Following news of a ransomware attack on Attorney General Kwame Raoulâs office, Gov. J.B. Pritzker was asked at an unrelated news conference whether citizens should be afraid.
Long-term groundwater monitoring at the plant revealed that concentrations of certain toxic pollutants â including arsenic, boron, sulfate and iron â exceeded the groundwater quality standards outlined in the stateâs administrative code.
The lawsuit, in Vermilion County court, was brought at the request of the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, which found in 2018 the companyâs disposal of coal ash violated the stateâs groundwater quality standards.
The IEPA referred the violation to the state attorney generalâs office in 2019.
Illinois AG sues company for coal ash pollution
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Coal ash dumps along state s only national scenic river to be removed
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Provided / Jeff Lucas
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul is suing the owner of a closed downstate coal plant alleging the site polluted groundwater and is threatening to contaminate the state’s most scenic river with toxic waste.
Raoul is suing Dynegy Midwest Generation, now owned by Texas-based Vistra Corp., for violating multiple state pollution laws by allowing coal ash to leach from containment ponds into groundwater and endanger the Middle Fork of the Vermilion River, the state’s only federally designated National Scenic River.
The civil suit was filed Tuesday in circuit court in Vermilion County more than two years after state environmental officials referred the pollution case. It also seeks a judge’s order to make the company produce an emergency response plan. The plant has been closed for about a decade.