It couldn't have happened to a more Bush-Friendly state.

De-regulation; Karma with neurotoxins.

Since when do "The Authorities" ever tell the Truth in the first or second or fifth "release of Information"? Remember the clean air in Manhattan following the collapse of the WTC Towers? Deregulation is the blessing. It allows the Free Market to work and all are protected. /snark/

peace,
st john

..and yet once again, the mighty Invisible Hand of the Free Market, flips us the bird.

I find it disturbing that the amount of fly ash now thought to have been released is over twice as much as the TVA originally thought was in the entire pond.

Disturbing, yes. But business as usual. I have no doubt that they had far more in the pond than it was designed or permitted to hold.

Fortunately, they've not had to worry about that pesky EPA looking over their shoulders for the past 8 years.

Bush would say, "The quick action of the authorities and the fact that there will be no long-term lasting damage shows that the system is working. Less regulation! Less regulation!"

The Bush Legacy: "Way to go, Brownie!"

So we have another Katrina, this time in Tennessee? When will the inevitable photos of Bush looking out of the window of Air Force One be published?

I'm surprised Glen Reynolds of Instapundint.com hasn't had a thing to say about this, as it happened in his own back yard.

Well, not really surprised as it seems to fly in the face of what his GOP Puppet Masters want him to talk about.

No clean coal, sure, however this is not any real clean anything. While I personally think coal is not an excellent energy source, the idiotic sloganeering rather runs against you recent chest thumping as to science and policy (rather than scaremongering). As case in point, your comments re re the spill's heavy metals, etc as contributors to the fish kills. The toxicity of those elements is real, but it is rather non-scientific to expect these long term toxic effects are the cause of spill effects (although very Leftish Hollywood..., Left Anti Science if you will).

Replacing your outgoing administration's anti-science idiocies with pious populist Leftist equivalents is hardly an improvement.

Well, maybe Fred Thompson can get his old friend Dick Cheney to grant Halliburton a lucrative no-bid contract to clean up the mess. I'm sure the good citizens of Tennesse won't mind being flleeced by Haliburton. Whon needs regulation and oversight?

It couldn't have happened to a more Bush-Friendly state.

On behalf of those of in the state (in Chattanooga, no less), who are NOT Bush supporters, fuck you.

A test of river water near the spill showed elevated levels of lead and thallium, which can cause birth defects and nervous and reproductive system disorders...

Evry'bod know thats just libral horse manure...
Nutin wrung wit lead and thallium...
Liddle bit wont hurt cha...

A test of river water near the spill showed elevated levels of lead and thallium, which can cause birth defects and nervous and reproductive system disorders...

More librul science hooey. There's considerable debate about weather lead in water is bad for you. Just pray to Jesus before every swallow, you'll be fine.

[...] the amount of fly ash now thought to have been released is over twice as much as the TVA originally thought was in the entire pond. -- Hilzoy

They *said* there was x amount of ash in the pond; doesn't mean they *thought* so. It was an instinctive cover-up because, most likely, the pond had been filled over its supposed capacity.

That was my immediate assumption, because the first thing that came out of their mouths was "the pond wasn't filled to capacity; the dam broke due to weather -- frost and rain". If officialdom goes into denial mode before anyone even starts pointing fingers, then, the truth is likely to be exactly what they're denying. "The guilty man flees where none pursue" kind of thing. And it's not limited to the current malAdministration; it's universal enough to have a version of that saying in many, many languages...

You have ONE bad accident and clean coal is a villian? Ladies and gentlemen - shit happens.
TWI and that thing in Russia were accidents. Learn from the mess and move on.
My home is heated by clean coal that produces energy for me and others in Indianpolis. Ok, going home for Christmas I did see a smoke cloud from the plant on the Wabash. That can be done better. However, until we get Obama in office - the environment is being ignored.

Sarge
Indianapolis

What I've read about the story tends to support a pretty cynical view of official response -- you know they're lying because their lips are moving.

But what is most disturbing to me is the seeming indifference. There has been at least one story about how essentially nothing material is being done, and nobody seems to care even about that. Yeah, there's a huge spill of stuff that may or may not be slightly or seriously toxic, and some people's homes were destroyed, and it's heading for a major water source, and, uh, somebody somewhere is probably keeping an eye on it. Or something.

It's like nobody cares, and nobody cares that nobody cares.

