Join us for the MountainTrue Fall Gathering at New Belgium!

Wednesday, October 26, join us at New Belgium Brewery in Asheville for our annual Fall Gathering. Expect great beer, delicious food and some sweet, sweet jams from Asheville’s very own The Midnight Plowboys.

THIS EVENT IS FREE AND OPEN TO ALL CURRENT MEMBERS.

MountainTrue 2016 Fall Gathering
Wednesday October 26 from 6 PM to 8 PM
New Belgium Brewery’s Brewhouse
21 Craven Street, Asheville

If you’re a current member, RSVP HERE.
If you would like to join or renew your membership, CLICK HERE.
(Once you’ve joined or renewed, don’t forget to rsvp!)
If you’re not sure about your member status, see if your name is on our current member list. CLICK HERE.

With our proud mountain heritage, beautiful mountain vistas, lush forests and rushing streams, Western North Carolina is an amazing and special place to call home. The support of our members has helped us fight for our communities and protect one of the richest environments in the world.

Support WNC by renewing your membership and making a donation to MountainTrue today. CLICK HERE.

If you would prefer to send us a check, please make your donation payable to MountainTrue and mail it to us at 29 N. Market St., Suite 610, Asheville, NC 28801.

Thanks to our members and supporters, MountainTrue was voted WNC’s #1 Environmental Group by the readers of Mountain Xpress. Our programs represent you, your values and the issues that you care about. Here are some of the things we’ve accomplished together so far in 2016:

Protecting Our Waters

We launched the first monthly water-quality monitoring program in the Watauga River basin with 13 sites monitored by MountainTrue volunteers and staff.
We continue fighting Duke Energy in court over its coal-ash pollution at the Cliffside plant in Rutherford County and organized over a hundred people to attend hearings and demand the full clean-up of coal ash pollution.
We planted 6,000 live stakes that will grow, stabilize banks, and stop erosion along 12 miles of river frontage in the French Broad River basin.

Preserving Our Public Lands

As a leader in Nantahala-Pisgah National Forest planning process, we helped develop a groundbreaking agreement between wilderness, conservation and recreation advocates in support of more trails and public access and more backcountry and wild places.
We prevented over 100 acres of clear cutting on Nantahala National Forest, helped eradicate invasive species on the Grandfather Ranger District, and raised awareness of the natural wonders of Bluff Mountain with a BioBlitz that documented over 400 plant species.

Building Vibrant Communities

We mobilized over 1,000 comments on the I-26 Connector project in Asheville. In response, NCDOT selected the community-developed and supported Alternative 4B for the bridge section of the project. We celebrate this victory while continuing to work to reduce overall size, improve design, and include more bike/pedestrian infrastructure.

Working for Clean Energy

We intervened in Duke Energy’s application for approval of a new natural-gas plant in Asheville and a new peaker plant to be built in 2023. We asserted that Duke had not made its case for additional fossil fuel capacity, and the Public Utilities Commission agreed, declining to approve the extra peaker plant. Now, we are hard at work providing leadership for the new City of Asheville-Buncombe County-Duke Energy partnership to develop and implement a plan to increase energy efficiency and grow our renewable energy infrastructure.

Engaging Citizens

After three years of advocacy in support of surrounding neighbors, we achieved victory at the CTS site in Buncombe County when EPA required an interim cleanup of a large pool of subsurface contamination. Next, we will make sure that the long-term cleanup plan is as protective as possible.
MountainTrue members and staff took lobbying trips during the 2016 legislative session to be your voice in Raleigh. We are also hosting “meet and greets” between our members and candidates vying to replace our retiring WNC legislators.
We brought nationally renowned evangelical Christian and climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe to Asheville. She met with 80 faith leaders at a prayer breakfast and addressed more than 300 people in the First Baptist Church sanctuary.

BECOME A MOUNTAINTRUE MEMBER AND BE PART OF THE MOVEMENT FOR A BETTER WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA. CLICK HERE.

Thank you for your generous support of our work!

Henderson County Big Sweep Hauls 4,400 Lbs of Trash from Local Rivers and Streams

On Saturday, September 10, volunteers banded together to sweep Henderson County of as much garbage as possible! Nine teams of volunteers were formed including Mills River Partnership, Friends of Wash Cree, Trinity Presbyterian Church, Rotary Club, Cub Scout Troop 603, Mud Creek, East Hendersonville High School, Sierra Nevada and more!

This year’s haul far exceeded last year’s success. The 2016 Henderson County Big Sweep recruited 63 volunteers who served a total of 169 hours! We swept 11 miles of local rivers, picked up 24 tires, 81 bags of trash for a grand total of approximately 4,400 pounds of trash and recycling. What a successful event!

