is emerging, with utilities reporting serious groundwater contamination in at least 22 states. At dozens of power plants across the country, including many in the Southeast, utilities have found coal-ash pollution severe enough to force them to propose cleanup plans. Those plans will likely become the next front in a decades-long battle over how to manage one of the nation's largest industrial waste streams—one tainted by toxic heavy metals.

But as widespread as the contamination appears to be, environmental advocates are finding a measure of hope, even as the Trump administration pushes to roll back federal rules for managing and cleaning up contamination from the billions of tons of coal-burning wastes that have piled up across the country.

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This new national picture of coal ash contamination has emerged in part because the environmental groups Earthjustice and Environmental Integrity Project, with others, have combed through utility websites, collecting information from documents that utilities began publishing last year. The groups have issued several reports in recent weeks with similar conclusions. For example, in Illinois, they found evidence of toxic pollutants such as arsenic, cobalt and lithium in groundwater at 22 of 24 coal ash dump sites. In Georgia, similar contamination was reported at 11 of the state's 12 coal-fired power plants. A report released Thursday reveals evidence of contaminants leaching from all 16 coal-fired power plants with ash ponds or landfills in Texas.

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"We are taking steps to address the releases, and to address impacts to groundwater," said James R. Roewer, executive director of the Utility Solid Waste Activities Group, which lobbies on coal-burning waste issues for electric utilities. Roewer's group last year persuaded the Trump administration to relax the Obama-era rules in part by extending the deadline to stop using some coal ash ponds from April 2019 to Oct. 31, 2020. The Trump administration also gave states some enforcement flexibility. Earthjustice and other environmental groups have sued to stop those changes. The EPA last year said it will revisit the ash rule for other possible changes. And the agency still must respond to an Earthjustice lawsuit it lost last year that found some Obama-era protections lacking and will require the closure and cleanup of some 100 additional coal ash ponds left out of the 2015 rule. Earthjustice believes that before the EPA moves again to weaken coal ash regulations, it needs to strengthen them as required by the court, Evans said. EPA officials did not respond to requests for comment.

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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/16012019/coal-ash-groundwater-contamination-map-arsenic-power-plant-utility-reports