Good Friday is here! Everything to know from what is the holy holiday to what's open, closed
INVESTIGATIONS

State to coal mine's neighbors: Dust? We didn't see it

Ryan Sabalow
ryan.sabalow@indystar.com
David Hale wears a protective mask inside his home that sits adjacent to the Bear Run Mine, operated by Peabody Energy, in Carlisle, Ind., Sept. 23, 2014. He says the dust comes from blasting at the nearby mine and has made it difficult to live inside the residence.

Sullivan County, Ind., -- A fine layer of gray dust coats nearly every surface in the parts of this Southwest Indiana town nearest the Bear Run Mine, the largest surface coal mine east of the Mississippi.

Porches need frequent power-washing to clean away footprints in the powder. A day or two after washing a car, there's enough dust on its paint job to write "wash me." On particularly dusty nights, the beam from a flashlight looks as if it's penetrating fog.

Inside is not much better. Across the road from Peabody Energy's Bear Run Mine, Blakely and Joshua Pugh can't postpone dusting for more than a week or a thick layer of dust builds up on window sills, the blades of the living-room ceiling fan and the metal grate over their furnace's air filter.

What's worse, the Pughs say, is the damage they believe all that dust is doing to the lungs of their 4-year-old son, Noah. They say he has suffered from chronic respiratory problems since the blasting began at Bear Run soon after they moved here in 2012.

They blame the ever-present dust for his hacking coughs, constant earaches and almost daily sniffles.

An Indianapolis Star investigation reveals that Pugh and his neighbors have several causes for concern. They include:

Since 2012, state environmental regulators have received numerous complaints from neighbors about dust. In spite of rules that say mines must contain dust inside the property boundaries, no action has been taken. A gap in Indiana regulations says that state officials must personally see dust to take action, but in four inspections, officials said no dust was visible. In essence, state regulators tell residents that if inspectors don't see the dust clouds, they didn't happen.

The Star reviewed at least 10 videos shot by a neighbor of massive clouds of dust escaping the mine. In some of the videos, the wind can be heard howling, tree branches swaying, in spite of insistence from Peabody and state regulators that the mine does not blast on windy days.

In 2013, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency took enforcement action based on the dust complaints and numerous poor air-quality readings, but there is no resolution in sight.

A university public health scientist has taken samples near the mine and found potentially alarming levels of dust in the air and of inflammation in residents' blood, a possible indicator of health problems caused by breathing fine particulate matter.

"We never bargained for any of that when we moved in here," said 26-year-old Joshua Pugh, who, like many people living in this part of the state, is reluctant to complain. After all, he is a coal miner.

So when he speaks with worry about the blasts from Bear Run — explosions that shake his family awake, vibrate windows, knock items off walls and coat his home with dust — he does so almost grudgingly.

And he's not alone.

Peabody officials insist the mine is safe, and state regulators say they've not documented any violations during their inspections.

"Bear Run Mine operates in a safe, environmentally sound manner and complies with all state and federal air, land and water quality permits," Peabody said in a prepared statement.

But, in the heart of Indiana's coal country, where the local newspaper posts mine-blasting notices and no one flinches at the ubiquitous booms, the Pughs and a growing number of their neighbors have become unlikely allies with the fiercely anti-coal Sierra Club.

Together, they're urging state and federal officials to step in and force Bear Run to do something about the choking dust.

'Strong commitment to environmental stewardship'

In a two-paragraph statement, Peabody Energy said the company's "strong commitment to environmental stewardship is well entrenched in our operational history." The company says Bear Run provides the region with an economic boost of 625 jobs and more than $8 million in tax payments, all while supplying the state with a reliable source of cheap energy.

Bear Run has been criticized by environmental groups before. When Peabody expanded its mining operation in 2011, it drew protests for having one of the most relaxed water-quality permits in the nation for a mine of that size.

Around that time, regulators also began the process of signing off on an air-quality permit that environmental groups say provides only minimal protections for those living around the mine, which produces up to 15.9 million tons of coal per year.

Environmental groups say the mine has been allowed to expand under a lax air-quality permit that allows for higher levels of emissions, a contention the state denies.

IDEM spokesman Barry Sneed said in a statement that his agency "worked appropriately" to issue the air-quality agreement for Bear Run based on "potential emissions the facility would generate if it were to operate 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, at full capacity."

While debate exists over whether the air permit is strict enough, there's no argument about the regulations pertaining to what's known as "fugitive dust." The rules are clear. Mines are required to keep dust inside their property boundaries. But since 2012, at least 12 people have complained to IDEM that dust has spilled over.

Several of those who complained told The Star that they were troubled by IDEM's response.

"I was told, along with someone else that phoned, that if they didn't see it 'it didn't happen,' " said 70-year-old David Hale.

Dozen complaints, little action

It was a frustrating moment for Hale. After all, his wife, Dorothy, 70, has shot at least 10 iPhone videos of massive dust clouds enveloping their property after blasts at a Bear Run pit near their farmhouse. In several of the videos, the wind is howling.

Sneed said that when IDEM inspectors visited the mine during at least four inspections, they didn't see any dust leaving the property, so they took no action.

