https://tennesseelookout.com/2022/04/12/osha-officials-admit... https://tennesseelookout.com/2023/05/23/jacobs-engineering-s... These stories should give you the info you need to understand what happened to the Kingston workers. I spent years as an investigative journalist revealing this travesty through dozens of stories.
Wikipedia article with more detail https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly...
I am guessing this is coming up now due to the recent changes in regulations.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43357447
"Prioritizing coal ash program to expedite state permit reviews and update coal ash regulations (CCR Rule)"
This article has some great writing overall, but ends with this
> How could this happen? Ansol wondered.
I wish it had dug into this. These sort of things don't just happen. There must be accountability, and journalists are who are supposed to start that process. This was clearly an environmental travesty of monumental proportions. How do we grapple with the fact this sort of thing is apparently just allowed to continue happening?
Terrifying that this could happen as recently as 2008 and, I'm sure, with better understanding of potential consequences.
In 1966, something similar (although with a mining waste dump, instead of ash) happened in Aberfan, Wales (in the UK) with a more tragic outcome[1].
The question should be whether this occurred due to ignorance or ignoring the lessons of history, which rhymes if not repeats.
If you want me to read your article, don't cover it with a stupid popup in the middle of the screen. I closed the page as soon as I saw that.
I've heard of a few of these in the US, but have not heard of any in the UK, where we also burned a lot of coal. Did we manage the ash differently? I have a vague idea that we have a different kind of coal, which produces less ash.
I couldn't find anything conclusive, but found this from 2015:
> Storage, whether in lagoons, silos or landfills, rather than re-use, is the default solution for coal ash management in most countries. The UK’s Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) estimates that, of the eight million tonnes of coal ash produced in the country each year, half is re-used, while over 300 million tonnes have been stored in lagoons or silos since the 1950s. [...] The American Coal Ash Association (ACAA) reports on US coal ash production and use each year. In 2013, 53 million tonnes of coal ash were generated, of which 23 million tonnes were re-used. Of the unused portion, the EPA says 36 per cent was stored in landfills, and 21 per cent in wet storage facilities. [...] Some countries are doing better, though: for example, the Netherlands recycles 100 per cent of its coal ash because landfill is not allowed in the country. In Germany, where around 10 million tonnes of coal ash are produced per year, around 97 per cent is re-used, with the rest stored only on a temporary basis. According to the European Coal Combustion Products Association (Ecoba), of the 48 million tonnes of coal ash produced in 15 EU countries in 2010 (the latest available figures), 13.8 million tonnes were re-used.
https://www.powerengineeringint.com/coal-fired/managing-coal...
The "re-use" is by processing it into materials which can be used for various construction and materials manufacturing processes. There's lots of other fascinating details about coal ash in there. Wikipedia is pretty good too:
Related I lived through a large coal slurry spill in 2000 in Eastern KY.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_County_coal_slurry_sp...
You were lucky. We in the UK had this back in 1966.
Oh, I remember that one.
At the time, the construction of new coal-fired power plants was a controversial topic in many locations in Germany. (Around 30 new coal power plants were planned at times. Some were stopped, but 10 of them were actually build, which is bad enough.) I also tried to raise awareness about this incident in Tennessee, trying to have a look at the environmental issues of coal on a more international level. But it didn't generate much interest.
We had a high-PH red mud slurry disaster in Hungary 15 years ago: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajka_alumina_plant_accident
Feels like disasters like this aren't just random accidents - they're symptoms of slowly ignoring the cracks until everything breaks open. Makes you wonder what else we're overlooking right now that's quietly falling apart around us.
See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Blue_Run_Lake
> Another lawsuit was filed in Federal Court by 15 Beaver County, Pennsylvania residents and 36 West Virginia residents who accused FirstEnergy of contaminating groundwater and leaking hazardous waste, including arsenic, sulfates, sodium, calcium, magnesium and chloride[2] into local waterways and groundwater systems.
Man that still feels like it was ten years ago. 17, really?
Without spoilers...what a disappointing article. This feels like it should have been a long read, and yet, the article ends just as it started, with no explanation, investigation, or conclusion.
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This was recently an episode topic on the podcast 99% Invisible. It brought up a lot of interesting questions for me mostly about the systemic differences between public and private operations and pros&cons on both. Plainly shown TVA has been abysmal after it was forced to operate as a profit motivated institution. Though it was still federally owned it received nearly total immunity from the mishaps it caused through sovereign immunity laws. What is the check on disasters like this happening again? Will more regulation prevent it? The EPA's regulations incentivized it to further endanger workers during the cleanup. It needs to either be fully privately owned (still regulated) or fully federally owned and funded.
- https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/613-valley-so-low/