Dixie Transforming

El Nino’s wrath on the south this winter has meant highs in the mid 40s and evening temperatures hovering in the low 30s.  This happened in New Orleans, then in Mississippi, and now in the state of Alabama.  Despite the chill, the overall weather in Alabama was beautiful today.  The sun was shining at all times during my visit today to Uniontown, AL.

The latest environmental justice controversy surrounding Uniontown has been well-documented by several incredibly talented journalists.  In short, a billion gallons of coal ash sludge from a December 2008 spill in eastern Tennessee is being shipped to Uniontown in rail cars to be disposed of in a private Perry County landfill.  This landfill is less than one mile from the heart of town.  While I was in the Uniontown area, I was less drawn to the plight of the small town as I was interested in the traditional economic drivers that bring any semblance of prosperity to this place.  These drivers, needless to say, are potentially threatened by the coal-ash landfill project that delivers on average 88 rail cars worth of arsenic laced coal ash to Perry County EVERY DAY.

Catfish farming is big business in Perry County.  Thirteen percent of Alabama’s catfish are produced there.  Another 14 percent of the state’s catfish are produced in Dallas County, whose border skirts within one mile of the controversial Arrowhead Landfill.  Today I observed activities at the Dallas County catfish ponds.

Catfish farming has brought prosperity to some in Perry and Dallas Counties.

First, a little background on the contextual landscape: Aquaculture catfish ponds are sunken pits on agricultural land filled with freshwater surrounded by earthen dikes.  These dikes have gravel roads on top of them, which allow maintenance vehicles to travel around.  The ponds vary in surface elevation, meaning that a single dike road can separate two catfish ponds with different water levels.  There are several methods for filling the ponds.  In inland areas like Perry County, use of rainwater and storm water runoff is commonly used to fill the ponds.   Storm water that may originate at the Arrowhead landfill and end up in the Perry or Dallas County catfish ponds creates a dire problem in the aquaculture production chain.  Unfortunately, only time and persistent water testing will reveal what is happening (or not happening).

A dike separates two catfish ponds with different water levels.

The catfish maintenance worker I talked to today was skeptical about the landfill’s harm on the ponds he was watching over.  He’d “heard” that Auburn University had tested the water and found no harm; he’d also heard that a Japanese engineering firm has said there was nothing out of the ordinary with the water samples they’d taken.  I didn’t argue with him.  I do, however, remain unconvinced that tests done today can guarantee the future quality of the freshwater resources into the near and far future.  The fact is that the coal ash is here in Perry County forever.  Only long-term, persistent, and uninterrupted water quality testing can assure both counties that their economic lifeblood is safe from harm’s way.

Click here to see more photos from my trip through Perry County, AL.