Stories

The state legislature should hold public hearings into the way Iowa regulates coal ash disposal, the chairwoman of the state’s Environmental Protection Commission said.

Democrats are pushing for a vote on federal climate change legislation, perhaps as early as Friday, despite continued misgivings from farm-state Democrats like U.S. Rep. Leonard Boswell.

At today’s monthly meeting, Iowa’s Environmental Protection Commission (EPC), an arm of the state’s Department of Natural Resources that provides policy oversight, will hear from Cedar Rapids-based Plains Justice on the potential public health risks associated with coal ash disposal in quarries and mines and why a system of standardized groundwater monitoring should be mandated.

State regulators should hold public hearings and conduct research to decide whether changes are needed in how Iowa regulates coal ash disposal, said the chairs of the House and Senate environmental committees.

Officials at Iowa State University will meet with the owners of the site where its toxic coal ash is dumped to discuss possible public health dangers, a move that could lead the school to weigh “the ramifications of changing” its dumping policy.

Jeffrey Witt, assistant director of utilities for Iowa State University, said since new information has come to light, “it was time to touch base again” with the owners of the unlined, unmonitored dump.

The University of Iowa is reviewing new reports on the environmental impact of coal ash and whether the way it disposes of the ash it produces should be changed, the school’s spokesman said Thursday.
Following an Iowa Independent story discussing the school’s method of disposing of coal ash in an unlined, unmonitored quarry in Waterloo, university [...]

When Iowa’s Department of Natural Resources last year began to draft tougher regulations on the disposal of coal ash, the toxic byproduct of burning coal, it faced an enormous backlash. And joining the fight against regulation was the University of Iowa.

Plans for a coal-fired power plant in Marshalltown have been canceled because of current economic conditions and increasing environmental, legislative and regulatory uncertainty, according to information from Alliant Energy, the company that would have operated the plant.

A Department of Agriculture program that provided low-interest loans for rural coal power has been suspended. Iowa’s largest coal-burning plant, Council Bluffs No. 4, received $177 million from the USDA in 2004.

Iowa Global Warming will host a free screening of "The 11th Hour," a documentary about ecological threats on the planet, to be shown in West Des Moines Monday night.