Thanks goodness for the river keepers, their pictures & efforts are the reason Duke is being held accountable.
Keep in mind, their governor, McCrory worked for Duke Energy for 28 years....
Duke Energy fined $102 million for polluting rivers with coal ash
Duke Energy, the nation’s largest electrical utility, pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to nine criminal violations of the Clean Water Act for polluting four major rivers for several years with toxic coal ash from five power plants in North Carolina.
The $50.5-billion company was fined $102 million and placed on five years of probation for environmental crimes. All company compliance related to coal ash in five states will be overseen by a court-appointed monitor and reported to federal parole officers.
U.S. District Judge Malcolm J. Howard approved the plea agreement Thursday morning following a 90-minute court session in which a Duke Energy lawyer repeated the words “guilty, your honor” more than 20 times.
The nine misdemeanor charges were filed against three Duke Energy subsidiaries, and the lawyer responded for each charge against each subsidiary. Howard found the utility guilty on all nine counts.
“Today we said big corporations are not above the law, and polluters who harm our environment will be held accountable,” U.S. Atty. Thomas Walker of the Eastern District of North Carolina said outside the federal courthouse.
Though the plea deal ended the federal criminal case against Duke, a senior Environmental Protection Agency official who attended the hearing, Cynthia Giles, said ongoing investigations of Duke’s handling of coal ash could still result in civil enforcement actions.
“Companies that cut corners and contaminate waters on which communities depend, as Duke did here, will be held accountable,” said Giles, the EPA’s assistant administrator for enforcement and compliance assurance.
Environmentalists have complained for years that Duke has polluted waterways and groundwater with coal ash, and the company faces several civil lawsuits filed by environmental groups.
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But coal ash pollution did not come to widespread public attention until February 2014, when a spill at a Duke coal ash lagoon dumped 39,000 tons of coal ash, and 27 million gallons of ash slurry coated the Dan River with thick sludge for 70 miles.
A federal criminal indictment said Duke “did fail to exercise the degree of care that someone of ordinary prudence would have exercised in the same circumstance with respect to the discharge of coal ash and coal ash wastewater.” The utility was charged with the “criminally negligent discharge of pollutants” and failure to maintain coal ash treatment equipment.
Four of the nine charges involved illegal discharges at the Dan River plant. Duke also pleaded guilty to coal ash discharge violations at power plants near Charlotte, Asheville, Goldsboro and in Chatham County in central North Carolina.
more:
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-duke-energy-coal-ash-20150514-story.html#page=2
DO SOMETHING!
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