By examining 181 "coal combustion waste," or coal ash disposal sites throughout the country, the report estimates risks to health and the environment from coal ash disposal. The report found that unlined coal ash waste ponds pose a cancer risk 900 times above what is defined as 'acceptable.' The report also finds that coal ash disposal sites release toxic chemicals and metals such as arsenic, lead, boron, selenium, cadmium, thallium, and other pollutants at levels that pose risks to human health and the environment.

Earthjustice, the Clean Air Task Force, Environmental Integrity Project and other national and local environmental and public health organizations have long called for regulations that protect against the toxic ash produced by coal-fired power plants. Instead, a common industry practice is to mix the pollutant-laden ash with water and dump the toxic brew into unlined or inadequately lined ponds, allowing pollutants to poison groundwater supplies.

Death of the environment by a thousand cuts.

Coal ash pollution can deliver a silent bomb that would be a Wahabbi wish. I am crazy but still think Bush and company because of just plain greed are guilty of complicity with the Arabs and Mainstream Media. Massive potential for wide spread illness is part of this spill. And all kinds of potential combinations food cattle preserve fish chicken tobacco and of course water. The pollution in devastating. Why is this not on Mainstream Media or warnings by Tennessee Poison center? Have there been other spills anywhere else in the states not published. This is scary besides horrible, to be sure bottled water must now be labeled and dated for origin.

Great article thanks Hilzoy, stuff like this make it very difficult when all America hears is the surge in Iraq worked and that was nothing but sending in re-enforcements to win a war that America was loosing for years.

here is an interesting thing to check out...

http://www.earthjustice.org/news/press/007/coal-ash-pollution-contaminates-groundwater-increases-cancer-risks.html

Obama will have to hit the ground on this one...

There are reports of fish kills, though a TVA spokesman claims they are not the result of toxic substances, but of a surge of water beaching a lot of fish.

Those surges are tricky.

@ Lounsbury

I think I've managed to parse your inane little wank, no thanks to your apparent illiteracy, and all I can say is: FAIL. Not quite epic fail, but you come damn close. First, you might try actually, y'know, reading Hilzoy's post before you prattle on about it. Roughly correct, or even comprehensible, grammar and syntax in your post would also help. And if you're going to rail against "idiotic sloganeering", you might want to do that more than one sentence from your own idiotic sloganeering.

Thanks for making me feel a little less embarrassed for my country, though. Your reference to "your outgoing administration" helps me realize that recto-cranial inversion is not a uniquely American disease.

"On behalf of those of in the state (in Chattanooga, no less), who are NOT Bush supporters, fuck you."

Not a Bush supporter, eh?

You sure sound like one.

Those of you who take offense at the suggestion that Tennessee is reaping what they've sown for eight years of support for the Republicans need to read "Deer Hunting with Jesus".

There's been a lot of blame pointed at Bush and his administration and they deserve it. But Tennessee, West Virginia and the other Red States need to start thinking about what it means to support Republicans. Tennessee is a state that twice went for Bush. It's a state with a largely Republican Congressional delegation. Living with toxic waste and a destroyed environment is simply reaping the result of the Republican policy of deregulation and unfettered free markets.

No one likes to take about this. Elections have consequences. Vote Republican and support those who rip the tops of mountains off and dump them in streams. Vote Republican and you job will be offshored to China or some other country with little in the way of environmental regulations, low wages and no worker safety laws. Vote Republican and live with dangerous water and air. Vote Republican and be assured that the rich who benefit will not pay the price that you do. Vote Republican but remember, elections have consequences. If you live in Tennessee and gaze out at destruction, you're seeing this first hand.

Odysseus

"I'm surprised Glen Reynolds of Instapundint.com hasn't had a thing to say about this, as it happened in his own back yard."

I noticed the same thing...

But then again, I think he's too busy pimping sales on Amazon.com to notice.

Ok, I live in Knoxville, 40 miles from this power plant. I'm a liberal. So is my husband, who is a water quality engineer for TVA (who was NOT involved in any way with these ash ponds).

First, those of you who are gloating about a tragedy like this in a red state - F**K you. People have lost their homes. Their community is a mess that may never come back. We don't know the extent of the damage to the environment. It doesn't matter whether this is in red state, a blue state, or on the other side of the world. Liberals are supposed to care about human beings. Those of you who can't reflect on the human side of this mess don't deserve to call yourselves liberals.

Now... this is NOT bigger than the Exxon Valdez. About 300 acres are covered. The initial Exxon Valdez spill covered less, but the oil from that coated 1000 miles of coast line and killed around half a million animals. This is a serious incident, but comparing it to the Exxon Valdez is way overkill.

