It’s not the carbon dioxide of global warming. Nor is it the sulfur dioxide of acid rain, nor the mercury of smokestack-area pollution. Instead, it’s coal combustion waste, the solid byproducts of burning coal. In fact, air pollution smokestack controls wind up producing more solid waste.
Beyond mercury or sulfates, coal combustion waste can contain lead, selenium and arsenic, among other things.
The problem? Most power plants do little to nothing to dispose of combustion waste in an environmentally friendly matter, and the Environmental Protection Agency does little to make them. That’s mainly because EPA doesn’t consider it a hazardous waste, despite all the heavy metal content.
If stored in basically open areas, dust off the waste can blow in the air, or the waste can run off into water supplies after rains.
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