Don Huneycutt and 13 others from the Rotary Club of Hendersonville cleaned out 2,030 lbs. of debris from just Mud Creek. Under the leadership of Don, their team captain and the Henderson County Big Sweep coordinator for the past two years, they removed car and tractor trailer tires, and other trash that cluttered the waterway.

In 2005, the Rotary club joined the Adopt-A- Stream program, dedicated to improving the conditions of the water sources in our community, and adopted a portion of Mud Creek which runs directly through the town of Hendersonville and can become unsightly with garbage and trash discarded carelessly on its banks and in its waters.

“In the past six years, it has not been unusual for our team to remove up to 2000 lbs of debris from Mud Creek in a four hour period,” says Big Sweep team captain, Don Huneycutt. “It takes teamwork and hard work to safely collect all the items from both the creek and the banks and then transfer everything to a central collection point for pickup by the city. Teamwork and hard work also make for a satisfying and fun time”

MountainTrue wants to thank all of the volunteers who gave so much of their time and made this event possible! An important part of calling a region home is taking the time to care for it, and the rivers in Henderson County are better off with 4,400 fewer pounds of garbage floating in them.

Be on the look out for next year’s event and join in on the fun!

Bad Coal Ash Bill Being Rushed Through Raleigh

Action Expired

On the evening of Tuesday, June 28 the North Carolina Senate rushed through a rewrite to H630, the state’s coal ash cleanup law. This bad coal ash bill is quickly making its way through the legislature and we expect the House to take it up as soon as today.

Please call your NC Representative Immediately and ask them to NOT CONCUR with the Senate’s version of House Bill 630.

Official statement by MountainTrue Co-director Julie Mayfield:

“The legislature’s rewrite of the state’s coal ash cleanup law is a betrayal of the people of North Carolina. The General Assembly has abdicated its responsibility to clean up North Carolina’s coal ash and protect us from the ill effects of toxic pollutants.

“HB630 would disband the Coal Ash Management Commission and with it any effective oversight of the Department of Environmental Quality, which has a poor record of protecting our communities and our environment. Worse, this new legislation delays final classification for North Carolina’s coal ash pits and completely guts the criteria the state uses to determine the threat of these pits to our communities. The result will leave coal ash in place to continue polluting groundwater, our rivers and our streams.

“The strength of the Coal Ash Management Act of 2014 (CAMA) was that it used science to guide the coal ash cleanup effort. That science indicated that there are no low priority coal ash sites or low priority communities. Now the legislature wants to scrap the protections that are based on that science – protections lawmakers themselves have repeatedly touted as ‘the best in the country.’ The legislature’s willingness to weaken laws that protect so many people from such harmful pollution is both bewildering and shameful.”

Read the full text of H630.

H630, as passed by the Senate, would:

eliminate the Coal Ash Management Commission and, with it, legislative oversight over the NC Department of Environmental Quality, a deeply politicized agency with a poor track record;
eliminate criteria for risk assessment based on a site’s threats to public health, safety, welfare, the environment and natural resources;
give Duke two years, until October 15, 2018, to provide clean drinking water to affected households through a water line or filtration device;
require that DEQ classify ponds as “low risk” if dams are repaired and public water supply hookups are provided, regardless of whether they continue to pollute ground and surface waters;
allow the DEQ to revise and downgrade their classifications of coal ash pits for 18 months, until November 15, 2018;
delay closure plans for low and intermediate sites until December 31, 2019; and
give DEQ expanded authority to grant variances and extensions to the deadlines above, creating further delay and less accountability for Duke Energy.

The time to act is NOW. Call your representative and tell them that no North Carolina community is a low priority. Tell them to oppose H630.

DEQ Puts Cliffside Area Residents at Risk of Coal Ash Contamination

photo: courtesy of Duke Energy

The Department of Environmental Quality’s (DEQ) risk classification for North Carolina’s coal ash pits puts the health of residents who live downstream from the Cliffside coal ash impoundments, including those who live in Shelby and Gaffney, SC, at risk from contaminated drinking water.

Feb. 3. 2016

The DEQ issued its Coal Combustion Residual Impoundment Risk Classifications report on the afternoon of Friday, January 29. The DEQ has classified two of the Cliffside coal ash pits as low and one as “low/intermediate” priority despite testing that shows high levels of arsenic, chromium, cobalt, hexavalent chromium, thallium and vanadium contaminating groundwater and flowing into the Broad River. A classification of high or even intermediate priority would require Duke Energy excavate the sites, while a low rating means coal ash will be left on the banks of the Broad river to pollute a public drinking water source in perpetuity.

David Caldwell, coordinator of the Broad River Alliance — a Waterkeeper Alliance Affiliate, states:

“We know there are toxic chemicals in these ash ponds, and we know that they’re spilling into the Broad River and seeping into our drinking water. On every criteria set out by legislature in the Coal Ash Management Act, these three sites deserve a failing grade. If we don’t push the DEQ, all they’ll require for these pits it that they be covered and left in place to continue polluting our water in perpetuity. We are asking DEQ to show us the same respect given to 13 other communities across NC, and have the ash ponds permanently removed.”

