Coal ash protection legislation pending in Georgia legislature

The Georgia Water Coalition (of which WWALS is a partner) notes the city of Brunswick, Georgia passed a resolution agaionst coal ash 21 September 2016, and legislation is about to appear in the Georgia House of Representatives. There is already TVA and JEA coal ash in the Pecan Row Landfill in Lowndes County, just outside Valdosta, and in WWALS watersheds other landfills likely to be targetted are in Cook, Tift, Atkinson, Ben Hill, and Crisp Counties (see GWC map), all upstream of the Withlacoochee or Alapaha Rivers, and all upstream of the Suwannee River, all above the Floridan Aquifer from which we all drink. We don’t want the utility company coal ash problem exported to our landfills. The companies that produced this toxic pollutant should be responsible for disposing of it safely at their expense without foisting it on the rest of us.

Landfills Map
Coal Ash in Your District — Ash Ponds & Municipal Solid Waste, Published by the GA Water Coalition
See also the GWC position on coal ash.

WWALS recommends all Georgia legislators, especially those in WWALS watersheds, join in to prevent further coal ash contamination. See as an example the PR below by Rep. Jeff Jones of Brunswick, which concludes:

“The water that is being drained off of existing wet-storage coal ash ponds as they are being closed or capped-in-place must at least be treated to the same degree of water quality as water from our wastewater treatment facilities before it is discharged into our streams, rivers, lakes and ocean. We don’t want to go from solving one problem to creating another!”

Nobody is going to believe even that will be adequate after the 2.2 million gallon sewage leak Valdosta just had from its new, uphill, out-of-the-floodplain, Withlacoochee Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP). And the landfill coal ash situation is right next door.

New WWTP site near Withlacoochee River

Directly west across Wetherington Lane from the new WWTP is land owned by Veolia and the old, closed, Onyx Landfill. Just south of that is an unnamed creek that flows to the Withlacoochee River. South of the creek is the open Pecan Row Landfill, with its coal ash from TVA and Florida and $27,500 fine from GA EPD for PCBs, in in a recharge zone for the Floridan Aquifer. Both landfills (and Veolia) are owned by Advanced Disposal Services (ADS), which also owns all the land north of the creek to the Withlacoochee River.

For three years or more I’ve been asking our elected officials on the Deep South Solid Waste Authority that supposedly oversees that privatized landfill to find out what’s going on. They never report anything back. Maybe it’s time they do that, and also encourage our Georgia state legislators to do something to stop more coal ash from coming into that and other landfills.

 -jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®

You can join this fun and work by becoming a WWALS member today!

Rep. Jeff Jones, GA House District 167, PR, 19 January 2017, Rep. Jeff Jones Responds to Efforts to Protect Georgia’s Water Resources from Coal Ash Storage,

ATLANTA — State Representative Jeff Jones (R-Brunswick) today issued the following statement in response to the City of Brunswick City Commission’s effort to draft a resolution asking state lawmakers to create stricter regulations governing coal ash storage:

“I applaud the efforts of the City of Brunswick’s City Commission to call for state leaders to protect our state’s pristine water resources. I, likewise, encourage the Glynn County Board of Commissioners to consider similar efforts, as well as all communities throughout the state of Georgia that are impacted by coal ash storage. It is my intention to introduce legislation this session that seeks to protect our valuable, finite water resources from the potential damaging effects of long-term coal ash storage and the closing of existing coal ash ponds.

“The municipal landfills that are intended to accept the coal ash must be able to guarantee that the liners and other storage methodology they propose to use must last for thousands of years. That’s a very long time, and I’m not convinced the dime-thick liner that is being proposed by Republic for the Broadhurst landfill in Wayne County will hold up over time.

“The water that is being drained off of existing wet-storage coal ash ponds as they are being closed or capped-in-place must at least be treated to the same degree of water quality as water from our wastewater treatment facilities before it is discharged into our streams, rivers, lakes and ocean. We don’t want to go from solving one problem to creating another!”

Here is the Georgia Water Coalition (GWC) position on coal ash, as determined by consensus of the Partners at the July 2017 partner meeting:

All coal ash located in Georgia should be removed from unlined, leaking pits along state waterways to dry, lined storage away from rivers and lakes and groundwater recharge areas. Coal ash may be moved to municipal solid waste landfills only if those landfills are properly designed, permitted, and maintained. If municipal solid waste landfills wish to accept ash that comprises more than 5% of the daily tonnage intake, those landfills must apply to the state for a major permit modification.