May 3, 2023
Toxic Coal Ash in North Carolina: Addressing Coal Plants’ Hazardous Legacy
For decades, utilities disposed of coal ash — the hazardous substance left after burning coal for energy — by dumping it in unlined ponds and landfills. North Carolina has 47 coal ash dumpsites.
Coal ash contains hazardous pollutants including arsenic, boron, cobalt, chromium, lead, lithium, mercury, molybdenum, radium, selenium, and other heavy metals, which have been linked to cancer, heart and thyroid disease, reproductive failure, and neurological harm. In 2023, the EPA acknowledged that coal ash is even more dangerous than previously thought, with levels of arsenic and radiation that pose cancer risks.
Industry’s own data indicate that across the country 91% of coal plants are currently polluting groundwater above federal health standards with toxic pollutants.
Coal ash remains one of our nation’s largest toxic industrial waste streams. U.S. coal plants continue to produce approximately 70 million tons every year.
Despite EPA’s 2015 Coal Ash Rule, which created the first-ever safeguards for coal ash disposal, many coal ash dumps remain unregulated due to sweeping exemptions for legacy coal ash ponds and inactive landfills.
The exempted coal ash dumps are sited disproportionately in low-income communities and communities of color. After years of litigation and grassroots activism, the EPA will extend clean up requirements to hundreds of old coal ash dumps across the country when it issues new regulations in the spring of 2024.
In 2023, the EPA acknowledged widespread noncompliance with existing coal ash regulations and ramped up enforcement after designating coal ash a national enforcement priority.
Action Needed
The magnitude of harm from recklessly dumped toxic coal ash requires decisive action from federal and state regulators.
- Utilities must be required to comply with the law and immediately clean up their pollution.
- EPA and states must act quickly to ensure that utilities leave communities with sites that benefit rather than harm their health, environment, and economic status.
- EPA must take action to prohibit the use of coal ash as construction fill and make polluters clean up areas where ash was used as fill.
37 Regulated Coal Ash Disposal Sites in North Carolina
North Carolina utilities operate 37 federally regulated coal ash ponds and landfills containing more than 130 million cubic yards of toxic waste at 14 facilities.
Coal ash has caused groundwater contamination at all of North Carolina’s regulated dumpsites — most of which are owned by Duke Energy, the company responsible for the catastrophic Dan River coal ash spill in 2014.
Some of these dumps are contaminating water at dozens or even hundreds of times the safe levels of certain pollutants. Allen Steam Station, is the fifth most contaminated coal ash site in the U.S.
Despite the serious and widespread water contamination, no North Carolina company, to date, has initiated a plant-wide cleanup to restore groundwater, despite the legal requirement to do so.
| Allen | Belmont | Duke Energy | 2 unlined ponds, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x7), Beryllium (x6), Boron (x1), Cadmium (x1), Cobalt (x466), Lithium (x12), Selenium (x5), Sulfate (x3), Thallium (x1) |
| Asheville | Arden | Duke Energy | 2 unlined ponds | Boron (x5), Cobalt (x17), Radium 226+228 (x14), Sulfate (x2) |
| Belews Creek | Belews Creek | Duke Energy | 1 unlined pond, 2 landfills | Arsenic (x5), Beryllium (x1), Boron (x7), Cobalt (x40), Lithium (x24), Molybdenum (x8), Radium 226+228 (x1) |
| Brickhaven No. 2 Mine Tract “A” | Moncure | Green Meadow, LLC | 1 landfill | Lithium (x3) |
| Buck | Salisbury | Duke Energy | 3 unlined ponds | Boron (x1), Cobalt (x12), Lithium (x7), Molybdenum (x1), Sulfate (x1) |
| Cliffside | Cliffside | Duke Energy | 3 unlined ponds, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x9), Beryllium (x2), Boron (x1), Cobalt (x38), Radium 226+228 (x1), Selenium (x1), Sulfate (x1), Thallium (x1) |
| Dan River | Eden | Duke Energy | 2 unlined ponds, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x3), Cobalt (x1), Lithium (x3) |
| H.F. Lee | Goldsboro | Duke Energy | 1 unlined pond | Arsenic (x61), Boron (x2), Cobalt (x4), Lithium (x9), Molybdenum (x2) |
| Halifax County Ash Landfill | Littleton | Halifax County | 1 landfill | Unsafe levels of beryllium* |
| L.V. Sutton | Wilmington | Duke Energy | 2 unlined ponds, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x44), Boron (x2), Cobalt (x4), Lithium (x13), Molybdenum (x7) |
| Marshall | Terrell | Duke Energy | 1 unlined pond, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x5), Barium (x1), Beryllium (x1), Boron (x5), Cobalt (x22), Lithium (x2), Radium 226+228 (x2), Thallium (x1) |
| Mayo | Roxboro | Duke Energy | 3 unlined ponds, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x1), Boron (x3), Cobalt (x3), Lithium (x9), Molybdenum (x2), Radium 226+228 (x2) |
| Roxboro | Semora | Duke Energy | 5 unlined ponds, 1 landfill | Arsenic (x2), Boron (x27), Cobalt (x6), Lithium (x29), Molybdenum (x56), Radium 226+228 (x1), Selenium (x3), Sulfate (x7) |
| W.H. Weatherspoon | Robeson County | Duke Energy | 1 unlined pond | Boron (x1), Radium 226+228 (x3) |
* Based on industry monitoring data. See Ashtracker.
