IndyStar investigation: Error in Pines coal ash cleanup plan put residents' health at risk
Federal officials are looking into a northern Indiana utility’s cleanup plan that left residents exposed to potentially cancer-causing chemicals for nearly a decade, despite being told the threat was mitigated.
An IndyStar investigation found the soil analysis the plan was based on was flawed, resulting in a failure to remove dangerous concentrations of coal ash at several locations in the Town of Pines, a Superfund pollution site just a stone's throw from Lake Michigan.
“How the heck did this happen?” asked Mark Huston, an advisor to the Pines community for several years as part of the Superfund process. “Absolutely this has very real-world implications for residents.”
The investigation traced the error to a NIPSCO-hired consultant with ties to the coal ash industry and a history of dismissing the potentially harmful risks of the toxic waste. She included what should have been an invalid sample in the report and that skewed several important numbers — a seemingly small misstep that an attorney working with residents said has had major consequences.
Experts said another problematic sample, which did not include coal ash but likely other industrial contamination, further skewed the data and also should have been dismissed as an outlier.
The result: Residents were left exposed to potentially cancer-causing substances for years after being told they had been removed and the remaining soil was safe.
IndyStar also learned the EPA didn’t catch the error for nearly a decade.
When initially confronted in March by IndyStar, the EPA insisted no errors were made. But after IndyStar pointed to specific records that documented the mistake, the agency acknowledged it was looking into the issues raised by our investigation.
Lisa Bradley, a toxicologist and the NIPSCO-hired consultant behind the mistake, did not respond to multiple requests for comment from IndyStar.
NIPSCO said it was recently brought to its attention that one of the samples in the cleanup plan contained coal ash and that this sample will now be excluded. The utility said it is committed to following the EPA's direction "to ensure this remediation work is conducted properly so that human health and the environment are protected."
The struggle with coal ash, which was used extensively as construction fill in Pines, dates back at least to the 1970s. As members of the community pushed for answers about the dangers, they felt dismissed or left in the dark at every turn. Residents told IndyStar they just want to feel safe gardening in their yard or letting their children play outside, but even that has been out of reach.
Meanwhile, they’ve watched neighbors fall ill, wondering if their health problems were caused by exposure to the waste used as fill for roads and building lots ― even a playground at the town hall ― or harmful chemicals that leached from the ash and seeped into residential water wells.
“A huge percentage of residents of Town of Pines have no trust in NIPSCO or the government, and they have felt marginalized and forgotten,” said Paul Kysel, an area resident and a member of a former community group created as part of the Superfund.
“This is the same bullshit that’s been going on since Day One,” he continued, “so sadly it doesn’t surprise me at all.”
An attorney working with local residents said it is not uncommon for a polluter to inadequately investigate the site they polluted.
“They have a motivation," said Lisa Evans with Earthjustice, an environmental law nonprofit, "to not find as much contamination.”
Regardless of motivation, Evans told IndyStar, the report prepared by NIPSCO’s consultant was wrong.
“A mistake was made, but it can be corrected,” she said. “It’s not too late to go back.”
Use of coal ash dates back decades
Coal ash, the byproduct of burning coal to produce electricity, is the second-largest waste stream in the U.S. behind household garbage. One of the main toxic contaminants targeted in a coal-ash cleanup is arsenic because it’s common in ash and a known carcinogen. Last year, the EPA issued an updated report revealing the cancer risk from arsenic is 35 times higher than previously recognized.
Arsenic exposure also is linked to other health problems such as heart disease. The main risks come from ingesting the heavy metal, such as from produce grown in contaminated soil, or inhaling it when kicked up in dirt and dust particles.
NIPSCO’s Michigan City power plant on the shore of Lake Michigan less than five miles from Pines, a small community which covers less than three square miles. In the heart of the town is a mostly unlined landfill where the utility sent much of its coal ash — more than one million tons over time, according to federal documents. That’s enough to fill the Indianapolis Motor Speedway with a layer of coal ash more than a foot deep.
