Reports says N.C. coal ash disposal needs more oversight, and state official agrees

A new report from the North Carolina Sierra Club says the state mostly ignores the threat of coal ash to water supplies and needs to adopt new guidelines to address the problem. At least initially, the state agrees, Bruce Henderson of McClatchy Newspapers reports. The report focused on coal ash's popular re-use as so-called structural fill, the fact that sites using ash as fill don't have to be lined to keep toxic material out of groundwater, and the frequent failure to note on property deeds that ash has been dumped, as state law requires.

"Wherever the state has looked, there have been problems for the most part," Molly Diggins, the Sierra Club's state director, told Henderson. "The data is thin because there are no regular inspections or reporting. It's hard to get a full understanding when you don't have a full perspective of potential problems." The report does note state scrutiny has increased in recent months with violations found at 28 of the 48 sites inspected, most of which cited a lack of vegetation or soil to cover the ash, Henderson writes.

Paul Crissman, chief of the state's solid waste section, told Henderson the state has noticed the need for more oversight since it first began finding violations in the mid-1990s. "It led to our being convinced that the Sierra Club is correct and that we need to make new regulations," he said. When asked what regulations he thought were needed, Crissman said the Sierra Club's recommendations that ash be dumped only in lined landfills, groundwater monitoring be required at disposal sites, and developers held accountable for contamination clean-ups, "look pretty good." (Read more)