Larry Reed: Ultimate special interests

So David Fountain, president of Duke Energy, is complaining of “special interests” in his May 17 Point of View “The full cost of excavation.” That is too rich. He is the ultimate “special interest” in this company’s massive polluting of our rivers and groundwater.

The old adage in hazardous waste is “follow the money,” and Duke Energy is buying its way out of full responsibility “on the cheap” any way it can.

Duke’s successful political access to Gov. Pat McCrory has silenced and covered up objective scientific results.

Fountain constructs a false either-or situation of “special interests” (read affected residents) promoting that all the waste be excavated (at major cost) or capping most waste on site (the cheaper alternative that will save them from paying for their disaster). He then goes on to undercut his own argument to say that “each ash basin is different ... it may make sense to excavate a basin.”

The priority and number of those excavations are critical decisions that he is minimizing in the McCrory administration without the public’s knowledge.

Finally, he knows that business “special interests” have fought for decades the EPA’s ability to publish new drinking water standards. Industry then hides behind the statement that its contamination doesn’t violate outdated EPA standards.

This story was originally published May 18, 2016 at 5:15 PM with the headline "Larry Reed: Ultimate special interests."