90% of U.S. Coal Plants Are Contaminating Groundwater, Report Finds

More than 90 percent of the body politic ’s ember plant life are contaminate water across 43 states , according to anew report . And nearly one-half of them have no plans to clean house up the mess .

The sketch , give up on Thursday by the environmental watchdogs Earthjustice and the Environmental Integrity Project , looked at 292 web site around the nation , from the desert outside Las Vegas to the coast of Massachusetts . The researchers focused specifically on coal ash , a toxic by-product of burn off ember to produce power .

unsuccessful person to clean up coal ash violatesa federal rulethat was passed in 2015 after a stormwater piping salvo at the Duke Energy Dan River Steam Station in North Carolina , spilling39,000 oodles of the contamination into the Dan River . Coal ash hold malignant neoplastic disease - induce heavy metals such as arsenic and cobalt . According to the Environmental Protection Agency , toxic sludge from the spill stretchedover 70 milesdownstream , threatening the drinking body of water quality of yard of residents .

In this Jan. 14, 2016 file photo, a drainage pipe that was the original culprit of a coal ash spill that was one of the worst in U.S. history is seen at the Dan River Steam Station in Eden, N.C.

In this Jan. 14, 2016 file photo, a drainage pipe that was the original culprit of a coal ash spill that was one of the worst in U.S. history is seen at the Dan River Steam Station in Eden, N.C.Photo: Gerry Broome (AP)

One of the destination of the 2015 rule was to halt the industry ’s practice of dumping ember ash into unlined ponds that tolerate the textile to ooze into groundwater , creating an environmental risk for nearby community , and most companies are now required to send their wastefulness to safer containment sites . However , the report found that utilities are fail to abide by other view of the federal rule , such as houseclean up contaminate web site and restoring groundwater .

“ We know that the contaminant of groundwater at these ember plant will get worse if nothing is done to control the source of pollution,”saidAbel Russ , senior lawyer at the Environmental Integrity Project and Centennial State - author of the report , in a press release . “ We have an opportunity to cleanse these sites up before they create a much larger problem . If the industry would but follow the rules , we could make significant progress . ”

The authors ranked the most contaminated sites in the country using information that power companies were required to make useable as a solvent of the 2015 rule . At the top of the list are the San Miguel Plant , just in the south of San Antonio , Texas and the Reid Gardner Generating Station , locate on the Moapa Indian Reservation in southern Nevada . At both sites , the report advert failures to properly supervise and remove contamination .

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Mike Nasi , the environmental counsel for the San Miguel plant life , characterized the report ’s methodological analysis as flawed and enunciate that the fellowship is sour closely with regulator on reclamation movement . Jennifer Schuricht , a spokesperson for the Reid Gardner Generating Station also refuted the report , say that it is dismissive of the society ’s clean up efforts , which include the remotion of more than 2 million cubic thousand of toxic waste .

Contamination from coal ash is n’t distributed equally across the country . According to the report , roughly 70 percent of decommissioning world power flora with coal ash tree ponds are located in low - income neighborhoods or absolute majority non - lily-white nose count tracts . To help oneself extenuate the public health risks in these orbit , the report authors originate a set of recommendations , include dependable Union inadvertence and enforceable cleanup schedules . Without these gradation , they warn , these communities will have to survive the foresightful - term effect of coal ash contaminant .

“ This report chronicle the uncollectible organized religion of bighearted coal in America that has create public and environmental wellness problems that will take generations to clean house up in some cases , ” said Fred Tutman , beginner of the Patuxent Riverkeeper in Maryland . “ It ’s an ugly account and people want to take regard . ”

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