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Though no oil spill can be considered a good thing, what was initially reported as a 20-30 tonne spill is now ten times worse. The BBC is reporting that 230 tonnes of oil (about 70,000 gallons) have spilled from a Hong Kong-registered ship, damaged in a tropical storm earlier in the week, and is washing up along a 60km stretch of shoreline. Authorities are warning that this is threatening wildlife and carcinogenic: Area's affected by the spill run from Point Arkwright in the north to Bribie Island in the south, as well of all of Morton Island National Park. What's more, the spill happened when 31 containers containing ammonium nitrate fertilizer were toppled in the storm, puncturing the hull of the ship. 620 tonnes of the fertilizer have also spilled into the ocean. In addition to the damage caused by the oil s

For years, residents of the tiny lakeside community near Kingston, Tennessee, watched as the local power plant mixed tons of leftover coal ash with water and pumped the heavy mud into a massive pond just up the road. "We never gave it a second thought," says resident Diane Anderson. To read more of Kelly Hearn's reporting on the TVA spill, check out "Toxic Coal in Tennessee," "Tennessee's Dirty Data" and "The Dredge Report." Share this article * * * * Add to Mixx! * * * Related * Also By * Radioactive Revival in New Mexico Environment Shelley Smithson: Navajos say "No!" as the return of uranium mining threatens to despoil their lands and health. * The Most Important Number on Earth Environment OntheEarthProduction : Bill McKibben, Noam Chomsky and Terry Tempest Williams discuss the urgent need reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide to 350 parts per million. » More * Tennessee Spill: Regulation Hazards Environment Kelly Hearn: The recent coal ash spill in Tennessee reveals the toxic fallacy that states should regulate industrial waste. * Letters Subscribe Our Readers & Kelly Hearn * Tennessee Spill: The Dredge Report Environment Kelly Hearn: The TVA's efforts to clean up after its massive coal ash spill may create even more health hazards. But on December 22 the pond collapsed, triggering a billion-gallon mudslide that knocked houses off foundations and roiled into the Emory River. State officials and the Tennessee Valley Authority, the federally funded utility responsible for the spill, scrambled to allay fears, saying that the ash wasn't toxic and that the drinking water was safe. But residents also heard about the litany of harmful substances in the ash, like arsenic and lead, and about studies linking it to cancer.

A new study done by Duke University says exposure to the fly ash from the TVA spill could have "severe health implication." Duke University scientists collected water and solid ash samples at sites affected by the TVA spill on Jan. 9. Following preliminary analysis, the solid ash samples were incubated and underwent more detailed analysis. "Our radioactive measurements of solid ash samples from Tennessee suggests the ash has radiation levels above those reported by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for typical coal ash," said Avner Vengosh, associate professor of earth and ocean sciences at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment. "Preventing the formation of airborne particulate matter from the ash that was released to the environment seems essential for reducing possible health impacts." More than a billion gallons of sludge coal waste spilled from a pond at the Tennessee Valley Authority's Kingston coal-burning power plant on Dec. 22.

An interesting map overlay of the BP oil spill. click on the site and it will bring up a google map with the oil spill on top of where you live.

"Dr. Gina Solomon, a Senior Scientist with the NRDC is worried that fishermen enlisted to clean up oil may be unwittingly facing severe health risks. You see, in the effort to clean up the massive oil spill that's leeching across the Gulf of Mexico, BP has employed hundreds, if not thousands, of fishermen. Typically, they're equipped with booms, given a safety course, and then head out to tackle the spill. Problem is the oil itself, and the fumes it gives off, are toxic -- and the fishermen may not be getting the adequate gear to protect themselves from it. In this brief video, Dr. Solomon explains what risks the fishermen face, and what exactly they should be wearing. "

"Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Saturday called for a global fund to fight ecological catastrophes like the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, as he sought to burnish his credentials as a green leader. Admitting that Russia itself was lagging behind other countries in its standards of environmental protection, he also said Russians should feel free to protest against the authorities on environmental issues. Medvedev said that the oil spill from the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico -- the worst in US history -- had showed that the world had been unable to imagine the scale of such catastrophes."

