ATLANTA – The state is moving forward with plans to leave in place coal ash from some of Georgia Power’s closed ash ponds despite objections from neighbors and environmental groups.
The Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) has issued a draft permit allowing the Atlanta-based utility to cap one of four ash ponds at Plant Hammond in Floyd County near the Coosa River, leaving the ash in an unlined pit. Ash from the other three ponds will be excavated and removed for storage in a lined landfill.
The Plant Hammond ash pond is the first of 10 around the state Georgia Power plans to close in place. Ash from 19 other ponds will be excavated and removed.
Several factors were considered in deciding which ash ponds to excavate and which to close in place, Georgia Power spokesman John Kraft wrote in an email.
“We have worked with third-party professional engineers and geologists to design our plans on a site-by-site basis considering size, location, amount of material and the geology of the area among other factors,” Kraft wrote. “Each closure design is unique.”
But Georgians who live near ash ponds slated to be closed in place and environmental advocates say all of the ponds should be excavated.
Coal ash contains contaminants including mercury, cadmium and arsenic that can pollute groundwater and drinking water.
In the case of Plant Hammond, leaving the ash in an unlined pit will cause it to come into contact with groundwater, Jesse Demonbreun-Chapman, executive director of the Coosa River Basin Initiative, said Aug. 10 during a public hearing on the draft permit.
“Allowing it to remain in groundwater does not protect the Coosa River or water downstream,” he said. “It should be separated from water.”
Georgia Power is spending an estimated $8.1 billion on a multi-year plan to close all 29 of its ash ponds located at 11 coal-burning power plants across the state to comply with federal and state regulations.
The plants – including Plant Hammond – are being retired as the utility reduces its reliance on coal for power generation in order to reach a long-term goal of lower carbon emissions.
Aaron Mitchell, director of environmental affairs for Georgia Power, said the closure-in-place option for ash ponds is one of two authorized by both the EPD and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the other being excavation and removal.
The EPD’s permitting program for ash ponds due to be closed in place requires post-closure care for 30 years, including ongoing maintenance of the cover and groundwater monitoring. Results from monitoring must be reported at least twice a year and posted on Georgia Power’s website.
“It addresses both the federal and state rules and establishes permitting conditions we will comply with to protect the public health and environment,” Mitchell said. “Safe, effective closure is part of our commitment to the community.”
Opponents of closing ash ponds in place point to Juliette as an example of what can happen when ash left in an unlined pond contaminates adjacent groundwater. Residents of that community near Georgia Power’s Plant Scherer are suing Georgia Power over contamination of their drinking water wells.
“Georgia Power is gambling with our public health,” Acworth resident Robert Whorton testified at the Aug. 10 hearing. “I don’t think we should accept toxic coal ash leaching into our groundwater.”
Others who spoke at the hearing warned the decision the EPD makes on the Plant Hammond draft permit likely will set a precedent that will affect the other nine closure-in-place plans Georgia Power will be seeking from the state agency.
The EPD is accepting written public comment on the draft permit through Sept. 10.
ATLANTA – Georgia has won another legal battle in the decades-long tri-state water wars.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Thrash sided with Georgia this week in a lawsuit the state of Alabama filed challenging Georgia’s use of water from Lake Lanier. The suit accused the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers of mismanaging water allocations from Lake Lanier and other federal reservoirs in the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint (ACF) River Basin.
Thrash’s ruling was the second court victory this year in the three states’ tug of war over water allocations that dates back to the 1990s.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Georgia’s favor last spring, denying an effort by the state of Florida to cap Georgia’s water withdrawals from the ACF.
Florida’s lawyers had argued Georgia’s use of water from the basin was destroying the oyster industry in Apalachicola Bay. Georgia’s representatives countered that the state deserves credit for major advances in water-use efficiency during the last 20 years.
As in the Supreme Court case, Thrash found that Georgia’s use of water to supply customers in the rapidly growing Atlanta region was not harming either downstream users or the environment.
“We are pleased with Judge Thrash’s decision,” Gov. Brian Kemp and Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr wrote in a joint statement. “As his order made clear, the Corps of Engineers’ decision struck a reasonable balance that assures Georgians a dependable supply of water while protecting the environment and preserving other important uses of the ACF Basin.
“We will continue to be good stewards of our water resources, and we are proud to have obtained a positive resolution on behalf of all Georgians.”
Katherine Zitsch, managing director of natural resources for the Atlanta Regional Commission, said this week’s decision was vital to Georgia’s future.
“This ruling is exceptional news for Georgia and metro Atlanta, as it secures our region’s water supply needs from Lake Lanier and the Chattahoochee River,” she said.
“Combined with the recent win in the Supreme Court, we have taken two big steps in litigation. We look forward to moving beyond the courtroom and instead collaborating on ways to improve management in the basin.”
But the legal battles over water are far from over. Alabama has the right to appeal Thrash’s ruling. Meanwhile, another lawsuit Alabama filed challenging Georgia’s withdrawals of water from the Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa River Basin remains pending.
ATLANTA – The Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) is going after bad actors in the rooftop solar industry.
Commission Chairman Tricia Pridemore has sent a letter urging state Attorney General Chris Carr to protect Georgia homeowners from rooftop solar panel installers advertising free electricity and free solar.
“Some less-than-reputable companies are making promises they can’t deliver,” Pridemore said.
