FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -- January 21, 2011
 
CONTACT:
Tim Guilfoile, Sierra Club, 859-426-1978

Groups Put Kentucky Coal Company on Notice

for Polluting Local Waterways with Toxic Selenium

 
LEXINGTON, KY – Citizen groups took action this week to hold another Kentucky coal company accountable for its pollution of local waterways. Kentuckians For The Commonwealth and the Sierra Club assert that the mining company, Leeco, Inc., is illegally releasing toxic selenium into several waterways in Letcher County – including Bull Creek, Montgomery Creek, Defeated Creek, Upper Lick Branch, and associated tributaries – without a permit, a violation of the Clean Water Act and the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA).   The company’s own water monitoring reports, filed with the Kentucky Division of Water, show that its mines are discharging harmful quantities of the pollutant.
 
Selenium, a toxic element that causes reproductive failure and deformities in fish and other forms of aquatic life, is discharged from many surface coal-mining operations across Appalachia.  At very high levels, selenium can pose a risk to human health, causing hair and fingernail loss, kidney and liver damage, and damage to the nervous and circulatory systems.
 
“Selenium threatens our fish and other aquatic organisms because it readily bio-accumulates,” stated Tim Guilfoile, Deputy Director of Sierra Club’s Water Sentinels Program.  “It’s a growing problem for this region.”
 
“Waterways across Kentucky and other parts of Appalachia are damaged by toxic mining waste that threatens our streams and our way of life,” said Rick Clewett, a volunteer with the Sierra Club’s Cumberland (Kentucky) Chapter.
 
This notice-of-intent-to-sue letter follows a similar notice sent to ICG Hazard in early December for selenium pollution from its mine in Leslie County.  Selenium pollution is quickly emerging as a major issue of concern for streams and communities below coal surface mines.  Citizen groups have filed several recent enforcement actions against mine operators in West Virginia regarding selenium pollution.  In September, a federal judge in West Virginia ordered Patriot Coal Corporation to post $45 million in secured credit to cover the anticipated cost of treating selenium at two of its surface coal mines.
 
Sierra Club is represented by Joe Lovett and Derek Teaney with the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment and Mary Cromer with Appalachian Citizens' Law Center.  For more information on selenium get this factsheet.

A copy of the Notice of Intent letter is here.