Also, Chattanooga is 100 miles downstream. Nobody is worried about the Chattanooga water supply, although there are worries about some of the local supplies.

To whoever said nothing was being done - wrong. TVA has been working to clean this up 24/7, including on Christmas Day. They have put up affected residents in local hotels. They are testing the water regularly, as is TDEC and the EPA.

It bothers me that the initial estimate on spill material is so different from the current one, but I know enough about TVA that my assumption is "never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity." The TVA PR folks have not handled this well. I suspect somebody pulled that initial # out of his a** because he needed to say something. Now they have done aerial surveys, and actually done measurements. They should have kept their mouths shut until they knew for sure.

As to fish kills - the fish did NOT die from heavy metal poisoining. There's not enough of that to kill them so quickly. Very cold weather regularly causes shad kills around here (notice I said shad, not any other species) - and it was 11 degrees when the dam broke. There was a wave that washed some fish up on shore, where they died. Others may have died from the change in pH, and others probably died from sediment.

I'm saying none of this to defend TVA. We don't know if they're guilty of poor engineering, poor operations, poor maintenance, or all three, but they are certainly culpable.

And for the record, I'm a big critic of fossil plants, and this one in particular. I'm pleased that this mess has sparked a discussion of "clean coal" - which of course does not exist.

I'm just saying that what did happen is bad enough. We should all be yelling and screaming about it. But there's no need to elaborate with non-factual details, or with pure speculation.

It couldn't have happened to a more Bush-Friendly state.

Notwithstanding Matt's reaction (which I endorse as a new resident of the other end of the state), that's also incredibly stupid. Utah, Texas, and Alabama are all still with us.

Lax environmental regulation is an article of faith in the Republican Party, and I see nothing wrong with rubbing Tennessee's nose in this latest disaster; it might be the only way they'll learn.

But we should also recognize that coal is supported in the state because coal is PRODUCED in the state. People might think those are "jobs," but I imagine those jobs are fairly marginal. Let's present people with their real choices -- risk losing some shitty mining jobs, spend more money for better regulation (which, you know, might create jobs), or you can have arsenic in your drinking water. Simple choice.

Why can't we have a consistent competent regulatory regime in this country? It's exactly this kind of BS that makes liberals want to ban nuclear and coal outright. Sure, it could work, but as soon as dipshit Republicans are elected, they screw everything up. Until the Republican party can be responsible, we really seriously need to move to clean, renewable energy as quickly as possible.

Only problem, Ink old pal, is that in the part of the state where those "shitty mining jobs" are located there usually isn't anything else in the way of employment.

I agree that working in a coal mine is like a daily trip to the gates of hell, but when there are no other alternatives, it begins to look a little better.

CN - Hence the options. If they want to keep mining coal, miners and their families can push for better regulations (which might pinch the industry a bit) or they run the risk of environmental disasters. My patina of sneering liberal elitism does nothing to change the reality facing mining states.

the disastrously wasteful, poisonous life style of western "civilization" in the industrial revolution age is coming back as a monstrous upchuck.

thems thar good nonunion folk in Tennessee, so all is as it should be in repuglioservativefundi land. After all, whats a little generational environmental disaster killing for decades among 'Murkan patriots chompin' at the bit to give up their lives and those of their children and grand children so corporate fat-cats can get their due from repug nation.

Of course most of us "liberals" feel great empathy for those directly hit by this spill, just like we felt empathy for the Texas hurricane victims.

But as a taxpayer from a state with very strict environmental regulation who pays more for energy because of those regulations, it is natural to feel a bit of schadenfreude when a state that spurned one of its own to vote for the Little Idiot, Dim Son, Bush the Lesser, etc. in '00 and then didn't learn from their mistake in '04.

Heck of a job, Corkie. Why don't you hire some laid off autoworkers to help clean it up?

I was going to tell Joey to fuck off and die, and suggest to No Man that he go back to crasturbating over Ayn Rand collective guilt and punishment fantasies. But then Gemini came along and stated it much more eloquently and politely.

Oh, and Gemini, I'm a big fan of that rule about malice and stupidity. I'll probably even grant that for the spill numbers -- after all, they were also operating on bad information as to how much was there to spill. Compartmentalization of knowledge and all that (i.e., I doubt the PR people announcing stuff had any communication with the people cooking the books on the size of the site, though this exoneration is non-factual pure speculation on my part). The total amount in the cesspool, however... Does deliberate fraud count as malice, or simply as greed? (Is greed a subset of malice, or are these merely intersecting sets? Discuss.) 'Cause I can't see how that could have been so wrong otherwise.

