www.kftc.org | May 22, 2019
Balancing the Scales | 19
Environmental justice
Maintaining high standards needed to protect, clean up state’s water resources ORSANCO hearing coming up June 6 Members of KFTC and several ally groups are preparing for a big turnout at the June 6 meeting of the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission (ORSANCO). Commissioners are expected to vote on a proposal that would weaken the agency’s decades-old role in monitoring and enforcing water quality standards for the Ohio River and its tributaries. Some commissioners – who are political appointees representing the states involved in ORSANCO – want to make enforcement of the standards voluntary. That means, in states like Kentucky where administration officials have little interest in strong environmental protections, water quality standards could be significantly weakened. At least 100 pollutants for which there are no federal or state standards are included in ORSANCO’s standards. Fifty-two of Kentucky’s water quality standards are weaker than ORSANCO’s. While these standards have not solved the Ohio River’s pollution issues, their enforcement has resulted in considerable progress toward improving water quality in the river and its tributaries. In recent weeks, KFTC members worked to win the support the city commissions of the northern Ken-
tucky cities of Dayton and Covington, as well as from the Covington Human Rights Commission. ORSANCO was established in 1948 as a compact between eight states (New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois) and the federal government to control and abate pollution in the Ohio River basin. Controversy around ORSANCO’s role has been an issue for more than a year. In 2018, some commissioners floated an industry-backed plan to do away with the agency’s role in enforcing mandatory standards. Strong public opposition caused them to back away from that proposal and instead offer the current one to make enforcement optional. The June 6 commission meeting will take place beginning at 9 a.m. at the Radisson Hotel Riverfront, 668 West 5th Street in Covington. ‡‡‡‡‡‡
ley ReSource and WFPL News have been involved in making public some of the self-monitoring reports utilities are required to file, supplementing this information with additional investigation. Kentucky has a serious problem from coal ash contamination. Some of the findings Ohio Valley ReSource and WFPL News reported last year include: •
At the Mill Creek Generating Station in Louisville, operated by Louisville Gas & Electric, the WFPL News analysis found monitoring wells that contained up to 40 times more arsenic than federal drinking water standards.
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At the Paradise Fossil Plant, located on the Green River in Muhlenberg County, testing found levels of arsenic more than eight times higher than federal drinking water standards.
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At Kentucky Utilities’ Ghent Generating Station north of Carrollton, radium levels at a groundwater well near the ash pond were 33 times the drinking water standard. In a well near the ash landfill, the radium levels were 10 times the standard. Tests done at Ghent also revealed elevated levels of arsenic, antimony and beryllium, among other contaminants.
Pollution at high levels around coal ash dumps There is significant pollution of land and water in Kentucky from coal ash that has been dumped for decades at coal-burning power plants throughout the state. The Environmental Integrity Project, Ohio Val-
Some veteran KFTC members attended a recent Land Reform Committee meeting: Mary Love, Jeff Chapman Crane, Joanne Hill, Teri Blanton, Russell Oliver and Carl Shoupe. Together they represent more than 120 years of KFTC membership and many more years of service to their communities.
The Ohio Valley ReSource has an interactive map where one can view the power plants located in Kentucky and the contaminants found at their sites. These contaminants include Antimony, Arsenic, Beryllium, Cobalt, Fluoride, Lead, Lithium, Molybdenum, Radium and Selenium. The map can be found at: https://ohiovalleyresource.org/2018/06/15/coal-ashmonitoring.