Category — Selenium

Over at West Virginia Public Broadcasting, Erica Peterson had an interesting story this week that debunked the persistent coal industry line that selenium pollution from mountaintop removal mines doesn’t matter because regulators allow more of it in drinking water than they do in mine runoff.

Erica quoted Dennis Lemly, the leading scientist on selenium water pollution, explaining that:

As far as the actual drinking water, the concentrations that are well below the drinking water standard can still cause problems to the fish and wildlife.

Regular Coal Tattoo readers know that Lemly has already warned that selenium pollution from Patriot Coal’s Hobet 21 complex along the Boone-Lincoln County border has pushed the Mud River watershed to the “brink of a major toxic event,”  with high levels of selenium linked to deformed fish.

But the word this week is that the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection is moving to again give Patriot’s Hobet Mining subsidiary more time to fix its selenium violations and comply with state water quality limits.

Yesterday, WVDEP issued this notice, announcing that it was proposing to rewrite a settlement agreement with Hobet to extend the deadline for it to comply with those limits another two years — from April 2010 until July 2012.

[Read more →]

Here in West Virginia, a leading scientist has warned state regulators that selenium pollution from mountaintop removal mining has pushed the Mud River watershed to “the brink of a major toxic event.”

West Virginia regulators have generally bent over backwards to help the coal industry avoid having to reduce this pollution and eliminate selenium violations. But earlier this year, when lawmakers passed a bill giving coal operators three more years to comply, even the state Department of Environmental Protection thought it was going too far.

Now, evidence has surfaced that there are growing selenium problems in the coalfields over in Kentucky — and allegations that regulators there sat on the information until they got a new, industry-wide general permit approved without selenium limits or comprehensive selenium monitoring.

Environmental groups today are releasing the results of the  water monitoring and fish tissue sampling that shows violations of the state’s water quality standard for selenium and of the level of selenium experts consider safe in fish.

Some of the sampling was done in September 2007, but was not made public until recently — and not until after July, when Kentucky re-issued its “general permit” that covers water pollution discharges from coal mining operations.

Margaret Janes, a researcher with the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment, had been trying for two years to get the information — and could not get it in time to submit comments about it during the review permit for that general permit:

The state of Kentucky inappropriately withheld information requested through the Freedom of Information Act. No one should have to wait nearly two years to find out what dangerous toxins are in their fish and their water.

[Read more →]

Coal Tattoo readers have followed the ongoing controversy over efforts by West Virginia’s coal industry to further delay compliance with water quality limits for toxic selenium pollution from coal-fired power plants. (See previous posts here,  here, here, and here).

Now, federal regulators are focusing in on selenium discharges from coal-fired power plant waste dumps, as part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s broader examination of coal ash, prompted in large part by the December disaster at a TVA ash impoundment in East Tennessee.

Juliet Eilperin reported on this in Sunday’s Washington Post. According to her story:

Faced with new evidence that utilities across the country are dumping toxic sludge into waterways, the Environmental Protection Agency is moving to impose new restrictions on the level of contaminants power plants can discharge.

Plants in Florida, Pennsylvania and several other states have flushed wastewater with levels of selenium and other toxins that far exceed the EPA’s freshwater and saltwater standards aimed at protecting aquatic life, according to data the agency has collected over the past few years. While selenium can be beneficial in tiny amounts, elevated levels damage not only fish but also birds and people who consume contaminated fish.

But the reason more selenium and metals such as arsenic are now entering U.S. waterways is because the federal government has pressed utilities to install pollution-control “scrubbing” technology that captures contaminants headed for smokestacks and stores them as coal ash or sludge. The EPA estimates that these two types of coal combustion residue — often kept in outdoor pools or flushed into nearby rivers and streams — amount to roughly 130,000 tons per year and will climb to an estimated 175,000 tons by 2015.

[Read more →]

With a court-ordered deadline of June 30 fast approaching, Apogee Coal Co. has agreed to spend at least $350,000 to test technology that environmental groups say will cure repeated violations of selenium pollution limits at the company’s sprawling mountaintop removal operations along the Boone-Lincoln County line.

Apogee, a Patriot Coal subsidiary, will also pay a $50,000 civil penalty to the federal government, as a result of a citizen suit brought against the company by the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition and the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy.