However, claiming it's smaller than Valdez because it covers a smaller area is a little disingenuous, as is confabulating volume, area, and distance. Volume is probably about as close as you'll get to a real numerical measure of how much `stuff' spilled, and surface area covered is rather artificial when you're dealing with waste that can leech into soil, aquifers, etc.

As for TVA's culpability, I'm not going to blame any of the people doing their jobs unless I have reason to. But I am going to blame management and TVA qua TVA until I have reason not to when there is, in IRS-speak, "evidence of consciousness of guilt." If someone lies in their tax returns or, in this case, their hazardous waste declarations, it's a pretty good indicator that they know they're doing something wrong and it's not just an honest misunderstanding. I should perhaps add that in the current political climate, I have difficulty extending this too far down the chain of command (so to speak) now that whistleblower protections and environmental law enforcement are effectively non-existent.

So here's what I'd like to see. Bill TVA for the full cost of the cleanup. (If that would make them go bankrupt, well, tough. The feds can put them in liquidation and sell them off piece by piece to pay for cleaning up their mess. Mistakes have consequences.) Follow up with a full criminal investigation and assessment of punitive fines (which I think are due even if there is only incompetence). If any malfeasance or violation of laws is found on the part of TVA, find out who ordered it and nail 'em to the wall. I'd be 100% behind a US Attorney who offered immunity to workers who followed orders to break the law if they rolled and testified against their bosses.

It is hard for me to think that this is any more toxic than your averare volcanic mudflow (of similar volume). I think most of the damage will be mechanical, not chemical.

Still, an ugly incident. One that will hopefully cause the supporters of coal to rethink their position. And just maybe maybe pretty please, the opponents of regulation just might have to eat a small piece of humble pie.

But, using this as an anti cleancoal wedge I think is too much -at least if clean coal is the inground gassification kind, with carbon capture. But at this point, all attempts at that in the (can't do) US have been stopped, by high costs, although the Can-do Chinese have plans for several plants.

the disastrously wasteful, poisonous life style of western "civilization" in the industrial revolution age is coming back as a monstrous upchuck.

... writes spek, on his petroleum-based-plastic computer manufactured with caustic solvents and heavy metals and running on (probably) non-renewable power.

"I agree that working in a coal mine is like a daily trip to the gates of hell, but when there are no other alternatives, it begins to look a little better."

I grew up in a steel town, not a mining town. But I think the phrase is similar: "I'm not afraid of going to Hell, I already work there!" I'm not really sure whether being a coalminer or a steelworker is tougher, but both jobs suck. I think I'd rather be a steelworker. But I can take the heat and am claustrophobic.

Thanks Matt, 4:22 -- with ya. My sympathies and best wishes. Together, maybe we can do something.

Giraud: Learn or fuck off.

"One that will hopefully cause the supporters of coal to rethink their position."

Huh? You are obviously more optimistic than I am. But previous coal mine disasters have done nothing to change people's opinions about mining. In fact, previous mine disasters have improved some people's opinions. The death of a bunch of workers meant that there were now jobs available. Miners are a tough crowd.

ry ry,

I completely agree with your last paragraph - even tho it might cost my spouse his job. He wryly commented that the enviromental staff will probably be the ones laid off next year anyway when $$ are tight due to the costs of this cleanup. Their jobs have been teetering on the brink for the last 10 years, ever since TVA stopped taking any Federal funds (the natural resource/environmental folks used to be paid by the Feds - it was around 2 percent of the total TVA budget) and went to all power funding.

I think one of the problems with the initial PR was that TVA sent its "communications" people out to talk. These guys know less than nothing about technical stuff like ash ponds and water quality, and they said a bunch of stupid stuff. I've noticed that after the first day or two the techies started talking to the press, and at least the information started making more sense.

It is hard for me to think that this is any more toxic than your averare volcanic mudflow (of similar volume). I think most of the damage will be mechanical, not chemical.

I think that will probably turn out to be the case, although there will be some chemical damage from heavy metals. Still, cleaning 300 acres of 4-6 feet of sludge is bad enough.

TVA was very, very lucky nobody was killed.

As for regulation, while I'm sure regulation of emissions would have been tighter in the last 8 years under a Democratic administration, I have no idea if that applies to regulation of ash ponds. I don't even know if they're primarily regulated by the state or by the Feds. That's one thing I've not seen reported on yet, and I'd like to know more about it.