DEQ is required to rate the ponds high, intermediate or low based on three criteria: the impact to surface water, the impact to groundwater and dam safety. According to the DEQ’s own Corrective Action Plan for the Cliffside Steam Station Ash Basin (November 16, 2015) all three of the Cliffside sites deserve a failing grade.

Pollution of Groundwater:
All three Cliffside coal ash ponds pollute the groundwater with high levels of toxic metals, including arsenic at over 468 times the state’s safety standard, vanadium at 690 times the standard, hexavalent chromium at 185 times the standard and cobalt at 119 times the standard. The polluted groundwater from all three pits flows into the Broad River and Suck Creek, which are drinking water sources for Shelby NC, Gaffney SC and other downstream municipalities.

Pollution of Surface Water:
All three coal ash ponds pollute the Broad River and Suck Creek with 28 illegal discharges that dump millions of gallons of toxic heavy metals each day, including chromium at 51 times the limit, arsenic at 37 times the state’s safety, and cobalt at 19 times the state’s safety standard.

Deficiency of Dam Infrastructure:
DEQ has rated the dams as low priority despite the fact that the three Cliffside coal ash ponds received 5 notices of deficiency for dam structural integrity in 2014. DEQ has justified its ratings based on the outcome of future renovations to the dams’ structure that have yet to be completed. The Coal Ash Management Act was designed to rate the dams on their current risk and currently all the dams have received recent notice of deficiencies for many of the same problems that caused the Dan River spill.

The heavy metals and toxic chemicals seeping from the Cliffside coal ash pits are present at levels that are harmful to humans and wildlife. Arsenic poisoning can lead to heart disease, cancer, stroke, chronic lower respiratory diseases and diabetes. Cobalt has been linked to cardiovascular disease, gastrointestinal disorders, blood poisoning, liver injury and thyroid problems. Chromium is a carcinogen and hexavalent chromium was the subject of the movie Erin Brockovich, which was based on the true story of groundwater contamination in Hinkley, California by Pacific Gas Electric Company.

MountainTrue, a conservation organizations that is active on issues affecting the Broad River watershed, encourages residents to attend one of two DEQ public hearings on the Cliffside plants scheduled for March 14.

Cleveland County Hearing on Cliffside Coal Ash Classification
Monday March 14 at 6:00 PM
114 E. College Ave, Shelby, NC 28152

Rutherford County Hearing on Cliffside Coal Ash Classification
Monday March 14 at 6:00 PM
Isothermal Community College Auditorium, 286 ICC Loop Rd, Spindale, NC 28160

For more information on the public hearings and DEQ coal ash classifications, visit https://mountaintrue.org.

About MountainTrue
MountainTrue fosters and empowers communities throughout the region and engages in policy and project advocacy, outreach and education, and on the ground projects. To achieve our goals, MountainTrue focuses on a core set of issues across 23 counties of Western North Carolina: sensible land use, restoring public forests, protecting water quality and promoting clean energy – all of which have a high impact on the environmental health and long-term prosperity of our residents. MountainTrue is the home of the Watauga Riverkeeper, the primary watchdog and spokesperson for the Elk and Watauga Rivers; the French Broad Riverkeeper, the primary protector and defender of the French Broad River watershed; and Broad River Alliance, a Waterkeeper Affiliate working to promote fishable, swimmable, drinkable waters in the Broad River Basin. For more information: mountaintrue.org

Media Contacts:

Karim Olaechea
Communications Director, MountainTrue
E: karim@mountiantrue.org; C: 415.535.9004

David Caldwell
Coordinator, Broad River Alliance – A Waterkeeper Alliance Affiliate
E: broadriveralliance@gmail.com C: 704.300.5069

Duke announcement to clean coal ash ponds excludes two of three Cliffside sites

June 25, 2015

On June 25, Duke Energy announced plans to excavate and close 12 additional coal ash ponds across the state.

Duke Energy’s announcement does not impact its Asheville site, where all the ash is already mandated to be moved, but it does include excavation of one of the three coal ash ponds at the Cliffside power plant in Rutherford County. We know that all three ponds are leaching contaminants into the groundwater and the river so, while it is a step forward that Duke is committing to excavate ash in one of those ponds, we believe they can and should do better. They have not yet decided what to do with the coal ash in the other ponds, nor has the state mandated a cleanup strategy there.

With this announcement, Duke has now committed to excavate coal ash at 7 of 14 sites (20 of 32 ash ponds) in NC. Again, while this is a good step, seven communities across the state still don’t know the extent to which they will be protected from ongoing coal ash contamination going forward. We will press on with our litigation in the Cliffside case until we reach a resolution that will protect the people of that region and the Broad River.