The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has released a new study that concludes the use of coal fly ash in concrete and synthetic gypsum in wallboard are safe and appropriate beneficial uses.
“…Environmental releases of constituents of potential concern (COPCs) from CCR fly ash concrete and FGD gypsum wallboard during use by the consumer are comparable to or lower than those from analogous non-CCR products, or are at or below relevant regulatory and health-based benchmarks for human and ecological receptors.” the EPA said in its report. “EPA supports the beneficial use of coal fly ash in concrete and FGD gypsum in wallboard. The Agency believes that these beneficial uses provide significant opportunities to advance Sustainable Materials Management (SMM).”
Barnes Johnson, director of the EPA Office of Resource Conservation and Recovery which authored the report, spoke about it at the Winter Meeting of the American Coal Ash Association in Albuquerque on Wednesday, February 5, 2014.
The study was released along with an EPA-authored “Risk Evaluation Methodology” the Agency says any party can use to evaluate various encapsulated uses for Coal Combustion Products.
EPA began developing the methodology in 2011 after the Agency’s Inspector General criticized the Coal Combustion Products Partnership (“C2P2”) for “inadequately” evaluating the risks of coal ash beneficial uses the program promoted. EPA shut down the C2P2 program after the report. EPA officials have not expressed any interest in restarting the C2P2 program now that the methodology is complete and have indicated that they do not plan to conduct any additional studies utilizing the methodology.
The Agency also plans to develop a methodology for evaluating risks of unencapsulated beneficial uses of coal ash. The Agency originally planned to develop that methodology by April of 2014, but it likely will not be complete by then.
A copy of the encapsulated beneficial use risk evaluation and the study on fly ash concrete and synthetic gypsum is available on EPA’s website here: https://www.epa.gov/epawaste/conserve/imr/ccps/benfuse.htm
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