[Read more →]

As I’ve tried to report on what President Obama may or may not do about mountaintop removal, I’ve been thinking a lot about the mitigation bill.

Remember the mitigation bill? Those of you who haven’t been following mountaintop removal since the late 1990s probably don’t. But I sure do . And I would have thought the coal industry and its friends in the West Virginia Legislature would remember it, too.

The reason? I’m wondering if this new bill to give the coal industry yet more time to comply with water quality regulations for toxic selenium pollution might be the new mitigation bill.

By pushing for yet another way around environmental regulations, coal industry lobbyists might just be giving Obama administration officials (and citizen groups as well) a nice place to hang their hats if they’re looking to crack down on large-scale strip mining and valley fills.

[Read more →]

West Virginia lawmakers seem intent on helping the coal industry continue to stall compliance with water quality standards for toxic selenium pollution. They’re moving forward with a bill that even Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Randy Huffman doesn’t support.

Erica Peterson of West Virginia Public Broadcasting reports that a Senate committee approved the bill (SB461)  yesterday, despite the lack of DEP support and strong opposition from the West Virginia Environmental Council.

Here’s the video:

As I reported last week, the bill would give anyone holding a water pollution permit from the state Department of Environmental Protection — in this instance, coal companies — until July 1, 2012, to comply with water quality limits for selenium.

Recall that the coal industry and West Virginia regulators have been scrambling to find ways to avoid complying with these standards for years, since federal studies found dangerous levels of selenium runoff from mountaintop removal mines in Southern West Virginia.  A federal judge and the state Environmental Quality Board have both found that the industry has been stalling its efforts to stop selenium violations. (Also see Stalling on selenium?)

[Read more →]

A bill introduced late this week in the West Virginia Legislature would give the coal industry more time — again – to comply with water quality limits for toxic selenium pollution.

Senate Bill 461 has 20 sponsors, including Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin, D-Logan, and Energy, Industry and Mining Chairman Mike Green, D-Raleigh (who lists membership in Friends of Coal on his official biography, see photo at right).  After the bill was introduced on Thursday, it was referred to Green’s committee. Passage seems likely, since nine of the committee’s 13 members are sponsors of the bill.

The bill would give anyone holding a water pollution permit from the state Department of Environmental Protection — in this instance, coal companies — until July 1, 2012, to comply with water quality limits for selenium.

Recall that the coal industry and West Virginia regulators have been scrambling to find ways to avoid complying with these standards for years, since federal studies found dangerous levels of selenium runoff from mountaintop removal mines in Southern West Virginia.  A federal judge and the state Environmental Quality Board have both found that the industry has been stalling its efforts to stop selenium violations. (Also see Stalling on selenium?)

It’s also important to remember that the nation’s top expert on selenium pollution’s impacts on aquatic life, Dennis Lemly,  has warned that at least one West Virginia watershed, the Mud River, is “on the brink of a major toxic event” because of selenium pollution:

If waterborne selenium concentrations are not reduced, reproductive toxicity will spiral out of control and fish populations will collapse.

And thanks to Leon, whose comment on Coal Tattoo brought this bill to my attention.

In early December, U.S. District Judge Robert C. Chambers declined to hold Apogee Coal Co. in contempt of court for continuing to stall the cleanup of selenium pollution from a mountaintop removal mine in Logan County. But Chambers indicated he was running out of patience with the Patriot Coal subsidiary, and would hold Apogee officials to a June 30, 2009, compliance deadline.

Recall that federal officials have found widespread selenium violations downstream from mountaintop removal operations, and the nation’s leading scientist of the issue warns that at least one West Virginia waterway is on the “brink of a major toxic event” because of selenium violations.

Earlier this month, Apogee lawyers filed a monthly report with Chambers, and told the judge the company was “attempting to comply in good faith” with the court’s deadlines.

But now, internal company documents filed in the case indicate Apogee has been, in effect, keeping two sets of books.

Apogee has been giving Chambers one calendar, showing that it will meet the court’s deadlines.  At the same time, the company’s consultants have been keeping a “realistic schedule” that delays compliance until at least September — three months after the court’s deadline.