ADEM should follow lead of others in Southeast

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

by Diane Thomas

Republished with permission from and originally published in Lagniappe

The 597-acre Plant Barry coal ash pond sits in an oxbow of the Mobile River. Over 50 years, more than 21 million cubic yards of coal residual has been disposed of in the pond. Courtesy Mobile Baykeeper

To the editor:

In his commentary of October 23, 2023, Director Lance LeFleur of the Alabama

Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) states that the goal of Alabama’s

rules on the closure of coal ash ponds “is to provide guidelines so the ponds no longer

pose the threat of a spill and to prevent or reduce groundwater impacts due to

contaminants that leach from the sites.”

Data from Alabama Power’s own website disproves the second of Director LeFleur’s

statements about his agency’s efforts to protect our water resources from

groundwater pollution by the coal ash. In 2018, ADEM fined Alabama Power $250,000

for releases of the toxic heavy metals arsenic and cobalt into groundwater at Plant

Barry. Four years later in 2022, groundwater monitoring data at Plant Barry provided by Alabama Power showed continued discharge of the same heavy metals into the

groundwater. This pollution has likely been ongoing for decades and we only know

about it now because of federally required monitoring. Not only has ADEM done

nothing to prevent or stop further pollution at Plant Barry but they have given

Alabama Power permits that allow this pollution to continue.

Furthermore, the ash pond is unlined and sits in a depression below ground level.

ADEM has permitted Alabama Power’s plan to leave the dewatered and consolidated

CCR material in this unlined pond still close to the western bank of the Mobile River.

A cap will be placed over the top to prevent rainwater from entering the pond but

water will still infiltrate from the sides and the bottom ensuring that contaminants

will continue to pollute for many, many years.

Under the federal coal ash rule, coal ash ponds cannot be closed if, once closure is

complete, the coal ash continues to be saturated by water. So far the permits ADEM

has issued at Plant Barry and elsewhere allow utilities to leave their coal ash in

contact with groundwater guaranteeing the pollution will continue for decades to

come. This is a major reason EPA is right in proposing to deny ADEM’s state

permitting program. Director LeFleur is flat wrong when he says, “EPA has stated the

ADEM rule meets all the federal requirements and is at least as protective as the

federal rule.”

With regard to Director LeFleur’s statement that ADEM’s permit for closure would

ensure that the Plant Barry ash pond would no longer pose a threat of a spill, there is

no data to support this conclusion. In fact, failures of dirt dams such as the one at

Plant Barry have occurred in Tennessee and North Carolina resulting in tragic coal ash

pollution at those sites. By allowing Alabama Power to store 21 million tons of ash in

an unlined pond within the Mobile River’s floodplain, ADEM has failed to mitigate the

risk of a spill here. A hurricane or river flooding in the delta could breach the dirt dike

and release the ash into the delta, down the rivers and into Mobile Bay.

Director LeFleur says that his agency wants to protect our land and water but he does not tell you that Georgia Power, sister company to Alabama Power, has determined

that the only way to protect their coastal waterways is to dig up 65 million tons of coal

ash, recycling it into concrete or relocating it to modern lined landfills thus sealing it

away forever. In fact, major electric utilities in North Carolina, South Carolina,

Virginia and Tennessee have all determined that removal of coal ash from unlined

ponds next to bodies of water is the only environmentally sound method to protect

the health and welfare of their citizens. These southeastern neighbors are removing

more than 250 million tons of coal ash to protect their citizens and waterways. Alabama Power is an outlier in failing to remove coal ash from any of its nine statewide ponds.

If ADEM truly wants to do what is best for the citizens of Alabama and not for the

bottom line of Alabama Power, they will follow the lead of other states, agencies and

electric utilities in the Southeast and deny Alabama Power’s “cap in place” and pollute

forever closure plans.

Diane Thomas

Coal Ash Action Group