Jay Dee's Post

by Stephanie Pistello, Ben Evans, and Jeff Biggers, co-founders of the Coal Free Future Project. In the wake of the worst coal mining disaster in 40 years, compromise and political machinations this spring have resulted in a regulatory crisis of failure; workplace safety in the mines, including the black lung scandal, has emerged as a [...]

While President Obama addresses the US Congress in his historic State of the Union tonight, our nation will sit back and burn an estimated 115,000 tons of coal. Close to 250,000 tons of CO2 will be released from coal-fired plants during the hourlong presentation; hundreds of pounds of toxic mercury emissions will enter our air, [...]

Perched on 60-foot-high platforms in tulip poplar and oak trees, three nonviolent tree-sitting protestors associated with Climate Ground Zero and Mountain Justice carried out the duty of the EPA and the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection this morning–they reportedly shut down the reckless mountaintop removal blasting at the controversial Bee Tree Strip Mine on [...]

by Ken Ward Jr. A year ago next Tuesday, at about 1 a.m., a coal-ash dike ruptured at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Kingston Plant near the junction of the Emory and Clinch rivers in East Tennessee. An estimated 1 billion gallons of toxic coal ash spilled into nearby streams, fields and homes.  The disaster revealed [...]

EPA releases reports on AEP coal-ash dam in W.Va. by Ken Ward Jr. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials have finally made public the contractor’s report upon which they based their decision to require additional testing and warn the public about possible structural problems at two American Electric Power coal-ash dams in Mason County, W.Va. The [...]

by Ken Ward Jr. There’s an incredible story out today in the Miami Herald about the boy pictured above, and other residents of a small Dominican Republic town where toxic coal ash was dumped. Here’s the lead, by reporter Frances Robles: ARROYO BARRIL, Dominican Republic — Maximiliano Calcaño is 2 and was born with no [...]

by Ken Ward Jr. In May, Coal Tattoo covered the release of a once-secret U.S. EPA report that examined the risks of living near a coal-fired power plant ash dump. I wrote at the time: Every year, coal-fired power plants dump nearly 100 million tons of various wastes — fly ash, bottom ash, and scrubber [...]

Earlier today, the U.S. Governmental Accountability Office issued a new report updating Congress on efforts by the Environmental Protection Agency to start regulating the handling and disposal of toxic ash from coal-fired power plants. The report is available on the GAO Web site, and here’s a brief summary of the findings: – The exact number [...]

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has issued a big new report on the dangers posed by disposal of toxic ash from coal-fired power plants and other water pollution issues surrounding these plants. Among the conclusions: An increasing amount of evidence indicates that the characteristics of coal combustion wastewater have the potential to impact human health [...]