March 24, 2014 Business Meeting Minute Book 136, Page 337 The City Council of the City of Charlotte, North Carolina convened for a Dinner Briefing on Monday, March 24, 2014 at 4:08 p.m. in Room 267 of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Government Center with Mayor Patrick Cannon presiding. Councilmembers present were Al Austin, John Autry, Michael Barnes, Ed Driggs, Claire Fallon, David Howard, Patsy Kinsey, Vi Lyles, LaWana Mayfield, Greg Phipps and Kenny Smith. Absent Until Noted: Councilmember David Howard * * * * * * * DINNER BRIEFING ITEM NO. 1: MAYOR AND COUNCIL CONSENT ITEM QUESTIONS Mayor Cannon said we have several items we will want to cover this day. One Assistant City Manager, Eric Campbell is here to be able to find out from any members of the body if you have any consent items that need to be pulled. Are there any? Hearing none we will continue to move to item number two. * * * * * * * ITEM NO. 2: RIVERBEND STEAM STATION COAL ASH DUE DILIGENCE REVIEW Mayor Cannon said council you all recall that on March 13 2014, Duke Energy and Charah, Inc. invited the City of Charlotte to conduct a due diligence review of repurposing Riverbend Steam Station Coal Ash at Charlotte Douglas International Airport. Duke Energy and Charah, Inc. will present their requests to us this day and also in addition, the Catawba River Keeper will be presenting their perspective on coal ash to provide a more complete picture to the Mayor and Council on this particular item. Pretty much the issue surrounding coal ash repurposing itself and then finally, staff will present an overview of what actions have been taking place to date and then the City Council, you will be asked to provide direction to the City Manager on how to proceed regarding this request. Now since coal ash has been referred to the City Council Environmental Committee, which Councilmember Autry chairs, the members will be kept updated of course during this process on the review and how things will be going through that process. With that said, Mr. Manager I believe you have Assistant City Manager Hyong Yi here; anything further? Assistant City Manager Hyong Yi said I just wanted to tee this up by offering a few opening remarks. Once we got the proposal and as we have been thinking about the proposal over the last couple of weeks leading up to this dinner briefing, there have been two primary considerations that the Manager has made very clear to staff that we need to keep in mind as we go forward with doing the due diligence on this particular proposal by Duke and Charah. The first is that we need to keep in mind the environmental considerations and that the City of Charlotte will only do this if it makes environmental sense to do this and if all the environmental stakeholders are in support of this particular proposal. The second consideration that you made very clear to staff to keep in mind is that we are only going to do this if it makes economic sense for the Airport to be a participant in this and if it fails to meet either of those two criteria, that we’re not going to do this but most importantly he made it very clear that the environmental concerns were paramount to him as the Manager and that he was very in his direction to us and so I wanted to offer that as the context for what you are about to hear from Duke and the River Keeper and with that I would just ask Duke representative and the Charah representative to come on up and deliver the proposal. Dave Mitchell, Director of Environmental Programs, Duke Energy said Duke Energy and Charah are here today to talk to you about an opportunity to explore a coal ash structural fill at Charlotte Douglas Airport. Coal ash has certainly been in the news an awful lot lately. I’m sure that you’ve gotten a lot of questions from the public and I’m sure you’ve gotten a lot of questions yourselves. One of the key questions has probably been “what are we going to do with all the coal ash?” and that’s an answer that we want to explore further here today. We believe we have a good solution in a project that involves a coal fired power plant that sits on Mountain Island Lake right here next to Charlotte. For approximately 80 years, Duke Energy’s Riverbend Steam Station has provided the power that has really been a strong contributor to economic and other kmj March 24, 2014 Business Meeting Minute Book 136, Page 338 growth in the region. There is a lot of coal ash that’s been generated over all those years of energy production. Duke Energy and Charah; Charah is a company that specializes in coal combustion byproducts management, are here to explore an option with you to look at moving all the coal ash from Riverbend to a fully lined engineered structural fill at the Charlotte Douglas Airport. For about five years, Charah has explored a similar airport project along with Duke Energy at the Asheville Airport. This successful project has established acres of graded stable land that’s used for potential future development in the Asheville Airport region and it’s a result of using state of the art fully lined engineered structural fill techniques. Those techniques have been highly regarded by both local community and by the environmental protection advocacy folks. There are several benefits to this project. One benefit is that we would be able to transfer 4 million tons of coal ash from Riverbend Steam Station that currently sits in unlined ponds to a lined engineered structural fill project with a waste water collection system. The second benefit with this structural fill would provide is stable graded land for future development at the airport and the project would be based on a very successful model that’s been implemented at the Asheville Regional Airport. A few background information on the project predominantly Riverbend Steam Station was retired in the early part of 2013 so it no longer continues to operate. What we’re asking for today is to pursue due diligence. That again, would look at moving all the coal ash from Riverbend Steam Station to a fully lined engineered structural fill project. We think this project would be environmentally, scientifically, technically, and physically sound. Councilmember Barnes said I wanted to ask you a question about the previous slide. The first bullet point references the engineered structural fill system that’s lined. I want to talk to you about the waste water collection system because it strikes me that one of the concerns that a number of people have and one of the concerns I have is the whole issue of certain toxic chemicals being released into the water supply or into the ground by way of a waste water collection system. So what would be the nature of that waste water collection system and what would be the assurances or safeguards that it wouldn’t leak or breach? Councilmember Howard arrived at 4:16 p.m. Mr. Mitchell said that’s a good topic. That’s a topic that Charles Price with Charah has included. He has a nice slide and a few more slides that outline the structure of the structural fill so to speak in a waste water collection system. The predominant benefit is collecting that water, not allowing it to be transported into the ground or into the ground water and being able to manage that water and I think that will be the purpose of his discussion. Mr. Barnes said okay I’ll wait for it. Mr. Mitchell said I have a bit of information on coal ash: 10% of the coal consumed in power production is turned into ash. Duke Energy continually explores beneficial reuse projects for this ash and that’s an opportunity to safely recycle coal ash as a byproduct. The company reused approximately 67% of all the ash generated in North Carolina in 2013, either through onsite or offsite projects and also through the manufacture of concrete and other products. With that I’d like to be able to turn it over to Charles Price who will talk about the current project. Charles Price, President and CEO, Charah said this is Scott Sewell, our Chief Operating Officer. Charah is a privately held company based in Louisville, Kentucky. My wife and I started the business 26 years ago and named it after our children Charles and Sarah. We’re dedicated to providing the power industry the highest quality performance with total safety and environmental compliance. We currently manage over 50 long-term ash management contracts at 34 power plants in 18 states. We manage over 16 million tons of coal ash annually. We’ve been working in the Charlotte area since 2001. We have eight active projects in North Carolina. We have 120 employees in the state and we’ve been recognized by the North Carolina Department of Labor for their Gold Certificate in Safety. Scott Sewell’s going to come up and go over the technical aspects of the project. Scott Sewell, Chief Operating Officer, Charah said as Dave referenced earlier, we will be taking the ash out of the unlined ponds at Riverbend and moving it to a fully lined engineered structural fill design at the Airport. Now recently I’ve seen in several places references to the coal ash burrito. This design is the full definition of that coal ash burrito.