Coal is dirty. That is an unsurprising fact of coal, every process involving coal is dirty. Mining coal is extremely energy intensive and can destroy whole ecosystems, burning coal produces millions of tons of carbon dioxide, but perhaps the dirtiest part of coal is disposing of coal ash.
The United States burns over 800 million tons of coal each year to produce 30% of its energy. This burning of coal produces 110 million tons of coal ash annually according to the EPA. Coal is really just ancient carbonized plants, burning it produces millions of tons of carbon dioxide annually and disrupts the Earth’s carbon cycle. Once the coal is burnt and has released all of its possible potential energy, the remanence is ash, just like you would find in your fireplace, only this ash has a deadly secret. It contains lead, arsenic, mercury, chlorine, chromium, barium, and selenium. Despite its toxic nature, coal ash is considered “non-hazardous waste”. That’s right, waste that contains toxic levels of lead and arsenic can be considered non-hazardous.
So, what does the United States do with this “non-hazardous”, yet very toxic coal ash? The ash is typically put into ditches and filling it with water, but these coal ash ponds are more than often unlined, so the toxic coal ash comes in direct contact with the surrounding environment. The coal ash in unlined ponds can easily leach into the ground and contaminate nearby water sources with its deadly toxins. Coal Ash is the second largest industrial waste stream and it only saw the first set of regulations in 2015. Only after there have been over 200 known coal ash spills and contamination events. The new regulation requires that all coal ash ponds must be lined and companies must regularly inspect their ponds, which is a step in the right direction, but the simple fact is that this waste is toxic and needs to be treated as such.
People living within one mile of an unlined coal ash pond have a 2,000 times greater risk of having cancer than what is deemed safe by the EPA. Communities near unlined coal ash ponds are drinking water poisoned by lead, arsenic, and other heavy metals. A coal ash pond in Tennessee failed in 2008 and flooded 3,000 acres and poisoned communities. Not regulating coal ash as the toxic and hazardous waste that it is doesn’t help families or communities, it only aids big coal industries. America, we deserve better, we deserve our government to put families and communities before big polluting corporations.
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“It’s sending the message to students, parents and employees that we really don’t care about public education in Detroit, that we allow for second-class citizenry in Detroit,” Vitti said then. “And that hurts my heart and it angers me and it frustrates me that I can’t fix it right now.”Nikolai Vitti, is the superintendent of the Detroit Public Schools Community District. Read more.
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Safe Drinking Water Settlement $365,000
Under a settlement announced today by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), CertainTeed Corporation will pay $365,500 in civil penalties to resolve alleged violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) at the CertainTeed Lake Charles Polymer Plant in Westlake, Louisiana. The settlement requires the largest civil penalty payment under the Safe Drinking Water Act by a public water system with respect to drinking water in the state of Louisiana. Read more…
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Fracking Industry’s Water Use Rises
Water use for fracking by oil and gas operators in the Marcellus Shale region rose 20 percent between 2011 and 2016 as longer laterals were drilled to fracture more gas-bearing rock, even though the pace of well development slowed in response to low natural gas prices, a Duke University study said on Wednesday.
The rise was the smallest of any of the six U.S. regions studied, including the Permian Basin area of Texas, where water use surged by 770 percent over the period.
The study also said the volume of fracking waste water produced in the Marcellus – which includes Pennsylvania, West Virginia, eastern Ohio and southern New York, where fracking is banned — rose four-fold to 600,000 gallons in 2016, forcing energy companies to rely increasingly on holding the waste in underground injection wells. Read more.
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Kentucky Coal Company’s Sweetheart Deal
Conservationists say Kentucky regulators rubber-stamped the utility’s own plans, (Big Rivers Electric Corporation) insulated it from citizen’s lawsuits and neglected to assess the complete environmental impact of the pollution.
“To me that’s the bigger story, it’s not whether there’s a nominal fine or not. It’s the fact that there’s no indication the company is being required to do a full accounting for what the impacts are of this pollution or fully address the pollution at its source,” said Thom Cmar, an attorney with Earthjustice, an environmental advocacy non-profit.
