As energy companies shift away from burning coal to generate electricity, many are leaving behind toxic waste that could endanger public health and the environment for years to come.
New regulations proposed by the Biden administration would expand the number of coal ash dumps subject to federal oversight, a change intended to prevent spills that during the past decade wreaked havoc near power plants in North Carolina and Tennessee.
One of the sites that would come under federal oversight is the Waukegan Generating Station on Lake Michigan, a former ComEd coal plant ringed by two unlined ash ponds and an unlicensed landfill. Another is a Joliet quarry where ComEd and other companies dumped coal ash until NRG Energy overhauled a nearby coal plant in 2016 to burn natural gas.
