So, 2016 wasn’t a total shit show, at least in Lee County.
Duke Energy has rescinded plans to bury coal ash in an old clay mine in Lee County, the Charlotte Observer reported on Wednesday. Instead, the ash will be used to make concrete at a facility near Goldsboro. According to the Observer, the concrete industry has pushed for Duke to make this move.
Groups in Lee County have been fighting Duke ever since the company announced last year that it would move 6 millions tons of coal ash to the mine in the northern Lee County community of Colon. According to a Duke Energy press release, “the Colon Mine project remains a contingency site if final closure plans for basins across the state require it.”
Marsha Ligon, a spokeswoman for the nonprofit group EnvironmentaLee told the Fayetteville Observer the organization considers this announcement a victory, for now.
“We are absolutely thrilled, but we also know we have to be guarded at the same time,” she told the Fayetteville Observer. “We have to be vigilant and watch every move Duke Energy makes.”
Vigilance is great, but the last comment implies that such a posture, or actions taken by EnvironmentaLee, had anything to do with Duke’s decision. Like the fracking crisis that so far hasn’t come to pass, business forces often mean much more than protests or lawsuits.
Maybe the public funeral EnvironmentaLee held for the county was premature.