But the agreed order doesn’t require Big Rivers to assess groundwater impacts. “If it’s in those seeps it’s also getting into the groundwater in other ways and a much larger survey of the site needs to be done to determine what the full scope of the problem is and what the impacts are,” Cmar said. Read more.
“Even before Hassan Amjad’s family buried him on a West Virginia hillside, phone calls flooded his daughter’s office.
The callers remembered him as a kind man, boundless in his curiosity, fiery in his convictions, who had long maintained a medical clinic in nearby Oak Hill, in an old whitewashed house with a squeaky screen door and creaking wood floors.
Her father had made it his mission to get justice — or at least answers — for the people of this once-thriving coal town an hour south of the state capital. He told anyone willing to listen that industrial chemicals dumped decades ago by the now-defunct Shaffer Equipment Co. had long been poisoning residents.” Read More
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AZ Residents Water Polluted
“If we’d known the water was this filthy, we probably wouldn’t have bought here. I feel like we were cheated,” said Jose, a Border Patrol agent, about the Saguaro Bloom well contamination.
Read more.
No one should ever have to wonder if their water is safe. Across NY state, drinking water contamination has been hurting communities. Read more. On a federal level there is a bill in the Senate that force all schools to test their drinking water and provides grants to replace pipes where necessary. Take action button is on the left side of our webpage. Please let your representative know you care.
A 2013 lawsuit regarding the Bridgeton landfill finally reached a settlement in Missouri courts. The settlement holds Bridgeton accountable and is a step in the right direction according to Missouri’s Attorney General. Republic Services will still manage the site. Additionally, Bridgeton will create a$12.5 million restitution fund and pay $3.5 million in fines and damages.
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June 27, 2018
More than 200 people participated in the opening session of the first of several regional summits on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PSAS) and related chemicals that the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) plans to sponsor over the coming year. The summit held in Exeter, New Hampshire included both a public forum Monday, June 25 and a series of workshops the following day which involved environmental officials from the state, the federal government, municipal officials and interested parties. This regional summit was a follow-up to the EPA’s National Summit held in Washington, DC in May as it considers new standards and regulations to deal with the threats posed by this group of chemicals and the development of effective environmental cleanup methods. For more information on these chemicals and the community engagement process.
David Bond, from Bennington College, gave one of several presentations before the gathering. Bond said different regulations in every state and different levels of enforcement have made it more difficult to address the complex challenges posed by PFAS. Bond contrasted Vermont’s quick action when contamination was found in Bennington County with the slower, less vigorous response from New York state to PFAS contamination in the Hoosick Falls, New York, area.
However, Bond did praise a recent lawsuit filed by New York in an attempt to hold companies that released the chemicals into the atmosphere responsible for the costs of dealing with the contamination. He also said “I think of Vermont as a model for how to respond,” when Former Gov. Peter Shumlin and other officials, swooped in immediately after the tainted wells were discovered and held informational sessions. The governor ensured that water was delivered to residents, and the state pressured Saint Gobain to extend a water line to affected residents, as well as, having the Vermont Department of Health hold screening clinics.
Bond explained that exposure to perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and similar chemicals, primarily through drinking water, has been associated with high cholesterol, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, testicular cancer, kidney cancer and pregnancy-induced hypertension. These highly soluble chemicals can be spread through spills, dump sites or through factory stack emissions, working their way into groundwater or reservoir water sources, where it is believed they will not dissipate for many years, if ever.
Bond recommended a uniform, national approach guided from the federal level, including legal action if necessary by the Department of Justice against polluters.
Bond also stated that the EPA released an 850-plus-page draft report on June 21 that indicated the standards for the level of PFOA in drinking water should be lowered significantly. The EPA has set a safe drinking water standard at 70 parts per trillion, while Vermont set its standard at 20 parts per trillion. Bond stated, that both might need to be lowered, according to the draft report. The Comment Period for the draft report, prepared by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) must be submitted by July 21.
Source:
https://vtdigger.org/2018/06/26/pfoa-summit-vermonts-response-to-contamination-a-model/