Appalachia

The Charleston Gazette
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
Despite board ruling, DEP won’t accept lab’s water data
By Ken Ward Jr., Staff writer

Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Randy Huffman said Wednesday his agency will not accept pollution monitoring reports from a Raleigh County laboratory where federal prosecutors allege employees conspired to fake water quality samples, despite an appeals board ruling that temporarily blocks DEP from revoking the lab’s license.

“I cannot accept data from the laboratory for purposes of enforcing the Clean Water Act and issuing permits,” Huffman said.

Huffman said the guilty plea of one Appalachian Laboratories Inc. employee in an ongoing investigation by U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin creates a “grave situation” in which the credibility of industry self-monitoring of water quality at mining operations that used Appalachian for sample collection and analysis has been called into question.

“Their data is meaningless,” Huffman said. “We don’t want it.”

- See more at: http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20141029/GZ01/141029085/1419#sthash.i01Zy1eG.dpuf