Moderator: • Jeremy Oden, Alabama Public Service NARUC-DOE Carbon Capture, Commission Utilization, and Storage Chair, NARUC Subcommittee on Clean Coal and Partnership Carbon Management Speakers: • Maria Seidler, Seidler Consulting • Ken Malloy, Crisis & Energy Markets A Comprehensive Survey of Coal Ash Law and Commercialization : Its Environmental Risks, Disposal Regulation, and Beneficial Use Markets
QUESTIONS Submit questions two ways: 1. Raise your hand and the moderator will call on you to 1 unmute your line 2 2. Type a question into the question box | page 2
A Webinar Review February 6, 2020 Maria Seidler Ken Malloy
Background for Webinar 1. Coal Ash developments, even since the EPA ‘s Final Rule in 2015, have been far -reaching in their scope and complexity and continue to evolve. 2. There are 4 certainties: • Electric utilities cannot continue status quo practices; • Changes in coal ash management will be expensive; • Cost responsibility will be highly contested; • Tension between desired environmental outcomes and the ultimate costs. 3. In response, NARUC commissioned this White Paper to better understand the implications of the Final Rule for States, but more specifically for State utility regulatory commissions. 4. The White Paper is organized to provide a comprehensive foundation on which to build a deeper understanding of coal ash issues and regulatory responses. 5. The Webinar will focus on the subject of the regulatory and costs implications for the State. Specifically, States must: • Adopt a coal ash program for approval by EPA consistent with its Final Rule or, by default, relinquish authority to EPA under its federal permit program.; and • Manage impact of compliance costs on electric customers. 6. No clear policy has evolved on how to coordinate state environmental agencies’ responsibility for coal ash programs with PUCs ‘responsibility for managing i mpact of compliance costs on customers: • North Carolina is a good case study of the controversy of cost recovery • Kentucky and Indiana are good case studies of agency coordination for balancing compliance approach and costs. 4
White Paper Main Takeaways 1. Coal ash is an environmental challenge. 2. EPA issued a major rulemaking in 2015 regulating disposal of coal ash from electricity. 3. The Final Rule will require major and costly action by electric utilities /IPPs. 4. Compliance with the Final Rule is very complex and technical. 5. Permitting Rules are in a state of flux creating uncertainty under a tight deadline. 6. Coal ash has many commercial applications qualifying as Beneficial Use with commercial value. 7. Congress enacted WIIN in 2016, giving EPA special enforcement authority over coal ash. 8. State environmental policy will dictate utilities’ compliance path with federal criteria. 9. PUCs will have the responsibility of determining electric rate impact of costs. 10. North Carolina serves as a barometer of the debate on who should bear cost responsibility. 5
1. Coal Ash Coal ash or coal combustion residuals (CCR) is what’s left over after coal is burned for electric generation Mostly deposed of in surface impoundments and landfills located on generation site near waterways Environmental Challenges from Coal Ash Disposal • Structural Integrity: Collapse Catastrophes • Water Quality: Leaching into Groundwater Growing commercial uses as an alternative to disposal: • Established: cement, gypsum, road surfaces • Potential: Advanced R&D in new applications and rare earth elements (REE) 6
2. Size of Disposal Pro blem Over 1000 coal ash ponds and landfills Number of Plants: • 307 plants with on-site CCR waste disposal units • 197 plants which transports CCR waste to off-site landfills • Many of these plants do both Number, Size, and Age of On-site CCR Waste Disposal Units: • Combined total of 310 active landfills and 735 active surface impoundments • Average size of landfills was over 120 acres, or 90 football fields, with a depth of 40 feet • Average size of surface impoundments was 50 acres, with a depth of 20 feet • Most are over 25 years old; 56 units are older than 50 years 7
3. EPA CCR Disposal Rulemaking 1976 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) • Provides federal technical and financial assistance to help States to reduce waste through conservation of resources recoverable from waste • Authorizes EPA to regulate disposal of hazardous waste • Raises question whether coal ash is a hazardous waste • Amended o 1980 Bevill Amendment requires EPA to report on the coal ash question o 1991 HSWA adds new subtitle D for disposal of non-hazardous waste Infamous coal ash spills in 2010 and 2014 2010 Proposed rulemaking to regulate coal ash as non-hazardous waste 2015 Final Rule establishing national minimum criteria for the disposal of coal ash non- hazardous waste 8
