A class action lawsuit has been filed against the power company for allegedly contaminating groundwater near fly ash dump sites. The lawsuit was filed against Constellation Power Source Generation in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City, MD on behalf of Gambrills residents whose wells have been contaminated by the residue of coal combustion. The suit claims Gambrills residents have been affected by groundwater contaminated with toxins including arsenic, lead, and cadmium, which are linked to cancer and other serious health effects.
Constellation began filling old sand and gravel pits owned by BBSS Inc. with fly ash from the Brandon Shores and Wagner coal-fired power plants in 1995. By 1999, monitoring wells detected signs of contamination in groundwater. To date, Constellation has dumped 3.8 million tons of fly ash in the Waugh Chapel and Turner pits. The company stopped dumping there in September 2007. The class action lawsuit alleges Constellation has known that hazardous substances linked to cancer and other serious health effects have been leaking into groundwater from the Waugh Chapel and Turner Pit dump sites in Gambrills since 1999, but that residents received no warning of the discharges into the local aquifer from the defendant.
