For the residents living near the site of South Australia’s demolished coal-fired power plant, the coming months could be their third straight summer of dust.

A flawed rehabilitation of an ash dam has led to potentially hazardous particles being blown across Port Augusta and its 14,000 residents for the last two years.

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Leonie Insch lives about 500 metres from the ash dam.

Occasionally as she stands on her front veranda on windy days she can watch the sky disappear due to dust.

“I’ve been out there and you can’t see the hills,” she said, nodding to the Flinders Ranges looming in the distance. “You put a sheet out on the line and it just turns black.”



Nurse Cheryl Dawson, a Port Augusta resident near the former coal plant site, believes she sees the threat posed by the ash dam in her carpet. Each week she vacuums up a small plastic bag’s worth of heavy dust. She has developed a rash across her body, can no longer use normal soap due to the sensitivity and takes antihistamines to deal with recently developed allergies. “My doctor says ‘I sympathise with you, clearly it is environmental’,” she said.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Doctors for the Environment has warned dust from the Port Augusta dam could be exacerbating longer-term health issues in the state’s Upper Spencer Gulf. Photograph: Che Chorley/The Guardian

The community’s concern is backed by public health organisation Doctors for the Environment, which has warned dust from the Port Augusta dam could be exacerbating longer-term health issues in the state’s Upper Spencer Gulf linked to air pollution from heavy industry.

Doctors for the Environment honorary secretary David Shearman said the soil used to cap the 270 hectare ash dam on the site of the Northern coal plant and blown over town on windy days was likely to be a mixture of dust and small particles that could pose a risk to locals’ health.

There’s no reason in this day and age why you can’t rehabilitate a site – it’s just a matter of money David Shearman, Doctors for the Environment

Coal ash is a toxic byproduct left over from the coal burned on the site. Owner Alinta Energy initially covered the dam with a 15cm layer of soil and planted seedlings, but the plant is in an arid region and rainfall has been below the long-term average. Strong winds over the past two summers blew material from the dam across houses and businesses.

The company and the state’s Environment Protection Authority (EPA) say the issue is being addressed. But as winter recedes, some Port Augusta residents are worried they will again be blanketed as winds pick up this summer. And with two dozen coal plants across Australia due to reach the end of their natural life over the next two decades, they say other coal regions should be learning from the mistakes in their backyard.

Shearman said Alinta and its subsidiary responsible for the cleanup, Flinders Power, had not yet realised the urgency of the issue.



“I personally can’t see why they’re not spending more money on irrigation to fix the problem,” he said. “There’s no reason in this day and age why you can’t rehabilitate a site – it’s just a matter of money.”

He said it was part of a wider problem across the Upper Spencer Gulf, including the neighbouring industrial towns of Whyalla and Port Pirie. “I have concerns about any dust, but it needs to be seen in the context of all the other dust and pollution in the area, including that from heavy industry,” he said.

Doctors for the Environment cites government data that has found air pollution contributes to 3,000 deaths a year across the country. Research before the coal plants closed found increased incidence of childhood asthma and lung cancer in Port Augusta compared with other South Australian towns.

Air pollution from coal-fired power generation across the country is estimated to cost at least $2.6bn a year. Shearman said it made coal a more expensive fuel than was acknowledged in some public and political discussion.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘You almost get fined more for speeding down the highway then polluting an entire town of 14,000 people,’ says Port Augusta mayor Sam Johnson. Photograph: Che Chorley/The Guardian

Port Augusta mayor Sam Johnson said the ash dam rehabilitation was largely ignored by state and federal governments and their agencies, leaving the council and a small residents group to push the case that more needed to be done. He is highly critical of the EPA. When pollution from the former power plant site blanketed the city last year, the EPA fined Flinders Power $2,200.

“The reality is you almost get fined more for speeding down the highway then polluting an entire town of 14,000 people,” Johnson said.

He said Flinders Power was trying to address the problem and there were some signs of plant growth on the dam, but not enough to prevent soil being blown away. “We’re now going into summer with very limited growth across the entire site and we don’t know if we’re going to get a recurrence of the event or not.”

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The issue is soon to receive greater attention via a Senate inquiry into the rehabilitation of mining and other resources sites that has been expanded to look at coal ash dams. Senators are expected to visit Port Augusta next month to hear evidence from those who have been involved with or experienced the challenges of cleaning up Northern.

Among the concerns they will hear are claims of an initial lack of public information about the rehabilitation plan, including whether responsibility for cleaning up the site after closure was properly considered when the state sold its coal generators in 1999. Alinta Energy, which bought the plant in 2011, said there is no formal rehabilitation bond but it has guaranteed the work and is spending $200-$300m.

The Central Alliance senator Rex Patrick said he was concerned about a lack of clarity on who was legally responsible for fixing the site. “My feeling is the state government won’t have transferred the liability and that it sits somehow on the SA ledger, and that should be made public,” he said.

Flinders Power and the EPA say the problems at the site are now being addressed. The Flinders Power chief executive, Peter Georgaris, said the dam had been covered and seeded, eliminating the likelihood of ash dust. He said native plant growth had been slower than expected but the company was now implementing contingency plans to limit topsoil dust being blown over town. More than 200 community members and interest groups had accepted invitations to inspect plant growth and dust control systems on site. “A number of trials instigated over recent months provide confidence in the strategy.”

In a statement, the EPA said the dam had been covered with more than 33,000 truckloads of topsoil and Flinders Power needed to take steps to prevent it being dispersed across the town. It is required to submit an updated dust management plan this month. “The community is no longer exposed to ash from the ash dam,” it said.

Dan van Holst Pellekaan, the local Liberal MP and state energy minister, said he had told the company if it did not rain, it would have to irrigate the site to ensure plant growth. He said Flinders Power had mostly done a good job rehabilitating the site with the exception of the ash dam.

He said there is a clear lesson for future coal plant closures: that a higher standard needs to be set by governments from the outset. “Port Augusta people have paid too high a price because this was the first to be done.”