North Carolina's environmental agency says bugs "appear to be thriving" at the bottom of the Dan River downstream of Duke Energy's February coal ash spill.
Department of Environment and Natural Resources staff sampled upriver and about two miles downriver of the spill on Oct. 28. It was DENR's first testing of the aquatic insects, worms and other invertebrates at the base of the food chain. Their numbers, type and diversity signal a river's overall health.
Findings were similar in both places and had the highest biological rating, the department said.
Tests of water quality, river sediment and fish tissue are continuing. The results will be factored into a natural resource damage assessment that state and federal agencies are conducting.
Biologists have said that river-bottom creatures were likely smothered by up to 39,000 tons of ash that Duke's Dan River power plant dumped into 70 miles of river.
Operations to suck up the deposits got only 3,000 tons of ash and sediment. Duke and the Environmental Protection Agency said trying to retrieve all the ash would do more ecological harm than leaving it in place.
Monday, December 1, 2014
Dan River bottom life is thriving, DENR says
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3 comments:
So, preliminary indications are the self-appointed guardians of the environment were wrong about the effects of the coal ash spill. Another sturm und drang prediction that, when examined carefully, isn't holding up so well.
Why do we keep listening to these people rather than people who do, oh, I don't know, actual science maybe?
Agreed. Thre is this media narrative that anyone who claims to be an "environmentalist" is an expert scientist that must be blindly quoted and followed and NEVER questioned or doubted, and anyone who says a single word in opposition to them is evil.
Then some real scientists with real science degrees from real institutions of higher learning come along and discover that most of what the "environmentalists" are screaming is completely false. Amazing.
Life wins.
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