It happened on a Sunday. A pipe running under a coal basin at the retired Dan River Steam Station, a Duke Energy power plant, broke. Thousands of tons of coal ash were sucked out into the river.
Coal ash – the byproduct of two centuries of burning coal to generate power – continues to roil the U.S. energy sector. Troutman Pepper’s Brian Harms and Brooks Smith discuss the.
The EPA now recognizes the risks of gamma radiation from radium in coal ash, but many states aren’t even sure where the toxic waste has been used. In Alabama, environmental regulators say they do not track so-called ‘beneficial’ uses of coal ash.
Members of the regulated community this year should remain particularly vigilant for heightened enforcement and compliance activity from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA or.