Plus, IDEM officials watched mine employees spraying water to keep dust down.

"The mine environmental staff has informed IDEM that the operation works to minimize blasting activity on days when there are windy conditions," Sneed said.

Bowden Quinn, conservation director of the Sierra Club's Hoosier Chapter, said because regulators insist a state official actually must witness a violation before taking action, he has asked IDEM to appoint a regional official, possibly from the local health department, to respond to complaints.

So far, IDEM says that's not needed, but officials are at least open to the idea.

"Should we receive new information in this matter, we would take the proper steps to conduct an investigation," Sneed said. "We would be open to seeking the assistance of local agencies, if we believed it would be helpful."

Meanwhile, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been less inclined to take the mine at its word.

In late 2011, federal officials ordered the mine to place three dust sensors around the property. They were installed in summer 2012. The sensors, both upwind and downwind from the mine, reported potentially unsafe levels of dust more than 150 times in just four months.

Armed with the sensor data and after receiving several complaints, which included the Hales' photos, the EPA served Peabody with a violation notice in 2013.

According to records reviewed by The Star, the mine beefed up its dust control measures around the time the EPA got involved. But, a year later, the EPA's enforcement action is still pending.

"The agency does not comment on ongoing enforcement activities," the EPA said in a statement.

Wearing masks to do chores

Neighbors say the federal involvement has done little to stop the dust or their concerns about their respiratory health.

It's been so bad the Hales rarely stay in their farmhouse these days. When they return to do chores, they wear dust masks, particularly when doing housework or mowing. Some months when the weather is dry, they say, their lawn is more gray than green.

Christmas dinners in the home they bought in 1975 are out of the question. They don't want to expose their grandchildren to dust from rumbling heavy equipment and the blasts that shake the place, they say, at least once or twice a day.

"We feel like we're a couple of canaries up on the hill," David Hale said, "waiting for that dust to get us."

And at least one scientist says there's more to the dust than meets the eye.

Indiana University professor Michael Hendryx of the School of Public Health said those living near surface mines are at particular risk for "ultra fines," very small particles of dust.

Although they are invisible, Hendryx said, such particles "potentially have a bigger impact on health because they are so small they can penetrate deeply into the lungs and into the bloodstream."

He said mine dust can contain silica, organic compounds and high levels of heavy metals, all of which can be harmful.

'I could smell it in the air'

Hendryx has compiled data that suggest his worries are more than theoretical.

He recently moved to Indiana from West Virginia University. There, he published more than 25 peer-reviewed studies that showed those living closer to coal-mining operations, particularly surface mines, had significantly poorer health, ranging from respiratory problems to a greater risk of birth defects. The studies were controlled to account for factors such as regional poverty, obesity and smoking rates.

After the Sierra Club told him about the dust problems at Bear Run, he went out to investigate.

"I saw for myself what the conditions were like, noticed the dust on people's furniture and on people's houses and I could smell it in the air," he said. "I could feel it in my own throat."

He and a small team of researchers reached out to several people living around the mine, including the Hales and Pughs, and asked if they could collect blood samples and take point-in-time indoor and outdoor air quality samples.

The researchers also took tests from people living farther from the mine to see if they were less at risk.

What they found was striking. Those living close to the mining operation had average indoor air-pollution readings nearly three times as high as those living farther away. Outside it was nearly twice as bad for those living closer to the mine.

The researchers also tested the residents' blood for a type of protein that's an indicator of blood inflammation, which could be caused by breathing dust.

According to Hendryx, people who score a 3 or more on the tests should go visit a doctor because they may be at risk of health problems. Those living close to Bear Run scored an average of 4.23. Those further away scored a 2.5.

Some had alarmingly high levels.

'It would definitely concern me'

Blakely Pugh, 25, said she was horrified when she saw her c-reactive protein results: 18.4. The family also had shockingly high levels of indoor dust compared to other homes Hendryx's team sampled.

She said, so far, she hasn't suffered any noticeable problems.

Hendryx acknowledges the study is extremely limited, and it's too early to draw any conclusions. He's working on securing funding to perform more long-term studies of both the air and the health of those living near the mine.

Still, he said, if he lived in the Pughs' home, he'd be alarmed.

"It would concern me," Hendrix said. "It would definitely concern me."

Joshua Pugh doesn't need a scientist to tell him that.

He has taken enough safety courses at the mine where he works to be worried about what his young family is breathing every day.

He said that if Bear Run is anything like the underground mine where he works, they're blasting rock containing quartz to reach rich seams of coal.

Quartz often contains silica. When pulverized, it's akin to finely crushed glass. It can scar lungs and lead to long-term respiratory problems, an occupational hazard for coal miners such as him.

Pugh doesn't think his family should face the same risks he does deep underground.

"I don't want to see my family get silicosis of the lungs just because of where we live," he said. "It's scary."

Pugh just wishes someone — the government, the mine's owners, anyone — would take action to make the dust go away.

So far, though, the state says there's no problem, and Peabody and the federal government aren't talking.

Call Star reporter Ryan Sabalow at (317) 444-6179. Follow him on Twitter: @ryansabalow.