The landfill, referred to as Yard 520, sits above the aquifer that supplied water to most of the private wells used by town residents. The mound of waste began leaching arsenic and other harmful materials — including chromium, boron, molybdenum and more — into the water supply.
But not all of NIPSCO’s coal ash made it to or stayed in the landfill. As early as the 1970s, coal ash was being hauled to Pines by the truckloads to create the base of roads, city buildings, parks and homes.
Pines resident Cathi Murray recalls walking along an unpaved road at the back of her property more than 20 years ago when she was pregnant, and later with her daughters as they learned to walk and run. “The girls would pick up these black rocks,” said Murray, who didn't find out until years later the road was built on coal ash.
Since then, she's had more than 60% of her thyroid removed. Murray remembers once sitting in a group of about 10 of her neighbors, and more than two-thirds of them also had thyroid issues.
“No, I can’t prove it’s because of the coal ash,” she said. “But when you start to think of what we have in common … We were all drinking the same water from the contaminated aquifer and living on top of coal ash.”
Internal documents reviewed by Evans, the attorney working with Pines residents, indicate the utility first became aware of the contamination concerns in the mid-1980s. But it would be nearly 20 years before NIPSCO took any action.
'Something was just off'
When Phyllis DaMota moved to the town in 2000 she noticed her water had a strange odor: “It had a chemical smell," she said. "Something was just off.”
She asked the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to test her water, setting off a chain of dominoes that exposed pollution concerns still plaguing the town today. The state environmental agency found coal ash constituents in her water, and a sampling of other neighboring wells raised similar concerns.
That’s when the EPA came in and determined the metals came from the nearby Yard 520 landfill. Pines was declared in 2004 a Superfund site, a federal program that is responsible for “cleaning up some of the nation’s most contaminated land,” according to the EPA.
Pines was one of the first sites to be designated a Superfund for coal ash contamination, making it "the canary in the coal mine," Kysel said. And yet, 20 years later, the cleanup is still far from complete.
EPA: Cancer risk from coal ash higher than previously revealed. Could it be in your yard?
In Pines, the fix for the contaminated wells was to run municipal water lines from nearby Michigan City into the town. It was during the process of digging up the roads for the new water lines in the mid-2000s that another, possibly larger problem was discovered: Coal ash also had been used as fill in roadbeds and other sites around the community.
That discovery prompted the need for more cleanup. But first, investigators needed to determine where all the coal ash was buried and if it posed a risk to residents. Part of that process involved determining what metals exist in the soil naturally and at what levels.
These “background levels” are used to set the standards for what amounts would trigger a cleanup to return the soil back to natural levels.
'Not without harmful consequences'
According to the EPA, the risk-based cleanup number for arsenic in residential soil is less than 1 parts per million. That increases cancer risk by one in 1,000,000 — meaning there would be one more case of cancer in a population of one million people compared to if there were no arsenic in the soil.
But arsenic occurs naturally in soils at levels higher than 1 ppm. That’s why the cleanup level is set to what’s natural for the area.
The average level naturally occurring in Indiana soil is around eight to nine ppm, according to IDEM as well as the U.S. Geological Survey. But that rate varies by location. To determine the levels in Pines specifically, more than 40 soil samples were taken in 2007 and 2012.
The goal was to focus on soil that didn’t contain coal ash to determine those natural levels. But of all the samples taken, nearly half did reveal the presence of coal ash — showing just how widely the waste material was used throughout the area.
Any sample with coal ash should have been excluded from the naturally occurring soil samples, but that didn’t happen.
A letter from the lab that performed the microscopic analysis of the samples clearly shows a specific soil sample ― the one used to set the background level and cleanup standard ― contained coal ash. And yet Bradley, the NIPSCO-hired consultant, included it in her analysis as a "non-detect" or natural sample.
This skewed the levels: The cleanup guideline was set to 30 ppm, more than double the 14 ppm of the highest truly natural ash-free soil sample.
