Ohio Citizen Action

DALLAS, TX — Sierra Club has released a video called “Toxic Coal Ash” promoting next week’s public hearing on coal ash regulations to be held in Dallas on September 8, 2010.

For more information http://txcleanupfestival.blogspot.com/

LAWRENCEVILLE – “A Sept. 21 hearing before the Environmental Protection Agency in Pittsburgh could bring changes to industry as broad as those of the Clean Air Act, activists told the Citizens Against Coal Ash during a meeting Wednesday.

Citizens Against Coal Ash are primarily Green Township, Pa., residents concerned about the buildup of coal ash in Little Blue, the lake created years ago by Dravo, FirstEnergy Corp.’s predecessor. They said they want FirstEnergy to clean up Little Blue and to stop plans to expand the coal ash dump.

Roni Kampmeyer of Citizens Against Coal Ash (CACA) said Wednesday’s meeting held at the Lawrenceville Volunteer Fire Department was dedicated to learning about West Virginia residents’ problems with the coal ash dumping into Little Blue from the FirstEnergy Corp.’s Bruce Mansfield Plant in Shippingport, Pa”.

— Nancy Tullis, East Liverpool Review

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Activists urge waste be classified as hazard, but industries oppose plan

ARLINGTON, VA — “Environmental activists urged the federal government Monday to regulate toxic ash from coal-fired power plants as hazardous waste, arguing that federal standards are necessary because the states have done a poor job of regulating coal-ash disposal.

‘The threat that coal ash poses to human health is serious, and it is widespread,’ said Barbara Gottlieb of Physicians for Social Responsibility, a nonprofit advocacy group that works to protect the public from environmental toxins.

But road builders and other industries that use recycled coal ash in concrete, cement and other construction materials argued that labeling coal ash as a hazardous substance would devastate the recycling business.”

— Michael Collins, Knoxville News Sentinel

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HAZLETON, PA — “Barb Reed carts drinking water into her house, dissolves chlorine tablets in her toilet tank and replaces the element of her hot water heater every few years because of contamination in her well water.

The water from her son’s well is even worse, containing arsenic – a poison that causes cancer – in levels that exceed safe drinking standards. He moved in with his mother but still has to pay the mortgage on his own home.

The Reeds live near the Bruce Mansfield Power Station of FirstEnergy in Greene Township, Beaver County, one of 39 places around the country where a new report found metals and other toxic chemicals are escaping from storage areas for fly ash and other waste from coal-burning plants.

Environmental groups released the report Thursday as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency prepares to hold seven hearings across the nation on proposals to regulate coal ash.

The hearings start today in Arlington, Va., and the public can comment on the proposal through Nov. 19.”

— Kent Jackson, Hazleton Standard-Speaker

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CLEVELAND — “An environmental study has identified four Ohio sites where they say coal ash dumps are contaminating groundwater with heavy metals. Ideastream’s Bill Rice reports some accuse the Ohio EPA of being negligent in failing to warn citizens of the dangers.

The study by the environmental integrity project identifies a total of 39 coal ash dump sites in 21 states where water testing shows amounts of heavy metals in excess of federal standards. That’s in addition to 31 sites identified in a previous study by the group, and 67 cited by the U.S. EPA.

The four sites in Ohio are the first in the state to be publicly identified.

Rachel Belz of Ohio Citizen Action, which is working to bring the studies to the public’s attention, says the toxic substance figures come from the Ohio EPA. Private wells close to a dump site near Canton are shown to contain heavy metals at 30 times safe federal levels.

Belz says Ohio laws are lax when it comes to reporting pollution from coal ash, a waste product of coal burning power facilities.”

— Bill Rice, WCPN

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A flock of geese fly past a smokestack at the Jeffery Energy Center coal power plant near Emmitt, Kan.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — “A major confrontation between environmentalists and electric utilities that burn a lot of coal is about to boil over.

The fight is about coal ash — from the gritty cinders spread on icy winter roads, to the smokestack scrubber sludge that goes into drywall, to the fly ash in concrete.

The industry argues that coal ash is inert, that 40 percent of it is recycled into such products, and that the measures environmentalists want will cost billions of dollars and drive up power costs.

Environmental groups counter that the presence of heavy metals in the combustion products makes all of it hazardous.

They point to groundwater contamination from leaky utility ash disposal sites — including some in Ohio — operated under decades of lax regulations.”

— John Funk, Cleveland Plain Dealer

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As coal ash hearings begin across the country, impacted citizens criticize companies and lack of government regulation

COLUMBUS – As the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) considers how to regulate toxic waste from coal plants, Environmental Integrity Project, Earthjustice and Sierra Club issued a report today on the nationwide scope of the problem. The report, In Harm’s Way, reveals 39 new sites in 21 states where toxic coal waste has threatened water supplies, including 4 sites in Ohio. It documents the steadily growing number of waters known to be poisoned by poor management of the toxic ash left over when coal is burned for electricity.