An environmental disaster of epic proportions has occurred in Tennessee. Monday night, 2.6 million cubic yards (the equivalent of 525.2 million gallons, 48 times more than the Exxon Valdez spill by volume) of coal ash sludge broke through a dike of a 40-acre holding pond at TVA's Kingston coal-fired power plant covering 400 acres up to six feet deep, damaging 12 homes and wrecking a train. According to the EPA the cleanup will take at least several weeks, but could take years. Officials also said that the magnitude of this spill is such that the entire area could be declared a federal superfund site.

TVA is near the end of its first phase of response to a massive coal ash spill in East Tennessee last month, stabilizing and preventing further spread of the sludge at an estimated cost of $1 million a day. The giant public utility is considering options for what could be the costliest, lengthiest and most complicated operations: removing the ash from land and water and restoring the area to pre-spill conditions. Advertisement The state must approve the Tennessee Valley Authority's "corrective action" plans and has given it a mid-March deadline to submit details.

"As part of the Obama Administration's ongoing commitment to transparency surrounding the response to the BP oil spill, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced today that Department is providing online access to schematics, pressure tests, diagnostic results and other data about the malfunctioning blowout preventer. Secretary Chu insisted on making the data widely available to ensure the public is as informed as possible, and to ensure that outside experts making recommendations have access to the same information that BP and the government have. The site will be updated with additional data soon. "Transparency is not only in the public interest, it is part of the scientific process," said Secretary Chu. "We want to make sure that independent scientists, engineers and other experts have every opportunity to review this information and make their own conclusions." The information is posted at energy.gov/oilspilldata. It includes detailed raw data on the pressure readings within the blowout preventer, as well as rates and amounts of hydrocarbons captured by the top hat and by the riser insertion tube. There is also a timeline of key events and detailed summaries of the Deepwater well configuration, the blowout preventer stack tubes, and the containment system."

The gunk on the water had thinned to a gray scrim in front of Mike Thomas' riverfront home -- a small sign of progress one week after one of the worst coal ash spills in American history. But as Thomas drove along the bluff over the Emory River, he pointed to big piles of sludgy, dark gray ash, a byproduct of coal combustion, that had been accidentally disgorged by the nearby electricity plant. The heaps jutted from the water's surface like ugly volcanic islands. By the shore, many neighbors' docks sat in ruins, destroyed by mammoth waves when the ash was released.

Democrats on the Senate committee overseeing the Tennessee Valley Authority castigated the agency for failing to live up to its environmental stewardship mission during a hearing Thursday on last month's toxic sludge spill at the Kingston Fossil Plant. Led by Chairwoman Barbara Boxer of California, Democrats on the Environment and Public Works Committee also called for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to regulate fly ash, which is a byproduct of burning coal, as hazardous waste.

"State officials in Louisiana announced another set of fishing closures Sunday as the oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon disaster spread and approached state shores. The commercial and recreational fishing closure now includes an area of the state's territorial sea west of the Mississippi River to Point au Fer, at the eastern side of Atchafalaya Bay, as well as the beaches that border any of the closed areas, according to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. Sunday marked the third consecutive day that authorities closed areas to fishing. Oil has washed up on the Chandeleur Islands and is approaching other areas of St. Bernard Parish, while a plume also has spread west of the Mississippi River outlet."

"The full impact of a catastrophic oil well blow-out off the Louisiana coast is unclear but it could "focus attention" on cleaner forms of energy, U.S. Assistant Energy Secretary David Sandalow said on Thursday. The Deepwater Horizon well, owned and operated by energy giant BP (BP.L), is believed to be leaking at least 5,000 barrels of oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico, and Sandalow said the worst oil spill in U.S. history would have to be taken into account in any new energy law."

Three environmental groups want the state to throw out a permit it just issued that would allow TVA to dump water tainted with mercury, selenium, arsenic, and other chemicals from the Kingston coal-fired power plant into the Clinch River. The Clinch, which lies below the power plant, has already received ash moving down the Emory River from the massive ash spill last December. Earthjustice, Environmental Integrity Project, and the Sierra Club on Thursday filed an appeal of a water discharge permit that the Tennessee Department of Environment & Conservation issued four weeks ago. They say letting TVA pipe one million gallons of wastewater a day from a pond with gypsum into the river isn't wise. The material will be a byproduct of the plant's new air pollution system.

