EPA offers US power companies more time to clean up toxic coal ash

US electric utilities required to clean up toxic coal ash from power plant operations will have 15 more months to install groundwater monitoring systems and initiate the closure of leaking waste ponds, the US Environmental Protection Agency said.

Some electric utilities have told the EPA that the existing compliance deadlines were "infeasible," the agency said.

The companies cited "difficulty of accessing and reviewing historical documentation, contractor shortages and backlogs, large volumes of data, and the need to coordinate across affiliate companies or with local, state, and federal regulatory authorities," the EPA wrote July 17. The agency said it was issuing a direct final rule and a companion proposal that would extend compliance deadlines.

The Trump administration announced in March that it would reform the EPA's coal ash program and give states more say over how to handle the management of ash waste.

"Today's actions provide much-needed regulatory relief for the power sector and help deliver on the commitments ... to unleash American energy, lower costs for Americans, and work hand-in-hand with our state partners," EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a press release.

Several large electric utilities asked the incoming Trump administration in January to rescind 2024 regulations that tightened limits on contaminants from coal ash in water supplies and spelled out timelines for when coal ash stored at inactive "legacy" sites must be cleaned up.

With the proposed delays, companies would have until Aug. 8, 2029, to install groundwater monitoring systems and until Jan. 31, 2030, to submit a corrective action report to the EPA.

Heavy metals, health risks

Disputes and litigation over how and when to dispose of toxic coal ash go back years, and in 2015 the US issued its first national regulations for disposal of decades-old waste from coal-fired power plants.

The ash includes arsenic, boron, cadmium, mercury and other heavy metals known to cause cancer, reproductive problems and other serious health issues. Coal ash that leaks into groundwater can also affect fish and other aquatic life.

"The longer industry delays dealing with its toxic mess, the more toxic waste enters our water, and the more difficult and costly cleanup becomes," Lisa Evans, senior counsel with the group Earthjustice, said in a statement. "These coal power companies cannot escape liability for their reckless release of toxic coal ash."

The EPA estimated in 2015 that coal ash was being dumped into 310 active landfills and more than 735 coal ash basins in 47 states and Puerto Rico. That count did not include the inactive legacy sites.

The initial Obama-era rules finalized in 2015 exempted more than 200 inactive coal ash impoundments at power plants that no longer operated or existed. That loophole was closed when the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in 2018 that the EPA did not protect human health or the environment by exempting the inactive plants and allowing operators to continue to dump coal ash into unlined and clay-lined ponds.

The EPA's July 17 proposal addresses concerns raised by the operators of those inactive plants by extending compliance deadlines. The agency is planning further changes to the 2024 rule within the next year.

The administration appears to be using a similar delay-and-repeal strategy with mercury emission standards. The EPA earlier this year gave more than one-third of US coal-fired power plants a two-year extension to upgrade equipment and install emission monitors as it works to roll back those Biden-era environmental protections.