4. Compliance is Technical and Complex 3 primary areas addressed in the Final Rule’s national minimum criteria: • Standards for safe disposal in existing, new or extended units operating on- site • Standards for closure and post – closure care of non-compliant units • Definition of beneficial use regulatory exemption from disposal regulations The minimum criteria designed to address risks posed by • groundwater contamination • structural failures • fugitive dust emissions 9
4. Compliance is Technical and Complex Technical criteria for disposal units to operate: • Location Restrictions • Design Standards – Liners and Structural Integrity • Operating Standards o Fugitive Dust Control o Run-on/Run-off for Landfills o Hydrologic and Hydraulic Capacity Requirements • Monitoring, Inspections & Public Information o Groundwater Monitoring Program and Corrective Action o Inspections for Surface Impoundments and Landfills o Record Keeping and Internet Posting 10
4. Compliance is Technical and Complex Closure and Post-Closure Care Criteria for non-compliant CCR disposal units • Closure in Place (Cap-in-place) • Closure by Removal (Excavate and haul) • Closure Deadlines Definition of “Beneficial Use” to identify activities that would be exempt from CCR disposal criteria • Encapsulated uses – a use that binds CCR into a solid matrix; cement • Unencapsulated uses – a use that is not encapsulated; structural fill, roadways • Temporary “Piles” pending Beneficial Use 11
5A. Beneficial Use: RCRA Alternative Solution to Disposal EPA Definition of Beneficial Use Criteria 1: The CR must provide a functional benefit. Criteria 2: The CCR must substitute for the use of a virgin material, conserving natural resources that would otherwise need to be obtained through practices, such as extraction. Criteria 3: The use of the CCR must meet relevant product specifications, regulatory standards or design standards when available, and when such standards are not available, the CCR is not used in excess quantities. If all the requirements of Criteria 1, 2 and 3 are met, and if the use of the CCR meets the definition of encapsulated use, the CCR use satisfies the beneficial use definition; if the use does not meet the definition of encapsulated use and so is an unencapsulated use that involves less than 12,400 tons of CCR, the CCR use satisfies the beneficial use definition; but if the use is an unencapsulated use that involves 12,400 or more tons of CCR, Criteria 4 must be met in order to be a beneficial use. 80 CFR 153 defines encapsulated beneficial use as a beneficial use of CCR that binds the CCR into a solid matrix that minimizes its mobilization into the surrounding environment. Criteria 4 When unencapsulated use of CCR involving placement on the land of 12,400 tons or more in non-roadway applications, the user must demonstrate and keep records, and provide such documentation upon request, that environmental releases to groundwater, surface water, soil and air are comparable to or lower than those from analogous products made without CCR, or that environmental releases to groundwater, surface water, soil and air will be at or below relevant regulatory and health-based benchmarks for human and ecological receptors during use. 12
5B. Current Beneficial Uses: Demonstrates Value 64% of 2017 generated coal ash was recycled and sold for a beneficial end use Conventional coal ash products or CCPs include fly ash, bottom ash, boiler slag and FGD gypsum 13
5C. Future Beneficial Uses: CCR Solution Increasing Value DOE: Request for Information in March 2019 • New advancements in fossil fuel byproduct utilization • Pathways to produce value-added products from coal ash National Energy Technology Lab (NETL) • Maximize the value of coal as a feedstock and develop new high-value products derived from coal, initiated the Coal Beneficiation Program Advanced research in future uses: • Cenospheres – lighter, but stronger composite for car manufacturing • Rare earth elements – o China has 70% of global market; U.S. effectively no domestic supply; national security need o Vulnerability of U.S. economic sectors and U.S. defense industries: cell phones, computers, engines, all things electronics 14
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