A ruptured coal ash storage pond near Kingston, Tennessee in late 2008. The EPA has released a list of vulnerable coal ash storage ponds around the U.S. Most are in Appalachian states. EPA Photo.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has finally released a list of 44 vulnerable "coal ash" ponds in the United States. Two weeks ago the agency tried to keep the list secret, claiming these hazardous toxic waste ponds could be terrorist targets.
Bill Kovarik of Radford University has mapped the locations of these 44 hazardous sites, most of them in Kentucky, Ohio, West Virginia, North Carolina and Arizona.
These sludge ponds store the toxic waste remaining after coal is burned to produce electricity. Coal produces about 50 percent of the electricity in the United States, and also creates large amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) when it is burned. Rising levels of CO2 are widely seen by scientists as the leading reason earth's temperatures are rising.
If you live near one of these 44 toxic waste ponds, the EPA has said they have "high hazard potential." EPA verbiage accompanying the list says this means a failure of a dam holding back these coal ash wastes "will probably cause loss of human life."
Public interest has been high in these hazardous toxic waste ponds ever since one of them ruptured last December (picture above) at the TVA Kingston coal-fired power plant in Tennessee. That toxic sludge is still being cleaned up, and a recent report in the Knoxville News-Sentinel said the Tennessee Valley Authority expects cleanup costs will be about $1 billion.
A TVA-commissioned study of the causes of that disaster said an "unstable" layer of ash in the failed pond caused the dam to break. The 1,400-page study released in late June, called "Root Cause Analysis," is a compendium of obscure and virtually inscrutable technical language. What is called the "Executive Summary" can be found here.
Suffice to say the price of coal for producing electricity keeps rising. When we turn on a light we subsidize the creation of devastated and polluted landscapes, whether they be mountaintop removal coal mines, or the toxic waste sites created by these hazardous coal ash ponds. And as we burn ever more coal (and oil) to power our modern 24/7/365 society, we keep heating up the planet.
Resources:
Source Watch: Coal Waste
Bill Kovarik: Map of Coal Ash Pond Locations
Wiki Edited by Joe Davis: Coal Ash Ponds
GRIST: EPA Refuses to Reveal Dangerous Coal Ash Waste sites
Knoxville News Sentinel, Scott Barker: Four Factors Led to Fly Ash Spill
EPA List: Fact Sheet: Coal Combustion Residuals (CCR) Surface Impoundments With High Hazard Potential Ratings Downloadable PDF file of the list.
James Bruggers, Louisville Courier Journal, via USA Today: EPA Names Locations of Hazardous Coal-Ash Piles
Nieman Reports, Ken Ward Jr.: Why Are Tennessee Residents Buried in Coal Ash?
EPA: TVA Kingston Fly Ash Release Photo Page
flickr, Dennis Dimick: Panoramic Photo of Mountaintop Coal MIne in West Virginia
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