Proposed coal ash rule change blasted by environmental groups

Duke Energy would get a reprieve from a coal ash recycling requirement under legislation introduced in the N.C. Senate last week.

Duke faces a July 1 deadline to name a third site where it will recycle coal ash for use in cement products; the first two sites were identified earlier this year. But House Bill 374, titled the “Business Freedom Act,” would eliminate the requirement for a third recycling site.

A Duke Energy lobbyist says the legislation would give the utility more time to study if there’s enough demand for recycled coal ash to justify the third facility. But a lobbyist for the concrete industry said the demand is there and that a previous study by Duke is flawed.

The Southern Environmental Law Center says allowing Duke to avoid building the third facility would allow more coal ash ponds to be simply capped, rather than having the materials recycled. “I think what this could lead to is more ash left in the ground,” said Mary Maclean Asbill, an attorney for the group.

HB 374 didn’t have the coal ash provision when it passed the House as a bill addressing labor laws, but the bill got a new title and new provisions in the Senate Commerce Committee last week before it passed on a divided voice vote, with some Democrats opposed. It would need to go to two more committees before it can get a vote on the Senate floor.

Another provision added in the Senate would create stricter requirements for legal challenges to environmental permits and other approval actions by the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality. If the bill passes, only people and groups who raised objections during the permit’s public review process could bring a legal action through the Office of Administrative Hearings. They also couldn’t introduce new evidence that wasn’t brought up during the initial review process.

Environmental groups argue that the provision would make it harder for neighbors to challenge new facilities that could bring pollution or other negative impacts to their property.

“This provision shuts out citizens, who don’t have lobbyists to represent their interests at every step of the permit process, from challenging permits to pollute that are harmful or wrongly issued,” Sierra Club state director Molly Diggins said in a news release. “Public access to the courts is a core part of democracy.”

This story was originally published June 20, 2017 at 6:18 PM with the headline "Proposed coal ash rule change blasted by environmental groups."