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September 19, 2018

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Pollution fears from Florence flooding

Source: AP | 00:01 UTC+8 September 19, 2018 | Print Edition

Flooded rivers from Florence’s drenching rains have swamped coal ash dumps and low-lying hog farms, raising pollution concerns as the swollen waterways approach their crests on Monday.

North Carolina environmental regulators say several open-air manure pits at hog farms have failed, spilling pollution. State officials also were monitoring the breach of a Duke Energy coal ash landfill near Wilmington.

Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Michael Regan said Monday that the earthen dam at one hog lagoon in Duplin County had been breached. There were also seven reports of lagoon levels going over their tops or being inundated in Jones and Pender counties.

Regan said state investigators will visit the sites as conditions allow. The large pits at hog farms hold feces and urine from the animals to be sprayed on nearby fields.

The NC Pork Council, an industry trade group, emphasized the hog waste pits flooded by Florence represented a small number when compared with the total number statewide.

“While there are more than 3,000 active lagoons in the state that have been unaffected by the storm, we remain concerned about the potential impact of these record-shattering floods,” a pork council statement said.

High waters forecasted

Federal forecasters predicted several rivers would crest at record or near-record levels by Monday, and high water could linger for days.

Duke Energy said the flow was stopped on Monday from the weekend collapse in a coal ash landfill at the LV Sutton Power Station near Wilmington, North Carolina, and that cleanup work had begun.

Duke spokeswoman Paige Sheehan said a full assessment of how much ash escaped from the water-slogged landfill is ongoing.

The company initially estimated on Saturday that about 1,530 cubic meters of ash were displaced, enough to fill about 180 dump trucks.

The coal-fired Sutton plant was retired in 2013 and replaced with a new facility that burns natural gas.

The company has been excavating millions of tons of leftover ash from old waste pits at the site and removing it to a new lined landfill constructed on the property.

The gray ash left behind when coal is burned contains toxic heavy metals, including arsenic, lead and mercury.

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