TVA Ash Spill

Running Head : TVA Ash Spill

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Background and Introduction

The Tennessee valley Authority (TVA ) ash spill occurred following a breakage of an ash Dyke at the Kingston Fossil Plant located in Roane County . An estimated 1 .1 billion gallons of ash was released in the 1 a .m . incident that occurred on December 22 , 2008 . According to Kirshke (2009 , the spill came in form of a grey sludge formed as a result of mixture of by products

of combustion of coal and water at the steam power plant . The sludge traveled across the neighboring land covering about 300 acres . A lot of damage was caused as homes were extensively destroyed , a road was washed out , a major gas line was ruptured and many trees were downed (Kirshke , 2009 . This is said to be the largest fly ash spill in the U .S history and would take not less than four weeks to clean . This was the Environmental Protection Agency 's (EPA ) estimate but the Southern Environmental Law Centre (SELC ) proved otherwise when they said the cleanup would probably take months to clear . Gil Francis Jr the TVA spokesman issued a statement saying that they were taking the measures required to stabilize the runoff . A sequence of congressional hearings followed the incident to establish the cause and the responsibility of Kingston Fossil Plant . Immediate s into the investigations on health and environmental consequences were launched to prevent any damages . Cleanup...