To hundreds of coal power-plant facilities across the United States, 4/17/18 is D-Day. The EPA published its final rules (April 17, 2015) governing the disposal of coal combustion residuals produced by electric utilities. Where these impoundments are no longer in use, the rules provide a somewhat less strict set of requirements.
In order to take advantage of the special rules applicable to inactive Coal Combustion Residuals surface impoundments, the final closure must be completed by April 17, 2018. There are no extensions available under the rule. Utilities across the United States need to take steps to comply with these new rules to include developing closure plans for inactive ash impoundment sites to meet this deadline.
At some point, there will be a stampede to meet these requirements. Aqua Survey stands ready to provide the required surveying, sampling, testing and monitoring of these ash impoundments throughout the United States. Tom Dolce, Vice President at Aqua Survey observed “Our diverse fleet of vessels, geophysical surveying electronics and coring tools are the perfect toolset to gather the necessary data critical to these kinds of projects’ success. It’s like we’ve spent the last 40-something years unknowingly preparing just for this.”
Over the years, Aqua Survey’s teams have become extremely efficient at safely mobilizing vessels in and out of hard-to-reach water bodies. When asked what makes Aqua Survey the perfect team member for this kind of work, Aqua Survey founder Ken Hayes stated, “You can never say you’ve seen it all, but we’ve successfully deployed vessels at a number of unique and challenging locations … from your run-of-the-mill boat launches and crane deployments to areas so remote, vessels had to be trucked in and assembled on-site. We’re not shrinking violets when it comes to difficult work conditions and challenging projects.”
Dr. Jon Doi, Executive Vice President/Co-Owner of Aqua Survey, added, “Super Storm Sandy put us to the test back in 2013. We were able to survey hundreds and hundreds of debris-strewn waterways and collected over 2,900 sediment cores in less than a month. Now is the time to avoid the stampede.”