Plant's coal ash pits on Duke's agenda
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on June 24, 2015 1:46 PM
Five coal ash pits near the H.F. Lee Plant in Goldsboro are among the dozens of site across the state slated for excavation, Duke Energy announced Tuesday.
The company announced workers will remove the contents of each pit and relocate the coal ash. The majority of the coal ash being removed from the pits at H.F. Lee and other plants across the state will be moved to Chatham and Lee counties, which have lined structural landfills.
Other coal ash excavation sites include five basins at the Cape Fear Plant in Moncure, one basin at W.H. Weatherspoon Plant in Lumberton and one basin at the Cliffside Steam Station in Mooresboro.
"This is a huge win for anyone that depends on the Neuse River," said Upper Neuse riverkeeper Matthew Starr, who has worked for years to get Duke Energy to close the ash basins at the H.F. Lee Plant, which is near Old Smithfield Road.
Starr emphasized that getting Duke Energy to agree to remove the ash was a grassroots effort led by riverkeepers such as himself, as well as concerned citizens who live near the plants across the state.
"This decision didn't come from any state legislation requiring it, and it didn't come from the Department of Environmental and Natural Resources," Starr said.
The process, Starr said, was not easy.
He said he conducted independent testing on groundwater well sites near the H.F. Lee Plant in June and July of last year, sending his samples to an independent lab in Asheville and discovering illegally high levels of chemicals, such as arsenic and boron, in the water.
"We worked for a number of years on this," Starr said. "We did everything we could to make sure what we did led to the eventual removal of the coal ash."
Tuesday's announcement to excavate 12 additional coal ash pits in the state brings the total number of basins to be excavated to 24. All told, this means the company has committed to cleaning up half of its 14 coal ash dump sites.
"Coal ash stored at the other seven facilities could remain in unlined, leaking pits for decades if the company and state regulators decide that ash removal is not necessary to contain contamination," according to a Waterkeeper Alliance press release.
The Waterkeeper Alliance consists of waterkeepers and riverkeepers from across North Carolina.
"We're very pleased that Duke Energy has now committed to a full cleanup at half of its sites, but we're also disappointed that this $50 billion company isn't making the same commitment for the other seven plants in North Carolina," said Waterkeeper Alliance attorney Peter Harrison. "We're especially concerned that Duke hasn't agreed to remove the coal ash from the Buck plant near Salisbury and the Allen plant near Charlotte, where a recent test found 97 percent of nearby drinking water wells contain dangerous levels of contaminants associated with coal ash."
Duke Energy maintains that it is taking its time to decide the best way to clean up the remaining coal ash pits, although according to a press release from the company, "the remaining 12 basins could be candidates for a broader range of closure options, including an approach that consolidates the ash on site, caps it with durable and impermeable liner and protects groundwater."
A state law passed last year requires the company to close four high-priority sites by 2019 and all of them by 2029. No timeline for the coal ash pit excavations announced on Tuesday was released.
"We're making strong progress to protect groundwater and close ash basins, delivering on our commitment to safe, sustainable, long-term solutions," Duke Energy President and Chief Executive Officer Lynn Good said. "A blue ribbon national advisory board and independent engineers, scientists and dedicated teams at Duke Energy are spending thousands of hours studying data, building enhanced groundwater and surface water protection programs and identifying closure options that protect people and the environment in a cost-effective manner."