| The EPA has proposed two rules to regulate toxic coal ash, and they're going to hold only five hearings across the country to hear from citizens. One of those hearings is going to be in Dallas, Texas, on September 8th, so we are putting all hands on deck to make sure that there's a powerful voice demanding a strong coal ash rule.
Not sure what coal ash is? It's all the waste produced when burning coal (you can imagine how toxic it is). It may look like dirt, but it tastes like a Superfund site: monitoring data at 31 coal ash sites found arsenic, lead, selenium, cadmium, thallium antimony, mercury, boron, sulfate, and more exceeding drinking water standards in groundwater at 26 of the sites.
Right now, coal companies are free to put it wherever they like, usually in ponds, landfills, and uncovered earthen pits.
The EPA has proposed a strong option, which would classify coal ash as hazardous waste, and under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act Subtitle C, the EPA would have the power to federally enforce the following requirements: getting a permit for a disposal site, require effective clean-up in the case of a leak, groundwater monitoring, and storage sites. The soft option means continuing to classify coal ash as solid waste, which means that the regulation would be state-to state and enforcement would depend on the oh-so-easy citizen lawsuits. If you remember Pirates of the Caribbean, the soft option is kind of like Pirate Code. It's more of a guidelines, really, which means Elizabeth Turner is still going to be a prisoner on the Black Pearl and coal companies are still going to dump coal ash wherever they like.
Not sure how destructive this can be? See what happens when 1 billion gallons of coal ash sludge destroy a Tennessee community.
This was an obvious destructive catastrophe, but coal is a silent killer too. Living near a coal ash site is like smoking twenty, yes, that's right, TWENTY packs of cigarettes a day. Except if you live near a coal ash site, you can't just quit. You have to leave your home.
In Texas alone, the Brandy Branch Coal ash dump, the Southwestern Electric Power Co. coal ash dump, and the Texas Utilities Electric Martin Lake Reservoir have leaked elevated levels of selenium and toxic metals. There are no leachate collection systems in Texas, and there is no groundwater monitoring. It's worse than using a plastic bag for your goldfish- it's definitely going to leak.
But it's not just about coal ash. This is about making sure that polluters are responsible for external costs. This is about making sure that when there is environmental impact, the burden of responsibility falls on those who are responsible for the impact, not for those who suffer the collateral damage.
|