And to whoever said that coal was supported here because it was produced here: there is a bit of coal mining on the Cumberland Plateau, but Tennessee is NOT a big coal mining state. We're not Kentucky or West Virginia.

Oh, and Glenn Reynolds finally has a post up about this, in which he points out that TVA is a government entity, not a corporate one.

That's really misleading in TVA's case, but it's predictable coming from Glenn.

Gemini,

Interesting point about the "communications" people. It reminds me of Richard Feynman's appendix to the Challenger investigation in which he relates anecdotes from the investigation that show the management and quasi-political people calling the shots and talking to politicians and the public to be entirely out of touch with the engineers and anyone else who knows anything about anything. I'm not really making a point here, it just seems to be a common observation (cf. the Dilbert Principle, even as much of a wanker as Scott Adams can be). Why does the social norm seem to be that while we put experts who know their shit on the ground doing things, the decisions of what they do are so often made by people who neither know anything about what they're deciding nor care to listen to the actual experts? I don't know. All I can say is I'd at least have the self-awareness to not let anyone put me in charge of anything.

I'm sorry to hear that your husband would probably be among the first on the chopping block, and actually that makes me rethink some of my more idealistic (perhaps vindictive, but still idealistic) statements. In theory, I think any organization that messes up like this needs to face serious consequences, but, yeah, as a practical matter, the people who screwed up walk and the people doing actual work bear the consequences. Organizations don't make decisions or take actions, people do. And yet we have (explicitly, ever since Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad) this fiction of corporate personhood that lets criminals foist responsibility for their actions off on others. Sometimes I really hate society.

Don't really know where I'm going with any of this. But I'm glad to hear input from someone who knows more than any of us about the nitty gritty details of how things actually work. So, thank you. (And sorry if I came across as an @$$hole at all in my last post. I get carried away sometimes.)

over twice as much as the TVA originally thought said was in the entire pond.

my "delete" didn't work

cross out the words "originally thought" and replace with "said"

no way they "thought" there was 1/2 as much as there was

they either lied, deliberately didn't pay attention so they could say they didn't know or just never paid attention in the first place

putzes.

RyRy,

The entire communciations dynamic at TVA is interesting (and probably not very different from many big corporations/agencies). The staff is usually forbidden to talk directly with the press - everything must go through the Communications people. That may get out a consistent message, but in a case like this, where you need to understand the technical details of what you're talking about, it just magnifies the problem.

I didn't think you were an a**hole. In fact, I think you're one of the few commenters who are attempting to engage in intelligent dialog, rather than just venting their spleens on TVA and/or red states.

It is hard for me to think that this is any more toxic than your averare volcanic mudflow (of similar volume). I think most of the damage will be mechanical, not chemical.

No. Volcanic debris contains a large amount of the light elements. It has not burned, it was only molten. It's mostly silicon, followed by sulfur and iron.

Coal contains mostly carbon, some light elements, nearly no metals, and a small amount of heavy elements which are in all living things.

Fly ash is what's left after burning the coal. All the light elements - mostly carbon - have been released into the atmosphere or recovered. So all that's left is large amounts of concentrated heavy elements among middle-weight non-metal elements.

The first damage is the spill. A flood kills many fish. The cold, the disturbance, and the silt will kill things quickly. The heavy metals, the poisonous compounds... Those will snuff out life over the next few months, turning it to wasteland. Over the next tens of years, it will poison higher life via dust (which is why it's kept wet) and leeching.

There will be nothing alive in those 300 arces come next year, and nothing will live long there for the next hundred years. We're talking both smaller and more deadly than Chernobyl.

I love this line from the article:

"Residents with wells in the area are being advised to boil their water before drinking it, however."

Yeah, right. Boiling your water kills germs after sewage contamination or watermain breaks...but I'm pretty sure boiling your water does nothing to remove heavy metal contaminants.

Ah, yes, clean coal again.

I spent some time studying clean coal, + came up w/a solution which could, in theory, make coal a reasonably clean fuel. But there are two big problems w/any sort of clean coal idea.

#1: Let's stipulate- take as an absolute given- that your clean coal solution captures 100% of all the CO2 and CO released by burning coal. Now, this is all but impossible, but let's stipulate it anyhow. The reason I'm willing to do that is that coal releases a lot more than CO and CO2 when it burns- as the OP mentions, it releases mercury and other poisonous elements and compounds. Even if you manage to trap these underground, all you're doing is postponing the date at which you're going to have to reckon w/all that poison. Not a pretty thought.

