TVA to Remove Arsenic from Aquifer

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) announced Friday it will remove the arsenic found in groundwater near its now-shuttered Allen Fossil Plant, and begin forming a plan for the future of the coal ash there that caused the contamination.

Last year, investigators found 300 times the legal limit of arsenic in an alluvial aquifer that sits above the Memphis Sand Aquifer, the source of Memphis' famously pure drinking water. It is from that shallower, alluvial aquifer above the Memphis Sand that the TVA will pump water and treat it to remove the arsenic.

State officials mandated an investigation of the site and found that contaminated aquifer and the Memphis Sand aquifer were connected, posing a possible threat to the city’s drinking water.

“TVA intends to remove the arsenic by pumping out the water in the alluvial aquifer and capturing the contaminants,” TVA officials said Friday in a blog post called, “What’s Going on at the Allen Fossil Plant?”

Read more: https://www.memphisflyer.com/NewsBlog/archives/2018/11/30/tva-to-remove-arsenic-from-aquifer