“My community is getting poisoned. We’ve got multiple coal ash sites, including the Gavin power plant, plus so-called beneficial uses like when they dump the waste on our roads in the winter,” said Elisa Young from Meigs Citizens Action Now. “This is a justice issue. We need the EPA to regulate coal ash disposal and reuse, and hold the coal industry responsible for cleaning up its mess.”

Ohio is home to some of the most polluted sites in the report. At AEP’s Cardinal plant in Brilliant in eastern Ohio, levels of arsenic and molybdenum were recorded at over 10 times safe federal levels; at AEP’s Gavin plant in Cheshire in southern Ohio, alpha particles, arsenic, barium, and molybdenum were recorded at over 5 times safe federal levels. All four sites are less than two miles from private water wells, and the Cardinal plant is less than five miles from five different public wells.

The pollution in coal ash is known to cause cancer, organ disease, respiratory illness, neurological damage, and developmental problems. The data shows that this toxic pollution is flowing into nearby communities, polluting private drinking water wells and even putting some public water supply wells at risk. The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency has no requirements on groundwater monitoring of coal ash sites. Nationwide, not one state has required the toxic pollution to be stopped, let alone cleaned up.

Researchers found the sites by reviewing existing files at state agencies, and are only the tip of the iceberg amongst poor or non-existent monitoring and regulations. Sandy Bihn, from the Western Lake Erie Waterkeepers, has concerns about FirstEnergy’s Bayshore plant near Toledo, which is responsible for killing 2 billion fish and fish larvae each year. Bihn said “FirstEnergy’s new plan to divert the fish requires a bypass be cut through their old coal ash disposal site, which simply can’t be done safely because we don’t know what’s in there. They need to install cooling towers, which are proven to work in these situations.”

The report comes just days before the EPA begins a series of hearings across the country to gather public comment on new protections from toxic coal ash. Details on the hearings, which will be held in Virginia, Colorado, Texas, North Carolina, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Kentucky, can be found at www.sierraclub.org/coalash.

— Rachael Belz, Coal Program Organizer, Ohio Citizen Action

CINCINNATI — Today Ohio Citizen Action released an 8-minute video entitled “Coal Ash in Ohio” to highlight the problems and risks of toxic coal ash waste in Ohio. Coal ash is not currently regulated and Ohio is one of 29 states that does not require coal ash landfills and wet ponds to be monitored. Coal ash is disposed of in landfills and wet ponds, and some of the coal ash waste is used in consumer products ranging from bowling balls and building products to cosmetics and toothpaste.

The USEPA has announced two competing proposed regulations to begin regulating coal ash. The federal comment period for the proposed regulations runs through November 19, 2010 and citizens are urged to learn more about toxic coal ash, attend one of the seven public hearings that run August 30-September 28 and make citizen comments about coal ash to the USEPA.

— Rachael Belz, Coal Program Organizer, Ohio Citizen Action

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Special thanks to SouthWings for the flyover. Funding provided by the REAMP Media Fund.

WASHINGTON, DC — “U.S. EPA extended the public comment deadline today for proposed regulations for disposing of combustion ash from coal-burning power plants.

The period, which was originally scheduled to expire in mid-September, has been extended to Nov. 19.

EPA in May published two proposals for regulating coal ash under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. One would regulate ash as “hazardous,” setting binding disposal requirements for the waste that include an eventual ban on wet storage ponds. The other would classify the waste as nonhazardous and set federal disposal guidelines but leave enforcement to the states (E&ENews PM, May 4).

EPA began exploring federal regulations for coal ash after a wet storage pond at a Kingston, Tenn., power plant run by the Tennessee Valley Authority failed in December 2008, spilling about 1 billion gallons of sludge onto adjacent properties and waterways.

Environmental groups have been pushing for the “hazardous” designation, saying it is necessary to keep the waste from seeping into water supplies and wildlife habitat. The utility lobby and other industry organizations prefer the nonhazardous listing, saying that option protects recycling efforts while the alternative overestimates the environmental risks associated with coal ash.

Bipartisan blocs in the House and Senate have sent letters to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson asking her to back off the hazardous option as well.

EPA sent a draft rule to the White House Office of Management and Budget last October that proposed to regulate the ash as hazardous, but the nonhazardous proposal was put on equal footing during the OMB review (Greenwire, May 7).

The extension will be formally published in tomorrow’s Federal Register. The notice also announces two additional public hearings on the coal ash proposals, one in Pittsburgh on Sept. 21 and another in Louisville, Ky., on Sept. 28. EPA has already schedule five hearings in Denver; Dallas; Charlotte, N.C.; Chicago; and Arlington, Va.”

— Patrick Reis, Environment & Energy Daily