Environmental Racism and the Harms of Coal Ash
By Carly Rizzuto- Sierra Club volunteer + science teacher at Waiʻanae High School.
There is a dust collecting on the West Side. It is sweeping into homes and infiltrating schools. Year after year, the dust accumulates and rests invisible in the air, soil, water, and bodies of the communities where it is disposed.
The dust blows from the PVT landfill sites to the closest neighborhoods in Nānākuli and Mā'ili. In this dust is coal ash: the second most abundant form of industrial waste in the US. This “toxic brew” of human-created refuse is a byproduct of burning coal. It is made up of fine particles, called fly ash, and larger, rockier leftover materials inevitable in coal combustion. Coal ash finds its way into human bodies through ingestion and inhalation. The health impacts of coal ash are serious, including higher risks of organ damage and cancers.
On the West Side, the PVT landfill sites are not only home to coal ash, but also asbestos, drywall, polluted soils, and hydrogen sulfide gas. When you live within 4 miles of a landfill, you are at a higher risk of respiratory, gastrointestinal, nervous system, and pregnancy issues, as well as headaches, birth defects, and psychological conditions. Living within 2 miles of the PVT landfill sites are 18,000 people.
PVT’s coal ash is produced at a coal-fired power plant run by the transnational corporation, AES. Workers truck coal ash regularly from AES’s power plant in Kapolei to landfill sites that have been operating since 1985, with a mere 750-foot separation from the local homesteads.
PVT claims, "AES ash does not pose a risk to human health or the environment.” They call coal ash an “operations layer,” a “void space filling,” and a “fire barrier.” They make it seem mild. They make it seem useful. Meanwhile, coal ash threatens human health and was the cause for the biggest toxic waste spill in US history.
AES and PVT continue to produce and harmfully dispose of coal ash by will of the Hawai'i state government and the EPA. The EPA does not recognize coal ash as a hazardous waste. Deregulation after deregulation have left protections up to the states, and few states have taken action against coal ash and the companies who profit off of cheap and unsafe disposal.
When waste is deregulated, polluters, like AES and PVT, have the power to choose who gets sick and who stays healthy. Who lives and who dies.
This all matters even more because the burden of coal ash is only carried by some. In fact, that’s the case for most hazardous waste. Landfill sites are not chosen at random. PVT’s location is not random. The location of a hazardous waste site is determined by privileged individuals and institutions that have learned to devalue particular lands and people. Enabled by oppressive systems that determine who has power and who does not, powerful companies trade human life for private profits.
This injustice is called environmental racism. In Bunyan Bryant’s book, Environmental Justice: Issues, Policies, and Solutions, he explains “Environmental racism is the unequal protection against toxic and hazardous waste exposure and the systematic exclusion of people of color from environmental decisions affecting their communities.” Hazardous waste disproportionately threatens the health of people already fighting against societal inequities. 70% of coal ash dumps are in low-income communities. The district that the PVT landfill sites are located in is home to the highest percentage of Native Hawaiians in the world and almost 100% of O'ahu’s solid waste. The environmental racism is staring us in the face.
At this moment, PVT is working to expand their landfill sites on the West Side. Thousands of Hawaiian families’ right to a clean environment and a healthy life is being violently ignored. Thousands are threatened by serious health risks, including respiratory issues, cancer, and organ damage, because of their proximity to the PVT landfills.
So, what do we do? Listen to the people most impacted by the injustice and take action to support them. Recently, Senate Bill 2386, a bill mandating at least a .5-mile buffer zone between landfill sites and homes, schools, and hospitals, passed! The half-mile is a modest yet necessary step toward environmental justice. A'ole PVT.
But, the work is not done. Now, there is Resolution-119- to revise Land Use Ordinance to create a buffer zone (see previous post). It has been stalled for two months at the City and County of Honolulu. Yes, the state law passed, but we need it to come back so the county can start planning to make this happen sooner. Environmental justice is long overdue.
Call or email your local city council member to urge them to bring back this resolution.
Sources
https://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/StateofFailure_2013-04-05.pdf
http://www.pvtland.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/PVT-FEIS_Vol-I-200129_new.pdf
Turner, Robin, and Diana Pei Wu. 2002. “Environmental Justice and Environmental Racism: An Annotated Bibliography and General Overview, Focusing on U.S. Literature, 100 1996-2002.” Berkeley, California: Berkeley Workshop on Environmental Politics, Institute of International Studies. https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/62435599.pdf.
Rajan, S. Ravi. 2001. “Toward a Metaphysic of Environmental Violence: The Case of the Bhopal Gas Disaster.” In Violent Environments, edited by Nancy Lee Peluso and Michael Watts, 389. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press.