Beasley, Allen, Crow, Methvin, Portis & Miles, P.C.

Problems continue to mount for the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). This week a federal judge upheld an order handed down in January that the TVA accelerate its billion-dollar program to clean up four of its coal plants in Tennessee and Alabama so the plants could stop polluting the air in North Carolina, according to the Associated Press/Forbes.

The TVA had asked for more time to carry out those orders, requesting one more year – to 2012 – to install smokestack scrubbers at its John Sevier plant in Rogersville, Tennessee, and two more years – to 2014 – to carry out other pollution controls. U.S. District Judge Lacy Thornburg denied the TVA’s request, saying North Carolina’s experts offered a more compelling argument than the TVA.

The order came within a month of another pricey situation for the utility. On December 22nd, a coal ash impoundment pond at the TVA’s Kingston, Tennessee plant spilled over, dumping 1.1 billion gallons on to 300 acres of an east Tennessee community. The utility is currently undergoing a huge cleanup operation which is expected to cost the TVA between $525 million and $825 million.

The TVA has not yet decided whether it will appeal the entire ruling. “This is a fiscal problem for us,” said TVA Chairman Bill Sansom. “Can we fiscally do what the court tells us to do?”

The lawsuit was originally filed in January 2006 by North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper, arguing that the TVA needed to take stronger measures to reduce the emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury that were drifting east and polluting the air in the North Carolina mountains.

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