#2: Let's go one step further, then, and stipulate that there *is* no poisonous leftover after you burn the coal- none at all. This is, again, impossible, but I'm willing to stipulate it b/c the environmental damage due to coal mining is so huge. Mountaintop removal, anyone? Coal mining was always a nasty, filthy business, but it's gotten worse over the past few decades. And the economic devastation from coal mining will remain even if you remove *all* ecological effects from burning the coal.

Clean coal isn't a dream; it's more of a pipe dream. And that's even before you consider disasters like this.

-Z

Oh, and Glenn Reynolds finally has a post up about this, in which he points out that TVA is a government entity, not a corporate one.

So utterly predictable and, in TVA's case, a distinction without a difference. TVA doesn't operate that much differently from most corporations - i.e. it's inefficient, political and bureaucratic.

TVA is a federal "corporation" and has received no taxpayer appropriations for several years (if not decades). Yet, for years, the free market fundamentalists have been calling for the power generation and transmission assets to be sold to the magical private sector (Duke and Southern Company are likely benefactors) while the taxpayers get virtually nothing for the deal.

The problem is that there still is a substantial role played by TVA wrt flood control, environmental monitoring and navigation along the Tennessee and its tributaries. I'm not sure what would become of these vital functions if the power side of the organization, which is the side that makes money, was sold off. I suppose the COE might take over.

As a former employee, I can tell you a lot about what is wrong with TVA, but I'd hate to see it dismantled. Given the age of many of the dams and locks in the river system, and given the general state of infrastructure across our great country (e.g. Louisiana and Minnesota), I shudder to think what would happen if responsibility for the TVA river management system, with all of its faults, was fragmented between any number of private companies and other agencies.

Have they been doing the maintenance and monitoring they should have? I have no idea, but I can't see it getting any better after dismantling.

The private sector doesn't do long term maintenance when the focus is on short term results.

As a geologist (in N. Calif.) who works with mud flows that sometimes eat houses, I recognize the photos in the news. Sounds like several (not "many") houses were affected (basically destroyed). This happens every winter in L.A.

The heavy metals are something else, but really NOBODY on this thread (except Gemini, and not me either) really knows how toxic the situation is actually is there. It is fun to bad-mouth poor regulation, and goodness knows, there is Plenty of bad/no regulation to bad-mouth. BUT, seems to me, as a technical professional, that we shouldn't necessarily believe everything that we think.

Hey all you southern 'liberals' who live in states like Tennessee where there's so damn many right wing whack jobs that your vote will never matter...

Yeah, you useless 'liberals' who keep living in states full of conservative shit heads.

FUCK YOU!!

AND STOP WHINING!

Hey, SoSW: FUCK YOU! Stop whining about what's wrong with America. Just move to France or something. Why do you keep living in a country full of conservative shitheads? What, you have a job? Maybe not enough money to move a long distance? Well, tough shit. Go fuck yourself.

It's an interesting experience having to repeatedly smack people with this written clue-by-four, being from a solidly blue area of a solidly blue state and all. Can't help but think of the (I'd guess apocryphal) "ancient Chinese curse": "may you live in interesting times." I must have really fucked up in a past life or something.

Hey RyRy, BYE BYE!

You're just another southern whiner.

Enjoy your toxic waste, there's more to come to you and your type.

The first thing I thought about after hearing about this retention pond failure is how much the disaster was like the frequent failure of sludge lagoons at factory farms. The problem isn't that coal is dirty but the electric generation plant wasn't properly disposing of its waste. All factories, farms and households produce waste. Much of it a lot more toxic that you would think. But it only becomes an issue when the waste is allowed to pile up. That fly ash should have been taken to a hazardous waste disposal site and safely interred. Just dumping it into an artifical lagoon is just plain nuts.

Coal can be made clean, but it costs money and requires proper disposal of stuff.

Wow, I'm southern apparently. I always thought the 45th parallel was north of the Mason-Dixon line (~40th parallel) and south of me, but now I see that geography and math are just Republican lies to make me feel better about my obvious culpability for the actions of people I've never met who are thousands of miles away. Thanks for clearing that up, SoSW!

Hey all you southern 'liberals' who live in states like Tennessee where there's so damn many right wing whack jobs that your vote will never matter...

Awww....did wittle Joey learn to use sock puppets? How cute!