usseii
336-774-1077
4019-A Country Club Road • Winston-Salem. NC 27104
: TWO sides to double your pleasure!
Our main side features DJ Bin, spinning ail the top house turn,
while the hip hop side features the top urban hits.
CASS WESTBROOK'S
CABARET
Every Friday Nite @ Midnight!
May 22-All Male Review! Colt & Company, hot men not to miss
May 29-miad Pride We^end Kick-off Show featuring
Constance Dematlo (Miss Tirlad Pride ’08), Arabia Knight Addams,
leeda & Knute Westbrook
June 5th-Petlte de Jon^lie, onyx Jade
June I2th-The return of Charlie Brown fix)m Atlanta
: H with Tlfl^nY ^net
nisWednesdays ooiiar Nigut!
f cover for members & non-members
$5 cover for 18-20 year olds
$1.00 Domestic Beer • $1.50 Well Drinks
2009 Talent Search — happens
every 1st Thursday of every month.
$100 cash prize to the winner!
Every Wednesday and Thursday
Come party with DJ Tyson spinning!
Thursday. June 4th:
Talent Search Night
email: clubodysseync@hotmail.com
web: www.ClubOdyssey.info
Open niesday - Sunday, 9 pm until
For booking information contact
Cass Westbrook at the club from 9-11 pm on
Tuesdays at 336-774-1077
EarthTalk
from the editors of E/The Environmental Magazine
Tennessee coal ash spill
Dear EarthTalk:
What were the environmental impacts of the
huge coal ash spill in Tennessee this past
December?
— Dave S, Lynnfield, MA
Environmentalists’ call for an end to the
age of coal — one of the dirtiest and most
common of all the fossil fuels we now use —
took on new urgency this past December
when some 525 million gallons of wet coal
ash, enough toxic slurry to flood more than
3,000 acres of nearby land, spilled into the
nearby Tennessee River and surrounding
areas when a retaining wall at a power plant in
the town of Harriman gave way.
The sludge destroyed 12 homes, though no
one was directly injured. However, an unprece
dented fish kill occurred in the Tennessee
River and area tributaries in the aftermath of
the spill. According to John Moulton, a
spokesman for the Tennessee Valley Authority
which owns the plant, a test of river water near
the spill site found elevated levels of lead and
thallium, both of which have been linked to
birth defects and nervous and reproductive
system disorders. He reassured locals that,
although these substances exceeded safety
limits for drinking water, they would be filtered
out by normal water treatment processes.
But some area residents aren’t so sure that
they are safe from the effects of the spill,
which is estimated to have been over 40 times
bigger by volume than the infamous Exxon
Valdez oil spill of 1989. Calling it an “environ
mental disaster of epic proportions,” Carol
Kimmons, a local resident who works at the
non-profit Sequatchie Valley Institute, told
reporters that the nasty black ash flowed into
“the water supply for Chattanooga and mil
lions of people living downstream in
Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky.” She added
that the spill was 70 percent bigger than a
similar one in Kentucky in October 2000 (306
million gallons) that the US. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) referred to at the
time as “one of the worst environmental disas
ters in the Southeastern United States.”
More than a year after that Kentucky spill,
researchers found levels of lead downstream
from where the spill took place that were 400
times higher than the ER/& safe limit. And lev
els of Beryllium were 160
times higher than acceptable
EPA levels. “Coal contains
huge amounts of heavy met
als, and when coal is burned,
the organic matter burns off,
but many of the nasty chemicals stick around,
in higher concentrations,” said Kimmons.
“Also, coal is ‘washed’ using some really nasty
chemicals, which are also left over in coal slur
ry.” The bottom line, she concluded, is that
“coal slurry is really, really toxic stuffT
Ironically, on the very same day as the huge
Teimessee spill, a coalition of 39 non-profit
groups delivered a letter to then President-elect
Some 525 million gallons of wet coal ash
spilled into the Tennessee River and sur
rounding areas last December, flowing into
the water supply for Chattanooga and mil
lions of people living downstream in
Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky.
Photo Credit; Brian Stansberry (Wikipedia)
Barack Obama asking him to overturn a pend
ing Bush administration rule change that would
ease regulations on coal waste disposal. The
groups contend that coal ash has already pollut
ed 23 states and that the proposed new rule
would only allow more pollution and more risks
to human health and the environment President
Obama has pledged to undertake a comprehen
sive inventory of liquid coal ash waste and pro
pose new relations to ensure its safe disposal.
“This disaster proves that regulations around
coal slurry impoundments need to be tightened,
and not loosened,” says Kinunons. Only time will
tell if verbal commitments fiom Washington
materialize into help on the ground.
Further Reading
Sequatchie Valley Institute, svionline.otg
Tennessee Valley Authority, tva.gov
Send your environmental questions to:
EarthTalk, P.O. Box S098, Westport, Q 06881;
earthtalk@etnagazine.com. Read past columns at
wwvr.emagazine.com/earthtall(/archives.php. EarthTalk is
now a book. Details and order information at
www.emagazine.com/earthtalkbook. I
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