Three environmental groups want the state to throw out a permit it just issued that would allow TVA to dump water tainted with mercury, selenium, arsenic, and other chemicals from the Kingston coal-fired power plant into the Clinch River. The Clinch, which lies below the power plant, has already received ash moving down the Emory River from the massive ash spill last December. Earthjustice, Environmental Integrity Project, and the Sierra Club on Thursday filed an appeal of a water discharge permit that the Tennessee Department of Environment & Conservation issued four weeks ago. They say letting TVA pipe one million gallons of wastewater a day from a pond with gypsum into the river isn't wise. The material will be a byproduct of the plant's new air pollution system.

"Energy-never has a political topic had so many bold words expended on it with so little to show. As Jon Stewart pointed out in his usual skewering fashion last week, the last eight American presidents promised to move America off oil and onto renewable energy, and all we have to show for it is increasing dependence on foreign petroleum, rising carbon emissions and an out of control gusher in the Gulf of Mexico. Energy is one of those bipartisan issues that any politician can dust off-usually whenever gasoline prices have gotten a little high-promise to change and then promptly drop until the next crisis. Most of our politicians seem to lack what you'd need to really change how America uses energy: the will to take on the strong fossil fuel lobby and the persistence to see changes through over the long-term. But we all bear responsibility for that failure, because we fail to see-and take-the hard choices that would be necessary. We'd rather live in energy fairyland, as a new New York Times/CBS News poll demonstrates. The poll surveyed the attitudes of Americans-with specific attention on Gulf coast residents-toward the oil spill, energy policy, the economy, President Barack Obama and BP. The news is not good for Obama-the economy and employment remain the top concerns of Americans, bigger than the oil spill, but 54% of the public says he does not have a clear plan for creating jobs, and 48% of the public disapproves of his handling of the economy. 60% of Americans think the country is on the wrong track."

"Democrats are trying to take control of public anger over the BP spill, and that means moving the debate to energy legislation. Harry Reid is now urging chairmen to pass cap and trade out of committee by July, and to include a strong section regulation offshore drilling and associated liabilities. Remember when the compromise to get the bill passed was going to be moreoffshore drilling? "

A South Carolina environmental cleanup expert says the TVA Kingston steam plant spill will cost millions of dollars and will take many weeks to clean up. "They're going to have to do an extensive cleanup, that's for sure," said David Hitchens, CEO and chemist for AEO Advanced Environmental Options Inc. in Spartanburg, S.C. "It could get into the millions. If you've got 400 acres, and they're going to have to clean it up, and dispose it in a landfill, and the landfills charge $30 to $40 a ton, you're looking at approximately 2 (million) to 2.5 million tons."

A federal judge on Wednesday issued a ruling that could clear the way for a multimillion-dollar payout of punitive damages to thousands of commercial fishermen and others who claimed harm from the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989. Click to enlarge Click to enlarge Judge Russel Holland Story tools Comments (18) Recommend (0) E-mail a friend Print Digg this Seed Newsvine Send link via AIM Add to My Yahoo! Yahoo! Buzz Font size : A | A | A Judge H. Russel Holland of Anchorage rejected a bid from one plaintiff, Sea Hawk Seafoods Inc., to throw out a complex allocation plan for the damages and replace it with one that would steer potentially millions more dollars to the company.

A former top EPA investigator who helped lead an investigation into a giant oil spill in Alaska is blowing the whistle to KING 5 News. The investigator says it should have been a felony criminal case. So was oil giant BP let off the hook? KING 5's environmental specialist Gary Chittim talked with the investigator in an exclusive report.

At the same time that ExxonMobil was racking up the largest quarterly profit of any U.S. company in history - $14.8 billion - the oil giant was fighting in court to avoid making the interest payment in the long-running case brought by victims of the 1989 Valdez supertanker spill in Alaska. In case you were wondering, the sum the plaintiffs say Exxon owes in interest, about $500 million, is about three days' worth of company profits.