Overview:
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Trump administration has delayed the deadlines for utilities to report contamination from coal ash impoundments and install systems to monitor groundwater and begin drafting remediation plans. This move will further delay much-needed relief for predominantly Black communities exposed to coal ash through dust and groundwater contamination. Coal ash contains heavy metals such as arsenic, chromium, lead, and mercury, which have serious detrimental effects on public health. The Biden administration's update to the rule will bring further protections to sensitive groundwater stores, which are very difficult to clean up once they become contaminated.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s latest move in its ongoing effort to roll back the Biden Administration’s advancements centers on coal ash, the toxic byproduct of coal-fired power plants. Utilities will now have even more time before they have to do seemingly basic things such as reporting any contamination to the EPA and installing groundwater monitoring systems.
While the act of burning coal generates huge amounts of carbon and other toxic emissions, the environmental damage doesn’t stop there: Coal ash contains a variety of heavy metals, including arsenic, chromium, lead, and mercury, and the long-term storage what are known as ash ponds or ash basins have serious detrimental effects to the public health of nearby communities, which are exposed to the ash through dust and through groundwater contamination too. Even after coal-fired power plants close, the coal ash more often than not remains.
And more often than not, the communities that are exposed to coal ash are predominantly Black.
RELATED: Trump’s EPA Shuts Down $3B Environmental Justice Program
Black Americans make up just 15% of the national population, but a 2019 report from the NAACP found that Black people comprise fully two-thirds of the population that lives within 30 miles of a coal plant (and the coal ash ponds that are found at the majority of those facilities). According to the EPA’s own data from a few years back, 1.5 million people of color live in the catchment area of coal-ash ponds. In some communities, the disproportionality is even more stark. In Georgia, for example, Black people comprise 45% of people living one mile from a power plant, far higher than the 30% of the overall state population.
A rule finalized by the Biden EPA last year set two deadlines for utilities: they had until next February to report contamination from coal ash impoundments and until May 2028 to install systems to monitor groundwater and begin drafting remediation plans. Last week, Trump’s EPA pushed both deadlines by a year each, arguing that the regulations would get in the way of energy production.
RELATED: In Cancer Alley, There’s No Pollution Monitoring While Black
“President Trump recognizes that affordable and reliable energy are key to the strength of our nation and to our nation’s energy dominance,” EPA administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement. “Today’s actions provide much needed regulatory relief for the power sector.”
But of course, the delays mean that long-awaited and long-needed relief for fenceline communities will be pushed even further off. The very first coal ash regulations were only put in place a decade ago, and the Biden administration’s update to the rule will, when implemented, bring further protections to sensitive groundwater stores, which are very difficult to clean up once they become contaminated.
The change for coal ash comes after the Trump EPA similarly loosened enforcement on the actual act of burning coal itself: In April, 70 coal-fired plants were given a two-year reprieve from federal rules that required them to reduce toxic emissions.
This post originally appeared on Word In Black on July 21, 2025.