Landfill won't be main coal ash receiverFeb 8 - McClatchy-Tribune Content Agency, LLC - Don Wilkins Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
The Daviess County Landfill was preparing for a double expansion in order to start accepting Owensboro Municipal Utilities' coal combustion residuals. But now that won't be necessary -- at least for the foreseeable future. David Smith, director of legislative services for Daviess Fiscal Court, said the county's landfill on Kentucky 815 won't be the main receiver of OMU's coal combustion residuals, which are also known as CCR or coal ash. When the county was awarded the bid in October, Smith said the county initially thought the landfill would be receiving about 100,000 tons of the coal ash a year and generating an estimated $1.575 million in revenue that would go into the landfill's operational budget. But now, Smith said, the agreement only guarantees the landfill 125,000 tons of coal ash or "some material" in a five-year period. "They may wait and bring us all of the material in the last year," Smith said. "We took a long time to come to the agreement, because we had to come to an agreement that was mutually beneficial for both the county and OMU." Daviess Fiscal Court will be voting on the new disposal contract with OMU during its 5 p.m. meeting on Monday, Feb. 8. Sonya Dixon, OMU's spokeswoman, said the Daviess County Landfill was the only disposal option awarded. The utility also sought bids from vendors that would recycle the coal ash for beneficial uses, such as the making of wallboard and concrete. The beneficial bids were awarded to United States Gypsum Co., Headwaters, Inc., Peabody COALSALES, LLC. and US Minerals. OMU had been using Hancock County's single-lined landfill for disposing of its by-product materials. But new Environmental Protection Agency rules now require double-lined landfills, forcing OMU to seek proposals for the disposal or beneficial reuse of boiler slag, bottom ash, fly ash and gypsum from the Elmer Smith Station power plant. OMU is estimating that the EPA mandate will cost $3.9 million a year, which is about $1.1 million above what it's paying currently. The Smith plant burns about 1.3 million tons of coal a year and produces about 10,000 tons of fly ash from Unit 1, 45,000 tons of Unit 1 slag, 74,000 tons of Unit 2 fly ash and 22,000 tons of Unit 2 bottom ash. OMU also produces about 250,000 tons of synthetic gypsum from the flue gas scrubber, for a total CCR production of more than 400,000 tons a year. "The incentive for the beneficial reuse option is that it is a lower-cost alternative to landfilling," Dixon said. The Daviess County Landfill will charge OMU $15.75 a ton in tipping fees as part of the deal. "I think OMU's goal is to try to keep its options open," Smith said. "And the county is kind of serving as an insurance policy. If rules and regulations change, they know we've got a contained landfill that can take it under any rule or regulation." Smith added that the landfill was going to construct between 16 to 20 acres of additional landfill space to accommodate OMU's contract. But since it's not going to be the main receiver of the coal ash, the expansion will be reduced to 10.1 acres. "If it had been 100,000 (tons) a year, we would've looked at doing two expansions at the same time," Smith said. "As it stands, we're going to mothball the second expansion until we see a need to create a separate (coal ash) landfill." Don Wilkins, dwilkins@messenger-inquirer.com, 691-7299, Twitter: @DonWilkinsMI http://www.energycentral.com/functional/news/news_detail.cfm?did=38704265 |