A reservoir at Kingston Fossil Plant, a coal-fired electric generation facility operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority, a government-regulated utility, failed and that failure resulted in the release of 1.1 billion gallons of coal fly ash slurry onto 300 acres of surrounding territory. It’s important to note that the volume of sludge released at Kingston was 100 times greater than the volume of oil spilled in the Exxon Valdez accident. The spill damaged communities and waterways and the cleanup efforts have proven to be more than daunting, with only 3 percent of the spill effectively cleaned as of June of this year. That means 10 more years just to get the surface damage cleaned up, let alone what is seeping into the ground and the water tables.

Fly ash is a residue of fine particulate matter that results from coal combustion. It is a toxic substance that is often captured in water to be stored as a slurry mixture, as seen at the reservoir at Kingston. Fly ash, which contains substances such as arsenic and mercury, currently is not regulated as hazardous waste by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Tests of the slurry spill and surrounding river waters at Kingston have shown significantly raised levels of these toxins. Populations of fish and waterfowl were killed almost instantly when the slurry overtook those Tennessee waterways. We all remember the sad pictures of drowning waterfowl in the Alaskan waterways, but where is the coverage now?

In the wake of the accident, the EPA began reviewing coal ash disposal sites across the nation. The U.S. House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee has considered legislation to compel the Department of the Interior to increase regulations and establish design and performance standards for the storage of coal ash everywhere. Exactly how coal ash regulation will change is not yet clear, but for the residents around Roane, Tenn., the damage already is done.

The circumstances surrounding the fly ash slurry spill at Kingston raise important points in the “clean coal” debate. First, the incident makes a strong case for the fact that just the idea of clean coal is a misnomer. “Clean coal” has become something of a mantra in the modern political debate surrounding energy generation. The term actually derives from the notion of “clean coal technologies”; that is, technologies that aim to remove harmful substances from the byproducts of the combustion of coal. Unfortunately, many of our politicians have latched on to the idea that coal itself can be clean, largely because that hope, however far-fetched, is politically expedient. The truth is, true “clean coal technologies” just don’t exist. And even if harmful substances, like mercury, carbon and arsenic are removed from the processing of coal, they still need to go somewhere. Whose backyard is willing to be this dumping ground? The events at the Kingston Fossil Plant illustrate this point in graphic clarity.

Imagine barges of toxic slurry floating around the coasts of our country, much like the trash and waste from the East Coast big cities have in recent years.

Second, pollution, such as fly ash slurry, often is downplayed as an external cost of the use of coal. American utilities like coal because they contend it is a cheap fuel. But for years, the true costs to your environment and health have not been in that cost equation. We’re aware of carbon-dioxide and mercury emissions tied to coal and have heard accounts of men in the mines coming down with black lung disease. The Kingston event, however, brought to light another hazard in coal-fired electric generation. If “clean coal technologies” leave us with billions of dollars of new expenses and still billions of gallons of toxic slurry to account for, then where’s the real economic and environmental benefit? In the end, the environment and your wallet still suffer just the same, without a lasting, meaningful solution.

Finally, this massive spill should force us to refine the way we address America’s need for cleaner fuels in electric generation. Coal is still responsible for more than 50 percent of the nation’s electricity and to be rid of coal overnight would cripple our economy in ways unimaginable. Yet, in light of that reality, we need to immediately transition towards truly cleaner and reliable sources of electric generation, like natural gas and wind power, in ways that seek to replace coal’s share of the electric generation market.

Coal simply isn’t clean and America cannot afford another disaster like Kingston, whether media takes notice or not and whether America’s politicians like this inconvenient truth about coal power or not.