Fighting Power Plant Pollution and Coal Ash in Colorado!

By Alisa Lapp, Colorado Program Assistant Since the end of April our community organizers have been raising awareness about a major problem for our water. We’ve been motivating Coloradans to make their voices heard by writing public comment to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) about toxic power plant water pollution.  Power plants contribute more than 50% of the pollution in our water every year and coal plants are the worst offenders. There are 13 coal-fired power plants in Colorado, including Xcel Energy’s Valmont Power Plant in Boulder. It’s no surprise that most people we talk too were shocked and outraged that the EPA still hasn’t updated the minimum standards about the amount of heavy metals these power plants can discharge into our waterways in over 30 years! Heavy metals like mercury, arsenic, cadmium, selenium, and other cancer causing chemicals are legally dumped into our water, in huge amounts, every year. It’s time for this to stop. Will you join us? Take action today. For the last two months our members have been urging EPA to enact the strongest possible protections from power plant pollution for our lakes, rivers, streams -  and our public health. People we talk to at the door are extremely concerned about what we’re allowing to be dumped into our water through weak wastewater discharge guidelines in Colorado. Many are experiencing these impacts first hand. The local Valmont plant is dumping wastewater from ash ponds into Boulder Creek.  Advocating for a much needed update to current EPA guidelines, our canvass collected almost 500 hand-written letters from concerned constituents, which we delivered to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. For more in-depth information regarding Coal Ash, please visit Toxic Trash Exposed - Coal Ash in Colorado