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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] EPA, USDA Encourage Farmers To Put Coal Ash That Contains Mercury And Arsenic On Crops
  • Date: Mon, 21 Dec 2009 10:55:09 -0700


EPA, USDA Encourage Farmers To Put Coal Ash That Contains Mercury And Arsenic
On Crops
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/21/epa-usda-encourage-farmer_n_399331.html
12/21/09 08:17 AM
INDIANAPOLIS — The federal government is encouraging farmers to spread a
chalky waste from coal-fired power plants on their fields to loosen and
fertilize soil even as it considers regulating coal wastes for the first
time. The material is produced by power plant "scrubbers" that remove acid
rain causing sulfur dioxide from plant emissions. A synthetic form of the
mineral gypsum, it also contains mercury, arsenic, lead and other heavy
metals. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says those toxic metals
occur in only tiny amounts that pose no threat to crops, surface water or
humans. But some environmentalists say too little is known about how the
material affects crops, and ultimately human health, for the government to
suggest that farmers use it on their land.

"Basically this is a leap into the unknown," said Jeff Ruch, executive
director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. "This stuff
has materials in it that we're trying to prevent entering the environment
from coal-fired power plants and then to turn around and smear it across ag
lands raises some real questions."

With coal wastes piling up around the coal-fired plants that produce half the
nation's power, the EPA and U.S. Department of Agriculture began promoting
what they call the wastes' "beneficial uses" during the Bush administration.

Part of that push is to expand use of synthetic gypsum – a whitish,
calcium-rich material known as flue gas desulfurization gypsum, or FGD gypsum.

The Obama administration has continued promoting FGD gypsum's use in farming
even as it drafts a coal waste rule in response to a spill from a coal ash
pond near Knoxville, Tenn., one year ago Tuesday. Ash and water flooded 300
acres, damaging homes and killing fish in nearby rivers. The cleanup is
expected to cost about $1 billion.

The EPA is expected to announce its proposals for regulation early next year,
setting the first federal standards for storage and disposal of coal wastes.
Story continues below

EPA officials declined to talk about the agency's promotion of FGD gypsum
before then and wouldn't say whether the draft rule would cover it.

Instead, the agency released a statement saying the heavy metals in the
material are far less than the amount considered a threat to human health.
Field studies have shown that mercury, the main heavy metal of concern
because it can damage development of the human nervous system, doesn't
accumulate in crops or run off fields in surface water at "significant"
levels, it said.

"EPA believes that the use of FGD gypsum in agriculture is safe in
appropriate soil and hydrogeologic conditions," the statement said.

Eric Schaeffer, executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project,
which advocates for more effective enforcement of environmental laws, said
he's not overly worried about FGD gypsum's use on fields because research
shows it contains only tiny amounts of heavy metals. But he said federal
limits on the amounts of heavy metals in FGD gypsum sold to farmers would
help allay concerns.

"That would give them assurance that they've got clean FGD gypsum," he said.
"The farmers don't want to get a bad batch."

Since the EPA/USDA partnership began in 2001, farmers' use of the material
has more than tripled, from about 78,000 tons spread on fields in 2002 to
nearly 279,000 tons last year, according to the American Coal Ash
Association, a utility industry group.

About half of the 17.7 million tons of FGD gypsum produced in the U.S. last
year was used to make drywall, said Thomas Adams, the association's executive
director. But he said it's important to find new uses for it and other coal
wastes because the nation is likely to remain reliant on coal-fired power
plants for decades to come.

"If we can find safe ways to recycle those materials, we're a lot better off
doing that then we are creating a whole bunch of new landfills," Adams said.

Darrell Norton, a USDA soil scientist, said a predecessor of FGD gypsum
produced about 25 years ago often had high levels of heavy metals because it
had been mixed with coal fly ash. But FGD gypsum has no fly ash and is
"environmentally clean," he said.

FGD gypsum is widely used in the South as a less expensive alternative to
mined gypsum, said Glen Harris, a soil scientist at the University of Georgia
in Tifton, Ga. Farmers in states such as Georgia, Alabama and the Carolinas
have long spread mined gypsum on their fields, where its calcium spurs the
growth of peanuts.

Clay McDaniel, 47, who farms about 4,000 acres of peanuts and corn near the
southern Georgia town of Newton, has used synthetic gypsum on his peanut
fields for more than 20 years. He and other farmers call both FGD and mined
gypsum "land plaster." He said he's never worried about the safety of the
synthetic version.

"If we buy a chemical that's toxic, it's got a skull and crossbones on it,"
he said. "But this does not come with any such warning. It's just a calcium
source."





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