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To C or To D, that is the question…

By April 3, 2014September 3rd, 2014Emerging Issues

I was recently reminded that as a follow-up to my post A Goat Named?______ on February 17, 2014, I was going to briefly discuss the pending U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations of coal ash facilities in the United States.

The regulations have been in the works for quite a while—an initial draft was issued on June 21, 2010. In a January 2014 federal lawsuit Consent Decree, the EPA agreed to a December 19, 2014 deadline for publishing the coal ash regulations.

The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) appears to be the basis for the regulations that are coming. There has been much debate over whether the coal ash residuals would fall under Subtitle C (Hazardous Waste) or Subtitle D (Non-Hazardous), and current indicators seem to reflect coal ash will fall under the Subtitle D regulations.

The following link will take you to the key differences between Subtitle C and Subtitle D as it relates to the coal ash: http://www.epa.gov/osw/nonhaz/industrial/special/fossil/ccr-rule/ccr-table.htm.

I am curious to hear any thoughts you may have on this issue as well as the potential impacts you see ahead.