With 92% of Coal Ash Still Coating North Carolina River Bed, Duke Energy Declares Cleanup Complete

[G_j]

http://www.newsweek.com/92-coal-ash-still-coating-north-carolina-river-duke-energy-declares-cleanup-260084

By Zoë Schlanger
Filed: 7/21/14 at 11:49 AM

Last February, around 39,000 tons of toxic coal slurry gushed into a major North Carolina river. Now, having cleaned up around 3,000 tons worth, the company behind the spill and state regulators say their work is done.

With 92 percent of the original heavy metal-laden and possibly radioactive coal ash still coating 70 miles of river bottom, river advocates are frustrated.

“This stuff is not just going to go to the bottom and stay there and not harm the environment,” Brian Williams of the Dan River Basin Association told the Charlotte Observer. “It will be an issue for many, many years to come.”

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Most of the coal ash is now buried under a layer of sediment. But river advocates and scientists say that doesn’t mean it will always stay there. Under certain circumnstances, like major storm or during warmer weather, metals covered by sediment can be re-released into the water column, be eaten by organisms, and work their way up the food chain.

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Arsenic is among the contaminants of concern from the Duke Energy spill; a few weeks after the original coal ash pond collapsed, causing the release into the river, regulators released video of another Duke Energy pipe leaking arsenic-laden water into the river.

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