That resulted in some troubling coal ash not being removed: Residents whose soil tested under 30 ppm were told their properties didn’t need any cleanup. According to Bradley’s 2016 report, at least eight of nearly 60 homes tested at that time had levels above 14 ppm but didn’t have any soil removed because of the error in setting the standard.
“If folks thought their yards were clean and were told their yards were clean, they might not have taken any additional precautions,” Evans said. “So this is not without potential harmful consequences.”
'Coal ash is not toxic'
Beyond fixing the levels, and addressing sites with more than 14 ppm of arsenic in their soils, residents of Pines and environmental advocates now want accountability. Some suspect the error had something to do with NIPSCO being in charge of the investigation and the consultant doing the work on its behalf: Lisa Bradley.
Bradley has a history of downplaying the risks of coal ash and leaving communities dismayed by her work, IndyStar found. She first got involved at Pines in 2004 with the water issues. Working at the time for a company called AECOM, Bradley was brought on by NIPSCO to assess how bad the water contamination was. She later continued her analysis for NIPSCO of the soil problems.
Bradley’s bio says she has a doctorate in toxicology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is certified by the American Board of Toxicology and has 25 years of experience in risk assessment and toxicology. In addition to NIPSCO, Bradley has worked for other utilities around the country including Ameren in Missouri and Duke Energy in North Carolina.
In 2011, testifying on Ameren’s behalf, she said children could eat coal ash every day and not face an increased risk of arsenic exposure compared to regular soil. The judge in that case dismissed a lawsuit raising concerns over a proposed Ameren coal ash landfill in a decision based largely on her testimony, according to press coverage of the case at that time.
And in publications for both Duke Energy as well as for the ACAA, Bradley has written that “coal ash is not toxic.”
Huston, the former advisor for Pines residents, said Bradley uses her experience and background to advance these claims: “I think she could convince regulators it would be good to sprinkle coal ash on your cereal every morning.”
Many scientists such as Huston as well as environmental and public health experts, including those at EPA, would disagree. A report from Physicians for Social Responsibility says “coal ash toxins have the potential to injure all of the major organ systems.”
That was the case for hundreds of cleanup workers for the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Kingston coal ash spill in 2008, often referred to as the worst ash spill in history. Those workers spent years breathing in coal ash dust and having it coat their skin as they were told there was no risk. But in the decade since, at least 50 of those workers have died and hundreds are sick with a variety of ailments. Even family-members have fallen ill from second-hand exposure, according to lawsuits in the aftermath of the spill.
Many of Bradley’s claims about risk, or lack thereof, also parallel those of the American Coal Ash Association, a group she has been involved with for many years. The ACAA is a trade group whose members, according to its website, “share a common interest” in using coal ash products “to enhance revenues, minimize disposal costs, reduce liability and support environmental policies.”
As part of the association’s mission, the organization has consistently argued that coal ash is the same as soil because many of the same substances are found in both. While that may be true, they appear in different amounts — the heavy metals in coal ash are concentrated after combustion, according to the EPA and USGS.
Bradley served as a director for the association beginning in 2012 before joining the group’s executive committee in 2014. She served in the secretary and treasurer position from that time until 2020, according to tax records. For reference: The background soil samples in Pines were collected in 2007 and 2012 and the feasibility study that set the arsenic cleanup standard was approved in 2016.
'Be careful what you look for'
Additional flaws with Bradley’s assessment in Pines were revealed in a 2016 deposition for an unrelated coal ash case in North Carolina.
When doing her soil analysis in Pines, Bradley didn’t even assess coal ash in people’s yards, she said in the deposition. Most of the ash used in Pines’ residential properties is called fly ash. Instead, she relied on the assessment of a different kind of ash, known as bottom ash, that was in roadbeds around Pines. That bottom ash, according to the EPA, is a different and slightly less toxic type of ash — a fact that Bradley also acknowledged in the deposition.
In other words, Bradley made an assumption at first without actually testing residents’ yards.
