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US environmental activists express concerns With coal ash regulations

Local environmentalists got together Sunday to inform the public of their concerns with the EPA’s recently released coal ash regulations.

Coal ash is the waste material left over from the burning of coal and is the second largest waste product in the country behind household trash.

The EPA released its regulations in December, issuing several guidelines for how coal ash landfills should be operated. However, the agency stopped short of calling the material hazardous waste.

Judy Dasovich, a member of the White River Group of the Missouri Sierra Club, said coal ash contains chemicals the public should be concerned about.

"There are many but most people are aware that mercury, arsenic and lead let alone boron, chromium several others cause neurological problems, kidney disease, heart disease and cancers," Dasovich said.

Dasovich’s group brought in other activists and documentary filmmakers to talk about the good and bad of the EPA regulations at the Moxie Cinema. The event was part of a “Coal Ash Stories” tour organized by Missouri Sierra Club activists from across the state.

Activists are glad the EPA laid out some rules for how landfills should operate.

"The language that had a 2-foot separation between the liner below the waste and the water table increased to five feet, so that's much more protective," said Patricia Schuba of the Labadie Environmental Organization.

But as for the bad, a filmmaker learned the EPA’s decision not to classify coal ash as hazardous left enforcement up to the states and citizens.

"If they don't like it, if they want to force their state to do something about it they have to speak up and they have to sue and basically force their state to do something about it," said Rhiannon Fionn, the filmmaker of “Coal Ash Chronicles.”

In Springfield, City Utilities has plans to expand one of its coal ash landfills at John Twitty Energy Center.

In 2013, the Missouri legislature passed a bill allowing CU to skip a preliminary state inspection in order to move on to the next step, a detailed inspection, which worries environmentalists.

"The biggest thing I learned while traveling the country collecting coal ash stories is that industry and regulators are way too close," Fionn said.

"I mean they bypassed DNR (Department of Natural Resources) once it’s obvious they could probably do it again," Dasovich said.

Environmentalists say the public needs to tell DNR to enforce the EPA rules.

"There's a lot of great information in there that took scientists a lot of time to develop,” Schuba said. “And our goal is to have DNR adopt that in this state and provide those protections for every Missourian so we don't have to worry about the water we're drinking and the air we're breathing."

In the past CU has failed to pass the DNR’s preliminary site investigations so there's no guarantee its plan to expand one of its coal ash landfills will get state approval.

The environmentalists told KOLR10 they understand the waste needs to go somewhere, but prefer it goes in a spot away from water and people.

source: http://www.ozarksfirst.com