2010.11.17 Press Release
Consumers Energy's Weak Response Shows Coal Ash Rules Vital as Public Comment Ends Friday
CLEAN ENERGY NOW
For Immediate Release: Contact:
Wednesday, November 17, 2010 Tiffany Hartung: 248.933.2451
Consumers Energy’s Weak Response Shows Coal Ash Rules Vital as Public Comment Ends Friday
LANSING – Citizens groups today called on the Environment Protection Agency to implement strong coal ash rules and urged people to voice their concerns to the EPA before the public comments period ends Friday. The call comes after Consumers Energy recently released a superficial report on how it handles coal ash, following a demand by Consumers Energy’s own shareholders for more accountability on coal ash disposal.
“Consumers Energy continues to turn a blind eye to its coal ash problem, which puts people’s health and lives at risk,” said Susan Harley, Clean Water Action “This is another example that polluters cannot be trusted to police their own pollution, just as we cannot trust the fox to watch the henhouse. The status quo is unacceptable, and it’s time the EPA begin treating coal ash like the dangerous, toxic substance that it is.”
Coal ash is a concentrated toxic byproduct of burning coal and is a growing problem in Michigan and across the nation. EPA and National Academy of Sciences research shows that coal ash is toxic; confirming that coal ash threatens human health. Studies have shown that these coal ash sites are so toxic that they can increase cancer risk to a staggering 1 in 50.
“Consumers Energy is not coming clean with the public,” said Terry Miller, Lone Tree Council. “They have had to be pushed and prodded by the state to take actions to prevent their arsenic from getting into Saginaw Bay. They have failed to identify the toxics in their ash and opposed federal rules identifying ash as hazardous. They have sought and gotten special exemptions from the state for handling their waste. And the public is supposed to trust them to properly handle this toxic material of which 600,000 tons are produced each year? We’ll trust them when they’re held accountable by the federal government and we see a cleaner Saginaw Bay.”
Consumers Energy has two landfills on Saginaw Bay: a 292-acre site and a 172-acre site. These landfills contain bottom ash and fly ash from decades of coal burning on the mouth of the Saginaw River. The ash was converted to slurry and piped to the landfills. Historically the landfills were unlined and the utility failed to create a barrier between bay water and groundwater from the sites. The utility received several variances to allow creation of these landfills in coastal marshes and state bottom lands.
Consumers Energy violated state law when it failed to monitor hazardous coal ash at its two landfills in the Saginaw-Bay area and report leaks that potentially endangered people.
“Once again, polluters like Consumers Energy have demonstrated that it puts profits ahead of people,” said Tiffany Hartung, Sierra Club. “Coal ash is a clear danger to people. Consumers Energy has turned its back on the people of Michigan and its own shareholders, and that’s why we need the EPA to step in and make sure polluters don’t whitewash their records.”
Michigan coal plants generate over 2.1 million tons of coal ash annually. The bulk of that coal ash is handled onsite in temporary holding facilities and then transferred to low-hazardous industrial waste sites or municipal solid waste landfills. Some of the waste is recycled safely, but Michigan allows ash to be used as filler for road construction or land reclamation without protections from leakage into the groundwater.
According to Department of Natural Resources and Environment documents, currently there are fifteen coal ash facilities in Michigan, of which nine are currently accepting waste and six are closed. Several of the closed landfills have pollution remediation plans because they were found to be leaking contaminants. However, there are also an unknown number of coal ash sites that predate Michigan landfill rules; some have been found to be leaking contaminants into our soil and water.
In most cases, the public is unaware of where these coal ash landfills are located. Community members are left in the dark about the risk to their health and the environment when coal ash disposal sites have been found to be leaking.
Storage capacity data are missing for most of the ponds, but the largest unit for which there is data – the fly ash pond at the Monroe Power Station – can store up to 16 million cubic yards of coal ash.
The Consumers Energy report on how it handles coal ash can be seen at: http://www.consumersenergy.com/content.aspx?id=3254. The report did not discuss how best to deal with the coal ash byproducts that result from the utility’s dirty coal plants and instead, advocates for maintaining weak coal ash regulations.
--###--