Updated: 1/8/2009 11:57:31 PM
By Bill Theobald, Gannett News Service
WASHINGTON - The massive spill of coal ash at a Tennessee Valley Authority power plant in December will bring closer scrutiny of TVA and may change the way the potentially dangerous ash is handled across the country.
Senators at a hearing Thursday promised both as they reviewed TVA's handling of the billion-gallon spill.
TVA President Tom Kilgore, who faced sometimes tough questioning by members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said later that he expects federal environmental regulations will be issued designating the ash leftover when coal is burned as hazardous waste. That would put restrictions on its storage and disposal.
"I think this event will trigger regulations," Kilgore said. He said, "TVA will be glad to cooperate with those" but refused to say whether he supported new rules.
In 2000 the EPA decided against designating the ash - which is laced with lead and other dangerous metals - as hazardous.
Sen. Barbara Boxer, chairwoman of the environment committee, said that the EPA in 2007 identified 67 coal ash storage sites in 23 states that had caused or were suspected of causing contamination - and that the agency believed there were dozens of other sites.
She said she plans to ask Lisa Jackson, Democratic President-elect Barack Obama's nominee to head the EPA, about providing regulation of the ash during her confirmation hearing next week.
Boxer and Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., who chairs the subcommittee that oversees the TVA, also promised more vigorous oversight of the agency, which provides electricity to 9 million homes and 650,000 businesses in Tennessee and six other southeastern states.
"We didn't really do much in the first two years (that Boxer chaired the committee) looking at TVA," Boxer said. "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. I assumed a lot that I should not have assumed. Well, that day is over."
Boxer was the most aggressive in questioning Kilgore, claiming TVA officials had tried to downplay the seriousness of the spill, which occurred when a retaining wall collapsed.
"You've got problems. You've got big problems. You've got to clean up your act there - literally," Boxer said.
Boxer said the volume of the coal ash sludge that covered 300 acres was 100 times the amount of oil spilled from the Exxon Valdez tanker off Alaska in 1989. To illustrate her comments, Boxer showed giant photographs of the spill and damage it caused and passed around a glass jar filled with coal ash.
Kilgore defended the TVA's spill response and promised to follow through to make sure the area is cleaned up.
"It's not a time when we hold our head high, but it is a time when we will look our neighbors in the eye and say we will stay on the job until it is finished. We are going to do this and do it right," Kilgore testified.
Stephen Smith, executive director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, said residents near the plant feel betrayed by TVA.
"This was not a natural disaster; this was a manmade disaster," Smith testified.
He called for an end to the wet storage of coal ash, EPA inspection of all coal ash storage facilities and federal regulation of coal ash.
"It is outrageous that the landfills holding our household garbage are more regulated than the pits holding this toxic coal sludge," Smith said.
Tennessee Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander, a member of the committee, tried to take a broader approach to the spill, saying it illustrated the need for federal investment in making coal plants cleaner.
"I see no way we can avoid burning coal in the U.S." for at least several decades, said Alexander, who pointed out that 60 percent of the electricity used in Tennessee comes from coal.
The debate in Washington over coal plants and the pollution they create - and their contribution to climate change - has quickly been linked to the Tennessee spill.
Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., senior Republican on the committee, said he feared "extremist groups" were exploiting the spill to further their objective: "namely to eradicate the use of coal in this country."
