The Memphis and TVA breakup saga is about money. But it’s also about pollution and environmental racism.

For three years, Memphis, Light, Gas and Water has been considering leaving the Tennessee Valley Authority. Last month, the local power company reversed course and suggested signing a 20-year contract with TVA.

The MLGW Board was expected to vote on the contract Wednesday, but, after a month of community pushback, that decision was delayed.

“The Tennessee Valley Authority has not been a good neighbor in our community. They have been a perpetuator of environmental racism and environmental injustice,” said Justin J. Pearson, the co-founder of Memphis Community Against Pollution.

Pearson is referring to the Allen Fossil Plant, where coal burned near predominantly Black Memphis communities from 1959 to 2018 before being replaced with a natural gas plant — which TVA plans to do next at the Cumberland Fossil Plant near Nashville.

‘The ability to ignore our community forever’

TVA has a long history of pollution incidents, including the largest industrial spill to date after its Kingston Fossil Plant dumped about a billion gallons of coal ash slurry into the local environment in 2008.

In 2017, before TVA closed the Memphis coal operation, high levels of arsenic, lead and fluoride were discovered in monitoring wells at the site. TVA confirmed this but said the pollution was not impacting the deeper Memphis Sands Aquifer. In 2019, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation gave TVA permission, without public input, to dewater the Allen coal ash pond into the Mississippi River.

“For decades, coal ash from its Allen Coal Plant has threatened to pollute our water with toxic chemicals like arsenic. TVA had to be forced to clean up this mess by state leaders,” Ward Archer, president of Protect Our Aquifer, said in a recent ad with Memphis Community Against Pollution.

My mama used to say, "You never miss the water until the well runs dry." More than 1 million Memphians rely on our Memphis Sand Aquifer for water & we must protect it.
Go to https://t.co/WBg1g0yaeo TODAY & send a public comment to MLGW DEMANDING they negotiate a better deal! pic.twitter.com/LAfWQFmR4P

— Memphis Community Against Pollution (MCAP) (@MemphisCAP_org) September 29, 2022

Before these developments in Memphis, TVA was embroiled in a legal dispute about a different pile of coal ash. In 2017, the utility lost a lawsuit regarding its pollution of the Cumberland River with coal ash contamination from the Gallatin Fossil Plant, a coal facility still in operation about 30 miles northeast of Nashville. That ruling was overturned on appeal, but TVA signed a consent order with the state to remove the hazardous residues from its coal ash ponds.

Several years later, in January 2021, TVA and the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation decided to remove coal ash from the Allen Fossil Plant and truck it through mostly Black neighborhoods to the South Shelby Landfill for nine years, according to emails obtained by the Southern Environmental Law Center, or SELC. These plans were announced to the Memphis City Council about seven months later.

Now, diesel trucks are making hundreds of trips daily to remove more than 3 million cubic yards of coal ash through south Memphis, which houses nearly two dozen polluting industries.

This plan has sparked community backlash, which Pearson said partially stems from the lack of opportunities for public input on TVA’s operations.

“And now they want us to sign a contract that, in effect, gives them the ability to ignore our community, to ignore our city, forever,” Pearson said.

TVA has defended the 20-year contract, saying it makes planning power plants easier.

“We’re community energy. The foundation of our mission is to serve the people of the Tennessee Valley, and that mission has not changed,” said spokesperson Scott Fiedler.

Another spokesperson, Scott Brooks, disputed claims made in Memphis Community Against Pollution’s ad. He noted that TVA does not directly tap into the Memphis Sands Aquifer and instead purchases water from MLGW.

“Publicly available data demonstrates that activities at the retired Allen Fossil Plant have not impacted the Memphis Sands Aquifer,” he wrote in an email. “TVA wants to keep it that way. The Allen Restoration Project is dedicated to ensuring the continued protection of this precious water resource.”

MLGW pays TVA $1 billion annually 

TVA says 146 of its 153 local power companies have already signed similar evergreen contracts.

If MLGW signs the contract, which is currently being litigated by SELC, then TVA also gets to keep its annual billion-dollar revenue stream.

For this reason, Pearson said Memphis can and should negotiate with the federal utility to halt plans for new fossil fuel plants, focus on renewables and give resources to people struggling to pay their energy bills.

“We’ve got to use our voice in this moment,” Pearson said.

MLGW said a vote will likely take place later this year.

“The board plans to continue to hear related public comments, which include those from the SELC, until a final vote is taken,” MLGW said in a statement.

MLGW CEO J.T. Young, who presented the recommendation to sign the contract to the board last month, is leaving his position to join Florida Power and Light, the largest utility in Florida. Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland has nominated Doug McGowen, the city’s current chief operating officer, to take over his role.

Correction: This story originally misstated the context of a comment by TVA spokesman Scott Fiedler. Fiedler was asked to respond to community concerns about environmental justice and the 20-year contract, but not Memphis Community Against Pollution’s ad itself. The story has been updated to include TVA’s response to that ad, as well as additional details about litigation surrounding the Gallatin Fossil Plant.