Decades of lead, zinc and iron ore mining have left the adjacent towns of Treece, Kansas and Picher, Oklahoma sitting in "a toxic waste dump of lead-tinged dust, contaminated soil and sinkholes." The remediation of the land has been determined to be so difficult by the EPA that the federal government has offered the residents of Picher a buy out to relocate. Across the road in Treece, a buy out has not been offered as the EPA "favors rehabilitation of the tainted soil." What is left is an area that most do not want to live in anymore.

They live in a gothic landscape of varying degrees of disrepair. A few residents walked away from well-kept properties just last week, while most others took buyouts years ago, leaving dozens of houses to collapse upon themselves. Stray dogs wander. Faded signs announce places that are no longer: the Picher Mining Museum, the Church of the Nazarene, a 24-hour truck stop.

EPA executives and federal officials toured Treece in August and Senators Pat Roberts (R-KS) and Sam Brownback (R-KS) are strongly pushing for a buyout of the residents.

Dams assigned the high hazard potential classification are those where failure or misoperation will probably cause loss of human life.

North Carolina has the most with 12 followed by Arizona (9), Kentucky (7), Ohio (6) and Illinois (2). Indiana, Pennsylvania, Georgia and Montana each have one site.

Watch Sen. Boxer's June 12th Press Conference on Coal Ash:

• Holz Dam - South Charleston, WV
• Scotts Run Cinder Barrier Dam - Belle, WV
• FMC Retention Dam - South Charleston, WV
• Conner Run Dam - Captina, WV
• McElroy's Flyash Dam - Eureka, WV
• Scary Creek Impoundment - Scary, WV

The Louisville Courier-Journal reports that the Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet has it's own rating system that considers four coal ash ponds in the state to be high hazard. In the same report, the Indiana Department of Environmental Management declined to comment on whether any of the coal ash ponds in Indiana were on the EPA list.

UPDATE (2009-07-07): EPA releases locations of impoundments.

The US EPA awarded $48.8 million to the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection to help finance many overdue wastewater projects that are essential to protecting the health of the people and environment of West Virginia. This award is part of a larger program signed by President Obama in February. This program, the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009, provides low-interest loans for water quality protection projects for wastewater treatment, non-point source pollution control, and watershed and estuary management. This project will be important for a state with many rural communities that have never had proper wastewater treatment systems.

For more information about the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009, visit http://www.epa.gov/recovery.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has awarded a total of $1 million to four communities in northern West Virginia to assess, clean up and revitalize former industrial and commercial sites.

The Northern West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Center (NBAC) at West Virginia University has been helping these communities identify projects and to find funding sources to address the problems associated with these sites. These grants will help turn problem properties, known as "brownfields," into productive community assets.

• The City of Moundsville
• Preston County Economic Development Authority
• Brooke-Hancock Regional Planning and Development Council
• West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection

An EPA study of coal ash ponds shows that people who live near ponds with inadequate linings had higher rates of cancer and other diseases. Coal ash, also known as fly ash, contains high levels of arsenic, lead, mercury and boron among other heavy metals.

The report said that people who live near the most problematic disposal sites have as much as a 1-in-50 chance of getting cancer from drinking water contaminated by arsenic. The highest risk is for people who live near ash ponds with no liners and who get their water from wells.

The report said the ash ponds also produced an increased risk of damage to the liver and other organs from exposure to such metals as cadmium, cobalt and lead, and other pollutants.

The results of this study are a concern for rural populations as seventy-five of the coal ash ponds evaluated are located in rural counties. The study includes seven West Virginia coal ash ponds, five of which have no liner.

View the full EPA report and see if a coal ash pond included in the study is located in your area.