coal ash

Citing a mounting compliance crunch in America’s coal-fired power sector, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has finalized new rules extending key deadlines for coal ash cleanup and management, while floating the prospect of a further 12-month delay. The changes address calls from utilities, engineering contractors, and state regulators for more realistic timeframes to assess, […]

As government policies around energy transition continue to evolve, the pace of coal plant retirements in North America has shifted in some regions, slowing in a few cases due to energy reliability concerns. But broadly speaking, many coal-fired units have already retired, leaving behind a significant legacy challenge: the long-term management of coal ash stored […]

On Dec. 22, 2008, a major dike failure occurred on the north slopes of the ash pond at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA’s) Kingston Fossil Plant. The failure resulted in the release of approximately 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash spilling onto adjacent land and into the Emory River. The Kingston spill is considered […]

The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., on June 28 blocked the coal power industry’s attempt to get out of the requirement that they prevent toxic coal ash from contaminating groundwater. The court affirmed that the EPA regulations established in 2015 already prohibit closing coal ash dumps with ash sitting in groundwater. Industry filed […]

In an unprecedented move, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on April 25 simultaneously finalized four major environmental rules covering greenhouse gases (GHG), air toxics, wastewater discharges, and coal combustion residuals from fossil fuel-fired power plants. Among the rules is the EPA’s final Carbon Pollution Standards, which marks the agency’s third attempt to broadly curb […]

Have you heard about the cobra effect? During the colonial era, Delhi had a major cobra issue. The then-British government announced a bounty for dead cobras to reduce the number of snakes on the streets. Entrepreneurial spirits rose as people started breeding cobras and offered a dead one on the bounty. Money given on bounty […]

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in May of this year issued a proposed rule that would greatly expand the scope of federal regulations governing the management of coal combustion residuals, or

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed barring six coal-fired power plants in various states—a combined 11 GW—from disposing coal ash into unlined surface impoundments. The agency, however, also proposed to provide disposal extensions if the coal plants are needed to maintain grid reliability. The EPA’s proposed determinations, issued on Jan. 25, fall under its […]

The Biden administration has rolled out in a final what it says is a “durable” definition of “waters of the U.S.” (WOTUS), potentially capping a legal and political battle that has raged for nearly two decades. The final rule issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of the Army on […]

Coal ash, or coal combustion residuals (CCRs), is the second-largest waste material in the U.S., just behind household garbage. The safe and sustainable management of coal ash poses one of the most complex