OMAHA, Neb. (KMTV) — The Iowa Environmental Council officially responded on Wednesday to MidAmerican's proposal to discharge wastewater into the Missouri River.
The group says MidAmerican does not plan to treat the water despite listing a cleaner alternative in its proposal. At question is coal ash leachate, or water that's run through coal ash.
Untreated waste?
KMTV reported last week that MidAmerican said it would hold the wastewater in treatment ponds, countering IEC's characterization of the water as untreated.
IEC expanded on the treatment options in an interview Thursday.
"Sitting in a pond can be a treatment for some things," said Mike Schmidt, staff attorney at the IEC. "For dissolved solids, dissolved metals ... Sitting in a pond is not treatment."
They would prefer a physical/chemical treatment that would remove any toxins but that would cost MidAmerican more money.
MidAmerican says the discharge would meet all federal and state standards.
Justification
The IEC argues that even discharges that meet standards must be justified and show "any important economic or social development that would allow for a lowering of water quality."
"MidAmerican basically just identified itself as being affected and nobody else," Schmidt said. "There was no justification for degrading the water."
MidAmerican does include an economic and social statement on its proposal, but the IEC argues it is insufficient.
Proposed EPA rule
The IEC says MidAmerican did not account for a proposed EPA rule that would be more stringent.
MidAmerican says the proposed discharge would meet those stricter standards from the EPA, too.
Its full statement is below:
MidAmerican's proposal meets all federal and state standards. Contrary to the IEC's claims, MidAmerican did consider current and potentially more stringent future regulatory requirements as the proposal was being developed. This included the anticipated, and recently published, proposal from EPA to amend wastewater standards for leachate discharges.
While EPA established these limitations based on an evaluation of treatment technologies, the proposal does not require a specific treatment method, only that the outflow meets the limits. In other words, the EPA does not require a particular type of technology or process; rather, it establishes limits that are protective of public health and environment, and sampling of the leachate demonstrates that it will meet the more stringent limitations proposed by EPA. Further, MidAmerican will be required to meet and demonstrate that it is meeting these requirements as part of a permit.
The bottom line is that MidAmerican’s proposed plan meets both EPA’s current regulations and would meet the new, more stringent standards that EPA has proposed to implement.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources will consider public comments and is the agency charged with making a final determination on this pending matter.
IEC's full response to MidAmerican's proposal is here.
MidAmerican's draft proposal is here. Feedback is accepted until Friday before comments will be incorporated into a final proposal that would be submitted to the State of Iowa's Department of Natural Resources.
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