All data on groundwater contamination from coal ash derived from the utilities’ publicly accessible CCR Compliance Data and Information websites, and exceedances were calculated by Environmental Integrity Project.
For more information on regulated coal ash sites in Alabama and throughout the U.S., see Mapping the Coal Ash Contamination.
10 Unregulated Coal Ash Legacy Ponds and Inactive Landfills in North Carolina (ash dumps exempted from the 2015 Coal Ash Rule)
March 2024 Update: The table below underestimates the legacy units that may be regulated by EPA’s upcoming CCR Legacy Pond Rule. Additional legacy units at specific plants may be found in the national map, above.
In addition, North Carolina hosts at least 10 unregulated inactive coal ash landfills and legacy ponds that escape federal regulation. The exact number remains unknown because utilities are not required to report these sites.
These dumps are almost certainly contaminating water and threatening health and the environment; however, monitoring data are not currently available for most unregulated sites.
As we anticipate EPA’s proposed rule on legacy ponds and unregulated landfills in May 2023, a concern remains that the agency will not address coal ash that was dumped off site or used as fill.
| Belews Creek | Belews Creek | Duke Energy | 0 | 1 | Yes – EPA damage case |
| Cape Fear | Moncure | Progress Energy Carolinas Inc. | 5 | 0 | Yes – EPA damage case |
| Marshall | Sherrills Ford | Duke Energy | 0 | 2 | Yes – Industry data |
| Riverbend | Mt. Holly | Duke Energy | 2 | 0 | Yes – Ashtracker |
Marshall's evidence of site contamination: Data on groundwater contamination from coal ash derived from the utilities’ publicly accessible CCR Compliance Data and Information websites, and exceedances were calculated by Environmental Integrity Project.
Riverbend's evidence of site contamination: Based on industry monitoring data. See Ashtracker.
These data were developed by using EPA datasets relied upon in their 2007 and 2014 CCR risk assessments (Human and Ecological Risk Assessment of Coal Combustion Residuals) and comparing those datasets to the universe of regulated units.
“EPA damage case” denotes a site where US EPA has found documented groundwater contamination from coal ash.
For More Information
Christine Santillana, Legislative Counsel, Earthjustice, csantillana@earthjustice.org
Lisa Evans, Senior Counsel, Earthjustice, levans@earthjustice.org.
More on Coal Ash in North Carolina
- Poisonous Coverup: The Widespread Failure of the Power Industry to Clean Up Coal Ash Dumps (November 3, 2022)
- What a Real Coal Ash Cleanup Looks Like (April 8, 2019)
- Along With Flooding, Hurricane Florence Unleashes Toxic Coal Ash (September 21, 2018)
- Nation’s Largest Utility Has North Carolina Neutralized (August 9, 2016)
- A Coal Ash Clean Up Job Not Well Done! (July 23, 2014)
- NC Regulators Ding Duke for a Penny Per Toxic Ton (February 24, 2014)
- North Carolina Coal Ash Pollution and the Frankenbill (June 24, 2013)
- Tr-Ash Talk: Clean Up Your Coal Ash! (May 2, 2012)
Coal Ash in States, Territories, Regions
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