When it finally became clear the problem was bigger than she had assumed, Bradley said in her deposition that NIPSCO asked her to do a new risk assessment of the ash on people’s properties.
Bradley told NIPSCO to not waste its money with a risk assessment: “It’s not going to get us anything,” she said in the 2016 deposition, an apparent reference to reducing the utility’s obligation to cleanup the pollution.
Page 69 of Bradley Deposition - NC Duke Energy case 2016
Contributed to DocumentCloud by Sarah Bowman (The Indianapolis Star) • View document or read text
Evans, the Earthjustice attorney working with Pines residents, said she was shocked when she read that Bradley so clearly aligned herself with NIPSCO and acknowledged an assessment would not benefit the utility.
In his work as a technical advisor for the Pines community group, Huston’s job was to help residents understand the complex science and hold the polluters accountable. But before that role, he previously worked for industry and companies similar to Bradley. That meant he was able to understand how Bradley and NIPSCO may have worked — steering where samples were taken and what they would sample for.
“There is a saying among consultants: Be careful what you look for, because you just might find it,” said Huston, a geologist by training. His new role was a refreshing change, he said, because “we were actually looking for the truth rather than looking for an angle on how to get your client out of a bind.”
By 2016, when the flawed cleanup plan was approved, Huston’s watchdog work with the Pines community group had ended. That’s because the years-long back-and-forth between the utility and residents had exhausted the money provided by NIPSCO as part of the superfund program.
'A generation has grown up with contamination'
Now, EPA can no longer brush off the problem it failed to catch those years ago, Evans said.
The agency acknowledges that a key sample used in the original analysis contained fly ash. As a result, it said staff is currently re-evaluating the background levels, a process EPA said will likely wrap up within a few weeks. The agency plans to have a public meeting for Pines residents to share the new background level and answer any associated questions, according to NIPSCO.
In the meantime, the EPA is encouraging additional Pines residents to get their yards tested. There are still dozens of properties that have yet to have soils samples taken, meaning it is unknown if they will need any cleanup depending on the revised standards.
The agency held a community meeting in early March, the first in nearly eight years, to promote more sign-ups for testing. That community meeting came before the EPA acknowledged any issues with the numbers. Some residents raised concerns on that topic during the forum, according to Kysel, but the agency largely dismissed them.
It wasn’t the first time EPA had cast off issues brought forward about Bradley’s work in Pines. Nearly a decade ago, Kysel and others raised concerns about her apparent conflicts of interest. At one point the community group even asked the EPA to remove her as the consultant, Kysel said, but was told she was qualified given her educational background.
Still, the question of accountability looms large for residents. They want to know if anyone will be held responsible for the error that left members of their community potentially exposed.
Evans with Earthjustice also wants to better understand how EPA plans to re-evaluate the levels and set new standards. She requested a meeting with the agency to that end. It denied her request, she said.
“If EPA just goes into a back room and comes out with a new number that we have to fight about, then that just wastes even more time,” Evans said.
She was shocked that EPA said “no” to her meeting request. Evans worked for the agency for several years and said she thinks it should welcome the feedback and participation, “especially after these errors were made.”
The attorney wants to make sure the agency doesn’t introduce another error, in her eyes, by using the secondary outlier sample. Residents deserve to finally be protected and have that peace of mind they seek, she added.
“A generation has grown up within this contamination because of everyone dragging their feet on cleanup,” Evans said. “That’s why it’s so dangerous to have polluters and their consultants conducting investigations and driving cleanup decisions — it becomes an ‘us or them’ dynamic.”
And too often, she said, the residents are the ones who suffer.
Call IndyStar reporter Sarah Bowman at 317-444-6129 or email at sarah.bowman@indystar.com. Follow her on Twitter and Facebook: @IndyStarSarah. Connect with IndyStar’s environmental reporters: Join The Scrub on Facebook.
IndyStar's environmental reporting project is made possible through the generous support of the nonprofit Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Residents of small Indiana town face risks even after coal ash cleanup
