The Coal Ash Rule: How the EPA's Recent Ruling Will Affect the Way Plants Manage CCRs

摘要

Last December, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published its final ruling for the regulation of coal combustion residuals (CCRs). Commonly referred to as the "coal ash rule", the new policies have largely been met with acceptance, even relief, with many industry representatives calling the ruling a fair compromise. The final CCR ruling follows six years of debate about how best to handle a potentially perilous situation. In the early morning hours of Dec. 22, 2008, a structurally deficient dike containing an 84-acre unlined surface impoundment at the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) Kingston Fossil Plant near Harriman, Tenn. gave way, spilling 1.1 billion gallons of coal ash slurry into the Emory and Clinch rivers. The accident was the largest fly ash disaster in United States history, larger in volume than the 1989 Exxon Valdez or 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spills. It flooded 300 acres of land with up to six feet of solid waste sludge, toppling trees, damaging or destroying dozens of homes, but injuring no one. The disaster destroyed power, water, gas, and rail lines, and killed large numbers of fish and other wildlife.