The PSC approved a pilot program two years ago allowing 5,000 homeowners to install solar panels on their rooftops and sell any excess energy produced back to Georgia Power. That 5,000 cap was reached this summer, and representatives of the solar industry have been urging the commission to raise the limit.
Georgia is ranked ninth in the nation for solar installation and is one of the fastest growing solar markets, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association.
But the PSC has been cautious about moving too quickly on rooftop solar because of complications including whether homeowners using solar energy, Georgia Power or the utility’s customers should be paying the cost of transferring power to and from the grid.
False ads being run by disreputable rooftop solar installers are misrepresenting the pilot program, regulators and utilities, Pridemore wrote to Carr.
“The solar developer industry is self-regulated, but there are clear and decisive laws against misleading advertisements,” Pridemore wrote. “I implore the attorney general’s office to protect hard-working Georgia homeowners from these scams and companies who seek to damage the exceptional reputation of Georgia’s utility system.”
ATLANTA – Former Georgia Secretary of State Cathy Cox has been chosen as the sole finalist to become president of Georgia College & State University in Milledgeville.
Cox, who has spent 14 years in academia since leaving state government, currently serves as dean of the Mercer University School of Law. Before that, she served for a decade as president of Young Harris College.
“Cathy Cox knows and appreciates the impact of a 21st-century liberal arts education while deeply understanding the need to support students and commit to their success,” Teresa MacCartney, the University System of Georgia’s acting chancellor, said Thursday.
“Cathy’s experience and record show she is the best candidate to continue Georgia College & State University’s progress toward becoming a preeminent national public liberal arts university.”
Cox, a Democrat, was elected Georgia’s first female secretary of state in 1998. She served two terms before running unsuccessfully for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in 2006.
The Bainbridge native also served two terms in the Georgia House of Representatives.
Cox earned a journalism degree from the University of Georgia and worked as a newspaper reporter in Bainbridge and Gainesville before entering the law school at Mercer. She practiced law for a decade after graduating magna cum laude.
She also earned an associate’s degree in agriculture from Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College in Tifton.
“As someone who earned her undergraduate degrees through the University System of Georgia, I know how important it is to give students a strong foundation and the skills they need to help themselves and the state succeed,” Cox said.
“I am very excited for the chance to build upon Georgia College & State University’s reputation and work with faculty and staff to create a world-class destination for the liberal arts right here in Georgia.”
The university system’s Board of Regents will take action Cox’s appointment at a future board meeting.
Current Georgia College President Steve Dorman has announced he is leaving this fall.
ATLANTA – The United States, including Georgia, became more urban and more diverse during the last decade, according to U.S. Census results released Thursday.
The first detailed data from the 2020 Census covering cities, counties and census blocks showed the concentration of Americans in the nation’s metropolitan areas increased from 84.3% in 2010 to 86.3% last year.
Population growth in Georgia during the decade was limited primarily to the counties in metro Atlanta and along the coast.
On the other hand, many of the counties in rural Georgia lost population between 2010 and 2020, including large swaths of South Georgia.
That trend was reflected across the country, as the nation’s more heavily populated counties grew while the smaller counties lost residents.
“The country’s population is increasingly metropolitan,” Marc Perry, senior demographer in the U.S. Census Bureau’s Population Division, said during a news conference announcing the results.
Meanwhile, the nation’s population grew more diverse during the last decade.
While the country’s white population fell by 8.6% between 2010 and 2020, the Black population grew by 5.6%. The Hispanic and Asian populations also showed large increases.
The most diverse regions of the U.S. were in the South and West, including Georgia. Black residents make up the majority in many Georgia counties, primarily in parts of metro Atlanta, rural counties west of Augusta and in Southwest Atlanta, the Census found.
Nicholas Jones, the Census Bureau’s director of race and ethnic research, said data showing increased diversity across the nation resulted not only from demographic changes but from the way the 2020 Census was conducted. Improvements in how the questions were designed resulted in many Americans self-identifying as belonging to more than one race, he said.
Hispanics made up the largest minority group, with 62.1 million Americans self-identifying as Hispanic or Latino only. Black Americans self-identifying as members of one race only accounted for 41.1 million.
Thursday’s data release was the second from the 2020 Census. The Census Bureau reported in April that the total U.S. population grew by 7.4% between 2010 and 2020 to 331.4 million, the slowest growth rate since the 1930s.
Georgia remains the nation’s eighth-most populous state with a population of 10.7 million, up from 9.7 million a decade ago.
With the slower growth, only six states will receive more congressional seats. For the first time since the 1980 census, Georgia will not be among them.
The General Assembly will use the data to redraw Georgia’s congressional and legislative districts during a special legislative session this fall.
Ron Jarmin, the Census Bureau’s acting director, said the Census Bureau is getting out the data several months later than usual due to delays prompted by the pandemic.
Critics also blamed former President Donald Trump for delays caused by his administration’s unsuccessful attempt to ask Americans filling out census forms whether they are U.S. citizens, which was blocked in the federal courts.
Despite the delays, Jarmin vouched for the accuracy of the data.
“While no census is perfect, we are confident today’s redistricting data meet our high data quality standards,” he said.
The Census Bureau will release the same data it put out on Thursday in a different, more user-friendly form, by the end of next month.
