The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has reached an agreement with AES Puerto Rico, L.P. regarding its generating plant in Guayama. This agreement obliges the company to improve groundwater monitoring and guarantee adequate reports on its carbon ash pile, as stipulated by the Federal Law on Conservation and Recovery of Resources. In addition, AES will pay a fine of $71,845.
The agreement is part of the National Initiative to protect communities from coal ash contamination. This initiative seeks to address non-compliance with federal ash regulations that contain harmful health pollutants. Before 2015, there was no national regulation on the handling and disposal of these ashes.
“All people deserve equal protection under the environmental legal framework, and the EPA works to ensure such protection to the communities affected by the installation of AES in Puerto Rico," said Lisa F. García, Regional Administrator.
The EPA notes that AES did not meet the requirements of the program by failing to timely report statistical results or notify the public of significant surpluses in groundwater protection standards. It was also mentioned that they did not monitor certain wells twice a year.
The agreement states that AES must improve its current program by better evaluating the contamination associated with its ash pile through additional monitoring from nine wells installed in 2019. The company should publish all collected data to assess whether more wells are needed outside of the current area and determine effective corrective measures.
In 2015, the EPA established national rules for handling and removing ash to prevent risks such as groundwater leakage or dust-shaped air dispersion.
For more information on activities related to this topic, you can visit the CCR website dedicated by the federal agency.
