Activists seek to join coal ash landfill suit

A group of Colleton County activists requested on Wednesday to join a court case involving the hotly contested decision over whether South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. will be allowed to build a dump site to store potentially toxic waste materials.

The Southern Environmental Law Center filed the motion in the court of common pleas in Colleton County on behalf of two activist groups: Coastal Conservation League and Citizens for Colleton County, a group of area residents who organized in opposition to SCE&G's proposal for a 15-story-tall landfill on a 1,700-acre site in the rural county.

The landfill would take up about 200 acres of the site and would store coal ash, the byproduct of coal-burning plants, generated at the SCE&G's Canadys Station about four miles away.

Following a series of heated public meetings, a Colleton County board in February rejected a zoning change that would have allowed the company to build the dump.

SCE&G appealed that decision in the case now pending.

A judge next must decide whether to approve Wednesday's motion to intervene.

"We're seeking to intervene so that the voices of these community members will be heard during the appeal," said Frank Holleman, senior attorney for the Southern Environmental Law Center.

A hearing date has not yet been set, Holleman said.

Critics have said the landfill would negatively affect residents' health and quality-of-life and the environment because coal ash waste can contain a host of hazardous metals, including arsenic, selenium and cadmium.

SCE&G has said the site would be closely monitored and that the company would recycle as much of the coal ash as possible to make cement.