RALEIGH, N.C. – The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality held a public information session Tuesday evening regarding Duke Energy’s Allen Steam Station.
The meeting was at Stuart Cramer High School in Belmont at 6 p.m. [ALSO READ: Families near Allen Steam Station mark 1,000 days living off bottled water] This was the first of several opportunities for the community to discuss what they value in a closure plan and coal ash impoundment for the Allen Steam Station.
She and many of her neighbors spent years drinking bottled water.
They also fought to get a water line but only if they agreed not to sue Duke Energy.
[ALSO READ: Neighbors worry construction near Duke Energy power plant could disturb buried coal ash] Duke Energy has presented options for the state to consider at the Allen Steam plant and the Marshal plant: Covering the coal ash ponds would cost Duke $185 million Moving some ash and covering it all: $280 million Moving it to a landfill on site: $558 million Moving it to an offsite landfill: $1.2 billion Duke Energy wants to cover it, but Brown wants it all hauled away.
"They are unlined, and they are sitting next to our rivers and lakes," Brown said.
"Coal ash is poisonous forever,” Catawba River Keeper Brandon Jones said.
“These are elements (that) don’t breakdown."
"We have decades worth of surface testing on Lake Wylie that shows the lake is safe," Duke Energy spokesman Bill Norton said.
Duke Energy said it will remove coal ash closest to residents.