toxics

So much for 'clean coal'

Originally posted at the Wonk Room.

Before Thursday's Senate hearing on the devastating Tennessee coal plant billion-gallon ash spill, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) demolished the "clean coal" myth. Alexander told Knoxville's WVLT-TV:

Coal is a dirty business.

Watch it:

Digital TV delay could be win for environment

Anyone with a working TV set has likely seen the ubiquitous ads educating the public about the Feb. 17 switch to all-digital broadcasting. But millions of Americans still aren't prepared and could miss out on important news and emergency broadcasts -- a fact that has led President-elect Barack Obama to urge a delay in the transition.

Such a delay could be a perfect opportunity for manufacturers to improve their recycling programs, say activists from the Electronics TakeBack Coalition. The ETBC recently put together a report card ranking the major TV companies on their take-back policies. Highest-ranked Sony got a B- for leading the pack with the first national take-back program, but more than half of the 17 companies got failing grades for having no programs in place at all.

This week, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, ETBC has been calling attention to the lack of take-back programs -- and the electronic waste that will be created when a "tsunami" of analog TVs hit the landfill -- with a cadre of TV zombies (see video below). [Note to ETBC: Didn't you get the memo about vampires being the undead of the hour?]

TVA says leak has stopped but 'some materials flowed into Widows Creek'

You can't out-irony real life. The Tennessean has the story:

TVA is investigating a leak from a gypsum pond at its Widows Creek coal-burning power plant in northeastern Alabama ...

Seriously, Widows Creek coal plant? What PR guy thought that up? The same genius behind Frosty the Coalman, Clean Coal Night, and Deck the Halls with Clean Coal?

TVA says the leak has stopped, but not before "some materials flowed into Widows Creek." At least they won't have to change the creek's name. The story continues:

Gypsum is a byproduct of coal-burning power plants when "scrubbers" are added that use limestone spray to clean air emissions. This pulls sulfur dioxide from the emissions ...

Tighter air emissions controls result in additional waste byproducts. Gypsum can be used in building materials.

As always, the enviros are really to blame. If it weren't for their pesky laws, the pollutants would be in the air where they belong:

Stiffer regulation of coal ash would cost the industry billions

If I've said it once I've said it, oh, around eleven kazillion times now: "coal is cheap" because the coal industry externalizes costs.

Take, for instance, coal ash. It contains several substances that are classified as toxics individually, but the ash itself isn't thus classified. That means it can be stored in enormous pools with no liners, behind earthen dams that, as the disaster in Tennessee illustrates again, periodically fail.

What would happen if ash were classified as toxic? The answer can be found in this stellar piece from Bloomberg.

Increased regulation would bring costs to upgrade or close more than 600 landfills and waste ponds at 440 plants nationwide. While the Environmental Protection Agency put the price tag at $1 billion a year in 2000, power generators predict the cost would be as high as $5 billion, said Jim Roewer, executive director of the industry-funded Utility Solid Waste Activities Group, in a telephone interview.

Why so costly?

An EPA report in 2000 found a quarter of retention ponds and 57 percent of landfills lacked liners to prevent pollution from leaking into nearby water supplies, though the 2007 follow-up study found such controls more common at newer sites.

So much for cheap.

Also note this macabre/hilarious bit:

TVA coal disaster is toxic wake-up call

An estimated 500 million gallons of coal-ash sludge are seeping along the I-40 Knoxville-Nashville corridor in eastern Tennessee, after an earthen wall gave way on Dec. 22 at the TVA Harriman coal-fired plant. While no casualties were reported, the coal-ash spill — the refuse left over after the plant burns the coal — should be […]

Critics say EPA pick failed to clean up N.J.’s toxic sites

Lisa Jackson, who President-elect Barack Obama is expected to name Monday evening to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, is already being hailed as a historic choice. The former head of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and transition team member would be the first African-American EPA chief, and supporters have praised her work ethic, […]

Umbra on children’s art supplies

Hey Umbra, I’ve got a niece with a second birthday coming up and I’d like to get her a present that doesn’t involve sitting in front of a computer or TV. So, I thought, how about an art set? What better way to get those creative juices going at an early age than some finger […]

Study: Common pollutant may lead to obesity

Ever heard of tributyltin? Probably not, but odds are you’ve been exposed to it. The chemical is used as a biocide in industrial water systems, breweries (gulp), and in wood preservatives; and as a pesticide on so-called "high-value" food crops (think fruits and vegetables). Its residues are also found in fish and shellfish. And … […]

Children living in FEMA trailers are alarmingly sick

Photo: Marni Rosen Children who moved into FEMA trailers after losing their homes in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita have alarming rates of sickness and mental health problems, according to an in-depth review of medical records. Forty-two percent of the children studied suffer from respiratory troubles that may be linked to formaldehyde in the trailers.