Study, kept secret for years, shows cancer risk from coal ash; where's your closest impoundment?

A 2002 Environmental Protection Agency study showing the cancer risks of living near coal-ash disposal sites was released only this year. The study, brought to light by the Environmental Integrity Project and Earthjustice, showed that up to one of every 50 residents near coal-ash ponds could get cancer due to arsenic leaking into drinking water.

The study looked at 210 lagoons, impoundments or landfills in 34 states, but found that there may be twice as many coal-ash sites as EPA data show, that the pollution from the sites could last 100 years, and that lead and other pollutants found in the waste could cause additional health problems.

"The highest risk is for people who live near ash ponds with no liners and who get their water from wells," reports Renee Schoof of McClatchy Newspapers. "Although the health information mainly came from an EPA study released in August 2007," she writes, "the information was largely neglected and was too technical for most people to understand, the groups said." (Read more)

The study was quietly posted on the EPA Web site in March, Ken Ward Jr. of The Charleston Gazette reports on his Coal Tattoo blog. "The 2002 report reveals some incredible new findings about risks to aquatic ecosystems and wildlife," Ward writes. "According to EPA data, ash ponds are predicted to leak boron into surface waters at concentrations 2,000 times higher than what is safe for aquatic life. And, EPA data also shows levels of arsenic and selenium will be 10 times higher than what is safe." (Read more; read the report)

"In an interview with the Iowa Independent in March, [the State of Iowa's] lead staffer on coal ash issues said because there are currently no monitoring wells at these disposal sites to ensure groundwater is not being contaminated, he cannot say definitively that some sort of contamination isn’t taking place," Jason Hancock reports in the Indepenedent, which published this Plains Justice photo of an old Waterloo quarry being used as a coal-ash dump.

The Lexington Herald-Leader's story located six coal-ash impoundments in Kentucky that the study named most hazardous. (Read more; see the list of impoundments studied)