NORTH CAROLINA
Three subsidiaries of the largest utility in the United States plead guilty and were fined $102 million for polluting the Dan River by pouring massive coal ash into the water, federal officials announced Thursday.
Officials with the three subsidiaries of North Carolina-based Duke Energy Corporation plead guilty in federal court to nine criminal violations of the Clean Water Act at several of its North Carolina facilities.
“The massive coal ash spill into North Carolina’s Dan River last year was a crime and it was the result of repeated failures by Duke Energy’s subsidiaries to exercise controls over coal ash facilities,” said Assistant Attorney General John C. Cruden of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division. “The terms of these three plea agreements will help prevent this kind of environmental disaster from reoccurring in North Carolina and throughout the United States by requiring Duke subsidiaries to follow a rigorous and independently verifiable program to ensure they comply with the law.”
Four of the charges are the result of the massive coal ash spill from the Dan River steam station into the Dan River near Eden, North Carolina, in February 2014.
The remaining violations were discovered after further investigation, officials said.
Duke’s subsidiaries operate 18 facilities in five states, including 14 in North Carolina. They will be required to develop environmental compliance programs to be monitored by a court appointed monitor and be regularly and independently audited.
Results of these audits will be made available to the public to ensure compliance with environmental laws and programs, officials said.
Duke Energy also agreed to have enough money to assure the company can move the coal ash in all of its facilities across the country to lined landfills. The cost for this is $3.4 billion, officials said.
About 108 million tons of coal ash are currently held in coal ash basins owned and operated by the defendants in North Carolina, officials state.
Duke Energy Corporation subsidiaries also operate facilities with coal ash basins in South Carolina, about 5.9 million tons of coal ash, Kentucky, about 1.5 million tons of coal ash, Indiana, about 35.6 million tons of coal ash and Ohio, about 5.9 million tons of coal ash, according to authorities.
The companies must close coal ash impoundments at the Asheville, Dan River, Riverbend and Sutton facilities, officials said.