Trump EPA Moves to Approve Alabama Coal Ash Program Rejected by Biden Administration

The Trump administration is moving to approve a controversial program in Alabama that could allow millions of tons of toxic coal ash to remain buried in place alongside the state’s rivers, even though much of that material is sitting in groundwater where it can leach into the environment. 

The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday announced a proposal to approve Alabama’s coal ash permitting program, letting the state oversee the closure of coal ash ponds at its major power plants. It is the same proposal rejected by the Biden administration in 2024 for failing to meet federal standards.

Alabama Power, which operates six major coal ash ponds throughout the state, said it is reviewing the EPA’s proposed approval of Alabama’s permit program. 

“We remain committed to complying with all state and federal environmental rules and regulations,” the company said in a statement. 

The proposal would allow the Alabama Department of Environmental Management to decide whether utilities in the state could leave millions of tons of coal ash—containing toxic substances like arsenic, lead, mercury and heavy metals—buried in place alongside the state’s rivers, including the Mobile-Tensaw Delta, one of the most biodiverse places in North America, often called “America’s Amazon.”

Today’s proposal would reverse a 2024 rule by the Biden-era EPA that rejected Alabama’s coal ash permitting program, saying it was “significantly less protective of people and waterways than federal law requires,” invalidating a state program that had already issued closure permits to coal ash ponds across the state.  

The Southern Environmental Law Center said the Alabama program the Trump EPA now wishes to approve was “identical” to the one the agency rejected in 2024 during the Biden administration. 

“Just two years ago Alabamians celebrated when EPA heard their pleas and denied the state’s attempt to leave toxic coal ash in water filled pits next to rivers and lakes,” SELC senior attorney Nick Torrey said in a news release. 

“In 2024 Alabama’s program was ‘notably less protective’ than the federal rules, because it is allowing utilities to leave their toxic waste from coal burning power plants in unlined leaking pits, submerged in groundwater near the banks of Alabama rivers,” Torrey said. “It’s a joke to now say the same program is in compliance. Alabama deserves better.”

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said the agency “trusts local communities to make common-sense decisions that grow the economy and protect human health and the environment,” in a news release announcing the new proposal Monday. 

“As we Unleash American Energy Dominance at the Trump EPA, we know that Alabama understands its own resources and topography better than bureaucrats in D.C.,” Zeldin said, referring in his statement to coal combustion residuals (CCR), a blanket term for coal ash describing the solid materials left over after burning coal for electricity or other purposes. 

“Today’s proposal to approve Alabama’s CCR permit program gives the power to oversee those resources to the state, which is yet another win for cooperative federalism,” Zeldin said.

The Alabama Department of Environmental Management [ADEM] said in an email it was pleased that EPA has proposed approving its permit program. 

“The Department has been working for many years on CCR issues and more recently on this submittal package,” ADEM external affairs chief Lynn Battle said in a statement to Inside Climate News. “The Department believes that, with our professional staff and their understanding of the environmental features of the state, we are the Agency best suited to handle environmental issues within Alabama, including CCR.”

For decades, many utilities disposed of their coal ash by flushing it into unlined ponds, generally on the banks of rivers, where the plants were located. The solid ash material would settle to the bottom of massive lagoons, while water was discharged back into the river. 

But that left the ash in direct contact with groundwater in many locations, allowing contaminants to seep into groundwater outside the facility. 

Environmental activists warn that leaving the coal ash directly alongside rivers leaves the potential for more catastrophic dam breaches like the one at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Kingston Fossil Plant in 2008, which inundated homes with coal ash slurry and released 1.1 billion gallons of coal ash slurry into the Emory and Clinch rivers. 

Alabama’s coal ash ponds have been the source of contentious legal battles and community action for more than a decade. 

Shortly after the EPA announced rules for how utilities could manage their ash ponds in 2015, Alabama Power, TVA and PowerSouth announced plans to close all coal ash ponds in the state by covering the coal ash in place rather than digging it out and moving it to a lined landfill. In 2018, Alabama was one of the first to create a state-level program to issue coal ash permits and approved utilities’ plans to cover the coal ash in place before the EPA had approved its permitting program. 

Those state permits were thrown into turmoil when the EPA found in 2024 that they were not protective enough of human health and the environment. 

The EPA press office, in an email to Inside Climate News, said that the previous permits Alabama issued were not included in ADEM’s latest application for the permitting program, meaning those ponds would have to be permitted again. 

“If EPA finalizes approval of ADEM’s 2026 application, existing permits that ADEM issued will have to be reviewed, and the public will have the opportunity to comment on the entire permit,” the EPA said. 

In total, more than 117 million tons of coal ash sludge are stored in unlined ponds on Alabama waterways. Alabama Power operates six of the ponds, TVA operates two and PowerSouth one. Alabama Power has paid more than $1.5 million in fines related to coal ash contaminants seeping into the groundwater from its ash ponds. 

The environmental group Mobile Baykeeper is suing Alabama Power over the 600-acre coal ash pond at the James M. Barry Electric Generating Plant in Bucks, Ala., where 21.7 million tons of coal ash is stored near the headwaters of the Mobile-Tensaw Delta. 

In east Alabama, Coosa Riverkeeper has filed a lawsuit alleging that a coal ash pond in Gadsden, Ala. is still polluting groundwater more than seven years after it was capped and closed. 

The EPA will take written comments on its proposal to approve Alabama’s program through Sept. 14. It will also host a virtual public hearing on Sept. 3, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. CDT, where members of the public can provide oral comments for up to five minutes.