Yadkin Riverkeeper and Waterkeeper Alliance, represented by the Southern Environmental Law Center, have reached a settlement with Duke Energy that requires the removal of all the coal ash from the unlined, leaking coal ash pits at Duke Energy’s Buck facility on the Yadkin River in Salisbury, North Carolina. 

Senate leaders have put the health of our waterways at risk. They have included a sneaky provision in the budget (not a place for policy) that would repeal the pollution control strategies for the Neuse and Tar-Pamlico Rivers and threaten ten years of work put into a pollution control strategy for High Rock Lake on the Yadkin River. Your elected leaders need to hear from you! 

High Rock Lake is a 15,000-acre reservoir on the Yadkin River and is the second largest lake in North Carolina after Lake Norman. At present, High Rock Lake is impaired for chlorophyll-a, due to nutrient over-enrichment. While this fact may give you cause for concern, it may also leave you with a question. What does it mean to be impaired for chlorophyll-a and what is nutrient over-enrichment?

Winston-Salem’s Storm Water National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (“NPDES”) permit is intended to protect the public drinking water, but there are currently not enough funds to take the necessary steps to manage runoff entering the Lower Salem Creek Watershed. Storm water utility fees could be used to fund projects and land conservation plans to protect the watershed and effectively manage polluted runoff.

There are a number of waterbodies in the Yadkin Pee Dee River Basin that are impaired by a high concentration of copper, some of which have been impaired for a number of years. Rather than develop a plan to reduce these impairments to a lower concentration of copper, the State has proposed to reclassify these waterbodies so that they do not trigger corrective actions required by State and Federal law.

OP ED by Alison RIngwood. The Yadkin River Basin is a critical source for drinking water that relies on the protection from undeveloped lands to help maintain water quality…

Pushing off from the east end of Fishing Island, we enter the Great Bend area of the Yadkin River. This stretch is significant, both geographically and historically. Here is where the Yadkin changes course from west to east and begins flowing north to south. It is where the town of East Bend derives its name. This area is rich in Native American history…

Going down Bean Shoals is probably my most favorite part along this section of the Yadkin. It will test your skills to “read” a river, maneuver quickly around obstacles (rocks) and make quick decisions on the best course to pursue.

The following is a series of excerpts of Judge Biggs' ruling against Summary Judgement on our federal Clean Water Act case at Buck Steam Station on High Rock Lake.  Yadkin Riverkeeper brought this case to force clean up of ongoing and continuous discharges of coal ash to the Yadkin River via unpermitted seeps and contaminated groundwater flowing into the Yadkin River in September 2014.  Oral arguments on Summary Judgement were in August 2015 and Judge Biggs' decision came down in October 2015. 

Ever since the Europeans settled in the Yadkin River Valley attempts have been made to turn the river into a commercial waterway. Area residents were eager to make the river accessible for transporting their agricultural goods and products to other markets by linking the western and central parts of North Carolina to the eastern part of the state…

The North Carolina Legislature is once again attacking provisions that protect our water. The rivers and streams of North Carolina belong to the people. TAKE ACTION NOW: Call your NC House member and Senator today and tell them you want your water protected. If you have already reached out to them, thank you!

Driving down the dirt road to the put-in at the end of Shoals Road, you cross Hall Creek, one of the six tributaries along this part of the Yadkin River. This south bank is actually the far, southwest corner of Pilot Mountain State Park, and is maintained by the North Carolina Division of Parks and Recreation. What is striking about the put-in location is how calm the river appears – almost mirror-like. Do not be fooled by the placid waters. The excitement of Bean Shoals waits just downstream.

Adventures on the Yadkin River is written by former journalist and life-long river enthusiast, D.R. White. He is a self-proclaimed guardian of the Shoals Road to Donnaha Bridge section of the Yadkin River. Over the course of the next few months, he will bring this stretch of the river to life in words.

Yesterday Duke Energy pled guilty to nine criminal violations of the Clean Water Act at coal ash plants across North Carolina.