Coal's severe impact on water quality

Energyis a major user of water, especially coal. What may be less well known isCoal's severe impact on water quality.

'The chemical spill that contaminated water for hundreds of thousands in West Virginia was only the latest and most high-profile case of coal sullying the nation's waters.

For decades, chemicals and waste from the coal industry have tainted hundreds of waterways and groundwater supplies, spoiling private wells, shutting down fishing and rendering streams virtually lifeless, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal environmental data.

But because these contaminants are released gradually and in some cases not tracked or regulated, they attract much less attention than a massive spill such as the recent one in West Virginia.

"I've made a career of body counts of dead fish and wildlife made that way from coal," said Dennis Lemly, a U.S. Forest Service research biologist who has spent decades chronicling the deformities pollution from coal mining has caused in fish.

"How many years and how many cases does it take before somebody will step up to the plate and say, 'Wait a minute, we need to change this'?"' Read more @ http://bigstory.ap.org/article/wva-spill-exposes-new-risk-water-coal