If Alabama is forced to dig out millions of tons of coal ash all over the state, those extra costs will probably show up on your power bill.

But there might be a second option.

Some utilities in other states are being required to pay a portion of those costs out of the profits they earn providing power, rather than passing the costs along to the general public.

“I think that would be the right way to handle it,” Mobile Baykeeper Cade Kistler said, citing Alabama Power’s 2021 annual report, showing the private company earned $1.24 billion in profit that year.

With approximately 1.5 million customers in the state, that means Alabama Power earned just over $825 per customer in profit in 2021.

Kistler said given those numbers, the company could afford to bear more of the costs of any coal ash cleanup.

“They’re doing well as a company, their shareholders are doing well,” Kistler said. “Alabamians are paying some of the highest prices in the nation, and we’re not even we’re not even cleaning up the coal ash effectively, so it just doesn’t quite add up.”

Alabama Public Service Commission decides

Ultimately the Alabama Public Service Commission will most likely decide who pays and how much.

The PSC did not respond to requests by AL.com for comment, nor did the office of Commission President Twinkle Andress Cavanaugh.

But the PSC has allowed Alabama Power to raise electric rates to cover coal ash costs before. In 2019, Alabama Power raised rates approximately 3%, citing the costs of coal ash cleanup. The company said at the time that increase would add approximately $4.49 to the average residential customer’s monthly bill.

Alabama Power told AL.com in a statement Wednesday that cost was only one factor in its decisions on coal ash remediation.

“Alabama Power spent years evaluating the best possible choice for closing its coal ash sites, with expert input from independent, third-party engineers and geologists,” the company said in an emailed statement Wednesday.

“These experts evaluated both closure options (closure in place and closure by removal) for each of our sites and identified closure in place as the more favorable option to comply with the 2015 Coal Combustion Rule.”

“The decision was based on key factors such as safety, schedule, constructability, site specific geology, volume of ash, protection of human health and the environment and regulatory compliance when shaping the final plans.

“Cost was only one of the multiple factors assessed.”

“Alabama Power remains committed to complying with all environmental rules and regulations,” the company said.

Mobile Baykeeper has clashed with Alabama Power for years over the roughly 21 million cubic yards of coal ash sitting in an unlined impoundment on the Mobile River, in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta, an area called America’s Amazon for its remarkable wildlife and biodiversity.

The Baykeeper has sued Alabama Power over its coal ash plan, a case that was moving forward in the courts before the EPA’s proposed decision to reject Alabama’s plan.

Massive, expensive cleanup

Coal ash is the material left over when power plants burn coal for electricity. For decades, utilities typically dumped the ash in massive on-site ponds, usually unlined and located alongside a river so excess water could be discharged. Those ponds grew into massive lagoons over years, containing millions of tons of ash waste that contained potentially harmful substances like arsenic, mercury, cadmium and other heavy metals.

Earlier this year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Alabama’s plan to cover those ash ponds in place did not do enough to stop groundwater pollution.

If the EPA maintains its course, Alabama utilities may be forced to dig out these old ash ponds, even though two of them were covered with dirt and synthetic liners more than five years ago. There are no clear cost estimates yet, but the undertaking would clearly cost billions.

Daniel Tate, executive director of advocacy group Energy Alabama, said that people living in north Alabama who get power from the Tennessee Valley Authority would almost certainly have to pay the extra costs themselves.

The TVA is a non-profit federal entity and has no shareholders.

“In the TVA case, it’s quite clear that no matter what ends up happening, customers through their utility bills are going to be paying for it,” Tait said.

Could Alabama Power, a for-profit company that earns a return on providing power to roughly two thirds of the state, be a different story?

“In the Alabama Power case, shareholders, theoretically, could be forced to pay some or all of the costs,” Tait said.

That decision would be left to the PSC, and Tait isn’t holding his breath.

“We don’t anticipate the Public Service Commission doing anything but giving Alabama Power what it wants,” Tait said. “But theoretically it could hold the company accountable if it really wanted to.”

What are other states doing?

Some states have intervened to shield customers from paying for the full cost of coal ash cleanups, while others have not.

In North Carolina, Duke Energy reached a settlement with the state that shifted $1.1 billion in coal ash costs from customers to the power company.

“I have long held that North Carolinians should not bear the full cost of cleaning up coal ash,” North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein said when the settlement was announced in 2021. “As a result of today’s settlement, we won’t — to the tune of more than $1 billion.”

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality required Duke to excavate all its ash ponds in the state, about 124 million cubic yards worth, at an estimated cost of $8-9 billion.

In Georgia, it appears most costs will fall to the utility customers, as the Georgia Supreme Court declined to hear a lawsuit from the Sierra Club seeking to put restrictions on how much of the costs were passed on to customers.

While the total costs of coal ash cleanup are high, those estimates have been shown to vary widely, and the costs don’t come up all at once.

For instance, Alabama’s $3.3 billion coal ash estimate included costs that would include 30 years of monitoring the ash ponds after it closed. Alabama Power’s annual report for 2021 showed it expected to spend around $300 million a year on ash pond work over the next several years.

Also, some utilities have found ways to trim costs of ash removal by selling more of the recycled ash to cement-making operations, finding a viable use for a waste product.

But in the meantime, the state will likely go back to waiting for word from the EPA. The comment period on the EPA’s proposed denial of Alabama’s program ended last month.

The federal agency will now gather and prepare responses to those comments that will be published when a final decision is announced.

There has been no timeline given for such an announcement.