[R-G] at least 525 million gallons of toxic coal ash into the Tennessee River

[Macdonald Stainsby]

On Mon., Dec. 22, at 1:00 am, a coal slurry impoundment at the Tennessee 
Valley Authority’s Kingston coal fired power plant in Harriman, 
Tennessee spilled at least 525 million gallons of toxic coal ash into 
the Tennessee River and surrounding areas.

We need to make sure that the national news media give this story the 
coverage that it deserves.

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The Kingston spill is over 40 times bigger than the Exxon Valdez spill 
in Alaska, if local news accounts are correct. This is a huge 
environmental disaster of epic proportions; approximately 525 million 
gallons of nasty black coal ash flowed into tributaries of the Tennessee 
River - the water supply for Chattanooga TN and millions of people 
living downstream in Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky.

In Oct. 2000, the Big Branch coal slurry spill dumped 306 million 
gallons of toxic coal slurry down 100 miles of waterways 
(http://www.nrdc.org/onearth/03spr/coal1.asp). An EPA official called it 
"one of the worst environmental disasters in the southeastern United 
States." And this spill is *at least 70% bigger*.

A CT&E Environmental Services analysis of coal slurry from a sample 
taken in Dec. 2001 downstream from the Big Branch disaster found levels 
of lead 400 times higher than the EPA limit, beryllium 160 times the EPA 
limit, etc., etc. Coal contains huge amounts of heavy metals, and when 
coal is burned, the organic matter burns off, but many of the nasty 
chemicals stick around, in higher concentrations. Also, coal is “washed” 
using some really nasty chemicals, which are also left over in coal 
slurry. The bottom line: coal slurry is really, really toxic stuff.

Ironically, on the same day as this massive spill, 39 groups wrote a 
letter to Obama asking that he overturn a pending Bush administration 
federal rule change that would ease regulations on the disposal of coal 
waste (http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08357/936894-100.stm). There’s 
been a campaign for many years against Massey’s Shumate coal sludge 
impoundment in Naoma, WV, which sits 150 feet above the Marsh Fork 
Elementary School, and holds 2.8 billion gallons (a group in West 
Virginia has been collecting pennies in order to save enough money to 
relocate the school (http://www.penniesofpromise.org/)). This disaster 
proves that regulations around coal slurry impoundments need to be 
tightened, not loosened.

But more important than that, this disaster clearly demonstrates what 
we've been saying for years: coal ain’t clean. It’s really, really 
dirty. It’s dirty from cradle to grave. And most of the time, the toxic 
aftermath of the coal industry is hidden in slurry ponds, or pumped into 
abandoned coal mines, and its effects are secondary and very difficult 
to measure. But disasters like this demonstrate what the coal industry 
doesn’t want us to know: there’s no clean way to burn coal.

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Even though this is an environmental disaster of epic proportions, thus 
far the story has gotten only limited national media coverage. We need 
to make sure that the national news media get on this story, that they 
stay on it, and that they hold the coal industry accountable.

There's a lot of reasons that I could speculate about why this is 
happening. One is that it's two days before Christmas - but the Big 
Branch spill in 2000 got very little coverage, too.

Another possible reason is that coal slurry ponds - as well as 
mountaintop removal and other incredibly destructive coal industry 
practices - are located in Appalachia for a reason: because the coal 
industry thinks that nobody cares about Appalachia. Appalachia is the 
poorest region in the country - and the coal industry thinks that that 
gives them a license to turn it into an environmental dumping ground. We 
need to prove them wrong.


Help send a clear message to the coal industry: we've had enough of your 
dirty coal.