Somehow, someway the Tennessee Valley Authority's comments on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's new coal ash regulation were made before the public was allowed to review the new reg and comment themselves. Then -- somehow, someway -- the comments were included in the federal register along with the proposed regulations, offering a glimpse into how federal agencies really work.
But, that's not all. The EPA took the comments and reworded the regulation, weakening it considerably, again, before presenting the regulation to the public for review.
The TVA may have weakened the Environmental Protection Agency's stance on regulating coal ash when it was allowed to comment before the public on the issue, a government watchdog group says.An accidentally released internal federal document shows that the public power producer, still cleaning up from a massive coal ash spill in 2008, criticized EPA's original draft proposal, which said coal ash should be classified as a "special" waste, making it fall under hazardous waste rules.
Before the public — including TVA's critics — got to see that original draft, the EPA issued a rewritten proposal last month that added a weaker alternative that would allow each state to decide on any regulations for coal ash, with lawsuits serving as the main enforcement tool.
Lawsuits are one thing the coal industry does fear.
Should the EPA declare coal ash a hazardous waste — as they've been attempting to do for more than 30 years — then all of those golf courses, churches and other new construction sites that used coal ash as landfill might start calling their lawyers. Same goes for the folks who used coal ash in concrete, asphalt or dry wall.
But, they might not.
Until that TVA dam broke and spewed 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash — which contains varying levels of potentially toxic substances, including lead, arsenic and mercury — from the Kingson Fossil Plant, no one was interested in coal ash. That disaster, just days before Christmas in 2008, clogged the Emory and Clinch Rivers, covered about 300 acres of land with up to six feet of sludge, pushed one house off its foundation, covered a dozen others and damaged 40 more while uprooting railroad tracks, killing wildlife, washing out roads, downing trees and rupturing gas and water lines.
No, until that major disaster no one was concerned.
Since then, however, the EPA has declared more than 40 coal ash ponds in the country "high-hazard." North Carolina is home to at least a dozen. Charlotte, alone, has four high-hazard coal ash ponds along the Catawba River, two just upstream from our main drinking water source.
So, yeah, I guess I can understand why the online magazine Inside the EPA offers this headline: "EPA Cuts Coal Ash Rule's Benefits To Measure Industry 'Liability Fears'." There may be one or two people in our litigious society who decide to take a stab at power companies in the court system. Maybe.
In fact, the White House is worried enough about litigation that, according to Inside the EPA, they forced the agency to reduce the "regulatory benefits" of the new regulation by $300 billion.
At the insistence of the White House Office of Management & Budget (OMB), EPA was forced to slash by more than $300 billion its lower-end estimates of the regulatory benefits from its recent proposal to regulate coal ash as a hazardous waste due to industry's "fear of liability," the first time the agency has quantified such fears in a cost-benefit assessment, sources say.The diminished benefits estimate may make it more difficult for EPA to justify strict regulation of coal combustion residues (CCRs) as agency regulations are generally required to demonstrate greater benefits than costs, unless barred from doing so by Congress.
What's really at issue here is money -- money lost in lawsuits and money gained from reselling waste. At newer coal plants, and plants retrofitted with special equipment, coal ash is managed in such a way that it can be repurposed and used for things like road construction. On the surface, it appears to be a win-win situation. The coal companies rid themselves of waste, construction companies get cheap land fill and ingredients for things like concrete, asphalt and dry wall. And, that, supposedly means they'll be able to sell their work at a reduced rate.
Unfortunately, at 80-year-old coal plants like Duke Energy's Riverbend plant on Mountain Island Lake, Charlotte's drinking water reservoir, repurposing coal ash isn't a possibility because it doesn't have the appropriate equipment on site and, since the plant may be decommissioned in a few years, it's not going to get that equipment.
More, from Inside the EPA:
But EPA's waste chief, Mathy Stanislaus, says the agency has “yet to see any data” that supports industry claims that labeling the waste as hazardous will stigmatize beneficial reuse. Speaking on a June 3 conference call sponsored by the American Bar Association, he said EPA is interested in information about possible stigmas – “What would be the nature of those impacts? Are they short or long term?” – but he reiterated that he is “less interested in arguments that all coal ash reuse will go away without any supporting analysis.“We want to promote and expand beneficial reuse so we want to make sure that we preserve that. The proposal is not intended to affect beneficial reuse,” he said.
The two regulations the EPA are proposing, which are currently open for public comment, are seemingly polar opposites. On one side we have a "special" designation that falls under the "hazardous waste" category. On the other side we have the regular old, completely non-hazardous trash category. This for a substance that contains a list of ingredients that reads like the periodic table.
WiseGeek.com describes coal ash in this way:
Environmental studies have shown that coal ash can be quite dangerous. It is highly radioactive in some cases, with poor environmental controls which may not entirely prevent contamination. Unlike a nuclear facility, which is carefully monitored and must follow a series of laws to limit radiation exposure, a coal fired power plant can release radioactive material into the surrounding environment and handle its ash without safety measures comparable to those used to control nuclear waste. Coal ash also contains dioxins and other toxins which can be dangerous when released into the environment.
Yeah. Totally. That's the same kinda stuff that goes into my kitchen trash can all the time. You?
Now is your chance to speak up regarding coal ash. The EPA's public comment period is now open. Easy instructions for commenting are listed here.
Meanwhile, check out these other articles about coal ash regulation:
And come see me Thursday night at the Visulite Theater for Type/Face where I'll tell you all about my experiences with coal ash.
Also, watch this video. The first four minutes capture what life was like before the TVA coal ash disaster. The last six capture the aftermath. Of course, everyone in charge of all things coal ash say that just because we have four high-hazard coal ash ponds within a few miles of Uptown doesn't mean anything like this nightmare will never happen here. It's different, they say. Everything's fine.