MARCH 18, 2015
The abandoned
Cherokee Clay and Brick Mine in Lee County, N.C., may become a landfill for
coal ash.
When utility
companies burn coal to make electricity — and it generated 39 percent of U.S.
energy in 2013 — it leaves behind ash that can contain arsenic, selenium, boron
and many other toxic substances.
For decades, that
ash simply has been buried in pits near the power plants and covered with
water. Now, in North Carolina, it's become a multibillion dollar problem. After
a massive spill into the Dan River last year,
the state ordered Duke Energy to clean up more than 100 million tons of stored
coal ash, and the company has drawn up a plan that involves transporting it to
two abandoned clay mines in Lee County.
Local residents in
Lee County are protesting the plan to put a coal-ash landfill in their
community.
But the local
community and some environmental activists are fighting that proposal.
Lynn Petty, a
retired postal worker here, trudges through knee-high grass surrounding the Mt.
Calvary Baptist Church in Sanford, about 40 miles southeast of Raleigh. Behind
the modest brick sanctuary, his ancestors are buried in the Carolina clay.
"Water comes
down to here, won't soak in, makes a hole," Petty says. "Look, see
what I'm saying — my daddy is buried right there, so I'm always here. I know
this."
The nonabsorbent
quality of the clay in the area is one reason Duke Energy and its contractor
bought the Cherokee Clay and Brick mine across the road, and another in the
next county over.
The plan is to dig
up about 10 million tons of coal ash at 14 of the most critical sites across
the state and bring it here on trucks and rail cars to a dry, lined landfill.
The clay, they say, adds another layer of protection against leaks.
Petty just inherited
30 acres within sight of the mine, and he's afraid the coal-ash means he will
never get to pass the land to his children.
"To me it's a
socioeconomic discrimination at the highest, because they brought all of this
in, dumped it on a poor, black neighborhood, when you got the governor and all
these people staying in these big homes in cities like Raleigh and
Charlotte," he says. "But they bring it here to a little poor country
place like this and dump it on us."
Duke Energy is the
largest electric utility company in the country. After the spill last year that
coated 70 miles of the Dan River in coal-ash slurry, the North Carolina General
Assembly passed a first-ever statewide law requiring a coal-ash cleanup effort.
That will start with identifying the most dangerous sites and devising long-term
storage plans.
Amy Adams, North
Carolina campaign coordinator with Appalachian Voices, shows her hand covered
with wet coal ash taken from the Dan River, which swirls in the background in
February 2014. The Duke Energy spill coated 70 miles of the river with toxic
sludge containing arsenic, selenium, and boron.
Gerry Broome/AP
Jeff Brooks, a
spokesman with Duke Energy, says the two abandoned clay mines are crucial to
that.
"We've only got
five years to move these high-priority sites, completely close these sites, and
so we have to begin to move ash now," Brooks says. "If we don't start
with real applications that are available today, we'll never make that
timeline."
Grassroots
environmental groups and local residents are fighting back, saying the coal ash
will harm drinking water, real estate values and economic development. They
have held rallies and put pressure on local elected officials to file a
lawsuit.
"You know Duke
is smart — they got a lot of engineers that work for them," says Therese
Vick of the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League.
"This is a cheap and dirty, almost old-fashioned, solution. And you're
just moving a problem from one place to the other."
But that opinion is
not universal among environmental groups. Frank Holleman, a senior attorney
with the Southern Environmental Law Center, is no friend to Duke Energy — he
sued the utility and the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural
Resources over coal ash. But he says the company's solution is better than the
status quo.
"An old mine
site which has already been disturbed could be a good place, and clay, water
goes through it less easily than regular soil, so it can be even an extra
protection," he says. "So that kind of approach can be a good
approach."
Mark Bishopric, a
managing partner of Three Rivers Outfitters, paddles past the Duke Energy Dan
River Steam Station in February 2014. Tens of thousands of tons of coal ash
leaked into the river from a retaining pond below the steam station.John D. Simmons/MCT
/Landov
Holleman says speed
is the key, because leaving the coal ash in place isn't an option. By Duke
Energy's own estimates, about 3 million gallons a day of tainted water seeps
out of coal ash pits and into the state's rivers, lakes, and drinking water.
"In effect
we're having a spill every day in North Carolina," Holleman says.
"All 14 of these sites are leaking — some of them staggeringly."
Duke Energy says it
could start moving coal ash 60 days after the permits are approved by the
state.
Source: http://www.npr.org