Utilities Worried Coal Ash Rules Will Force Shutdowns

Date: November 13, 2009

Source: News Room

The electric power industry is warning EPA and the White House that if it classifies coal ash as hazardous waste under the agency's pending first-time coal waste regulatory proposal, some power plants will be forced to shut down because they will not be able to afford the high fees associated with disposing of hazardous materials. EPA is under pressure to regulate coal waste under the Resource Conservation & Recovery Act (RCRA) following the failure of a huge coal ash surface impoundment last December at a Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) facility.

Environmentalists have long pressured EPA to regulate the waste as hazardous and to ban wet disposal in surface impoundments such as the TVA pond that failed. States and industry, however, are lobbying for EPA to issue a non-hazardous classification in order to preserve state enforcement authority over disposal and to protect beneficial reuse of coal ash, which can be recycled into materials such as concrete. EPA is considering several "hybrid" approaches to the rule, including regulating the wet disposal of coal ash in waste ponds as hazardous while regulating dry disposal in landfills as non-hazardous, as well as classifying all coal waste disposal as hazardous while regulating certain beneficial uses as non-hazardous. The industry worries that classifying coal ash as hazardous, even under some conditions, will effectively eliminate recycling which accounts for 40 percent of coal ash generated annually.

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