TVA Coal Ash Pollutants Still in River
WASHINGTON (AP) - A top EPA official told a congressional panel Wednesday that pollutants remain at elevated but acceptable levels in treated drinking water around the site of a massive TVA coal ash spill in Tennessee last year.
However, two recent samples of untreated river water found arsenic amounts that exceed accepted drinking standards, said Stan Meiburg, the Environmental Protection Agency's acting administrator for the region.
Meiburg said that heavy rainfall has probably helped dilute the contamination, but "the longer it sits there the more opportunity you have for something to happen."
"We really need to get the stuff out of the river," Meiburg said.
The comments came at a House Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee hearing as the one-year anniversary of the Kingston Steam Plant accident approaches.
