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While the board members of the University of Alabama system were meeting at UAB’s Alumni Hall on Thursday, Feb. 2, a coalition of environmental, civic and student organizations gathered across the street to demonstrate opposition to a proposed coal mine along the Shepherd’s Bend portion of the Black Warrior River.
A close view of the growing coal ash mountain in Perry County, Alabama
A new study finds that state regulations for coal ash disposal are inadequate to protect public health and drinking water supplies for nearby communities.
The information comes as federal regulations — the first of their kind — are under attack by a hostile Republican Congress bent on derailing any effort to ensure strong, federally enforceable safeguards for coal ash, America’s second largest industrial waste stream.
Earthjustice and the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment released State of Failure: How states fail to protect our health and drinking water from toxic coal ash, an exhaustive review of state regulations in 37 states, which together comprise over 98 percent of all coal ash generated nationally.
Twelve Worst States Highlighted
The study highlights the lack of state-based regulations for coal ash disposal and points to the 12 worst states when it comes to coal ash management and disposal: Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, South Carolina and Virginia.
The Alabama Environmental Management Commission voted unanimously on Friday to approve a permit issued for the Shepherd Bend coal mine, a 1,773-acre strip mine to be located less than 1,000 feet from Birmingham’s primary drinking water intake.
The Southern Environmental Law Center, representing Black Warrior Riverkeeper, had challenged the permit, issued by the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM), as being unprotective
of water quality in the Mulberry Fork of the Black Warrior River.
In upholding the permit, the EMC disregarded evidence from the Riverkeeper and from the Birmingham Water Works Board and ignored instructions from the judge who was assigned to hear this case.
“We are disappointed that the commission charged with protecting Alabama’s water resources has chosen to rubber-stamp a faulty permit in violation of the Clean Water Act,” said SELC senior attorney Gil Rogers.
Two non-profit environmental groups have asked the Birmingham Metropolitan Planning Organization to remove the Northern Beltline from the proposed four-year funding plan “because of the project’s ballooning price tag, questionable economic benefits and harmful effects on the environment,” according to a press release from the Black Warrior Riverkeeper and the Southern Environmental Law Center.
The group are urging the MPO to invest instead in transportation projects that will bring sustainable economic growth to the region “in the most cost-effective manner possible.” At about $4.7 billion — or $90 million per mile — the Northern Beltline “would rank as one of the most expensive highways ever built in the U.S.,” the groups say. State taxpayers would pay nearly $1 billion of the cost, “almost equal to Alabama Department of Transportation’s statewide construction and maintenance budget for an entire year.”
“Birmingham has just been ranked the number two gas guzzling city in the country,” Sarah Stokes, SELC associate attorney, said in the statement. “Local officials should be pushing the federal and state governments to fund public transit or fix ‘Malfunction Junction’ not build a 52-mile highway far from the city center that will just mean more driving for Birmingham.”
Letter to the Editor
Eva Dillard, staff attorney
Black Warrior Riverkeeper
The stated position of the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, the Alabama Department of Transportation and the Alabama Public Service Commission that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should not classify coal ash as hazardous waste has more to do with the cozy relationship between those regulators and Alabama Power Co. than it does with facts, science or economics.
Alabama Power’s coal-fired steam plants in the Black Warrior watershed are recognized as among the dirtiest in the nation. Of the top 50 U.S. power plant mercury emitters by pounds in 2009, Alabama Power’s Miller Steam Plant ranked fourth and Greene County Steam Plant ranked 49th.
In January 2009, the Institute of Southern Studies compiled a list of the 100 most polluting coal plants in the United States in terms of coal ash stored in surface impoundments. Gorgas Steam Plant ranked seventh, with 2,888,290 pounds, Miller ranked 15th, and Greene County ranked 30th. The very size of these three impoundments suggests any breach or spill could dwarf the size of the catastrophic TVA’s Kingston release into the Emory River.
According to the National Inventory of Dams database, the Gorgas ash pond is rated a “significant hazard;” its failure would lead to a low probability of loss of life but to likely significant environmental and economic damage. The Miller ash pond is rated a “low hazard,” which means its failure would most probably result in damage to affected area property owners.
The Black Warrior River in fall
Pollution caused by coal mining near the Black Warrior River has landed the river on the annual list of America’s Most Endangered Rivers, according to a report issued by the conservation group American Rivers.
“The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has wisely closed this dangerous mining loophole across the Appalachian coal mining region – except for Alabama,” said Gerrit Jobsis, American Rivers’ Southeast Regional Director. “It’s time to give Alabama’s people, clean water, and wildlife the protection they deserve.”
The river and its tributaries are a major drinking water source for Birmingham, Jasper, Cullman and Tuscaloosa and the headwaters include the federally designated Wild and Scenic Sipsey Fork, which, along with the river’s Mulberry and Locust Forks, is rated among the top 2 percent of United States streams by the National Park Service.
Known for fishing, boating, commercial navigation, recreation and wildlife, the river also runs through the Warrior Coal Field where most of Alabama’s coal reserves are found.
In apparent violation of federal law, the Alabama Department of Transportation failed to fully account for the environmental impacts of the massive, high-priced Northern Beltline highway proposed to circle Birmingham, non-profit environmental groups said in a lawsuit filed Monday in federal district court.
The proposed cost of the 52-mile beltline was recently increased to $4.7 billion, a 38 percent hike from the original estimate. Much of the money would come from federal road dollars, but state taxpayers would be responsible for nearly $1 billion in matching funds. At about $90 million per mile, the beltline would be one of the most expensive interstate highways in U.S. history, according to the Black Warrior Riverkeeper.
The group is suing the agency for violating the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires a thorough evaluation of environmental impacts and alternatives in order to identify the most cost-effective and least damaging alternatives for projects funded with federal money.
“We have been waiting for years for ALDOT to do its homework before proceeding as required by federal law,” said Gil Rogers, senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center, which represents the river group in the lawsuit. “Unfortunately, this expensive and outdated highway project continues to move forward without a study of the most cost-effective way to bring economic growth to this part of the state.”
The Alabama Farmers Federation, a.k.a. ALFA Insurance, is working hard to kill Alabama’s Forever Wild Land Trust (Senate Bill 140) in the state Senate, according to a coalition of environmental groups.
The Black Warrior Riverkeeper is asking the public to get involved by contacting their state senators and asking them to support re-authorization of Forever Wild “as-is.”
ALFA has called for a hearing next Thursday morning, March 31, at 8:30 a.m. in Room 807, before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, in Montgomery. “So we need Forever Wild supporters there to show the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee strength in numbers,” Nelson Brooke, the Black Warrior Riverkeeper, said in an e-mail action alert. “Please consider coming to the hearing to show support for Forever Wild.”
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