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The plant is one of four coal-burning power plants in Maryland — including Mirant's Chalk Point plant in Prince George's County, Morgantown plant in Charles County and Constellation's Brandon Shore's plant in Anne Arundel County — that will use smokestack scrubbers to collect more than 2 million tons of additional coal-combustion byproducts next year.

Mirant and Constellation are planning to sell the wet-sand-like gypsum byproduct that the scrubbers produce to manufacturers who use it to make wallboard.

Meanwhile, the ash from the burned coal will continue to go to landfills that environmental groups say could pose serious health threats, particularly heightened cancer risks.

Some of that ash will be headed to the nearby Westland landfill that state environmental officials are pushing Mirant to retrofit with state-of-the-art synthetic liners designed to prevent toxic metals from leaching into the ground and water.

The Maryland Department of the Environment is working with the Maryland Attorney General's Office to try to apply new regulations that the department issued in December to landfills that were opened under earlier, more permissive regulations, MDE spokeswoman Dawn Stoltzfus said.

Mirant plans to put more effective synthetic liners, mandated by the new regulations, in sections of the Dickerson/Westland landfill that are expected to receive new coal ash deposits, Mirant's director of external relations Misty Allen said.

The company has added a synthetic liner to new areas at Chalk Point/Brandywine, but not at Morgantown/Faulkner because it is nearing capacity, Allen said.

Mirant says the Dickerson/Westland landfill has a compacted clay liner as do its landfills at Chalk Point/Brandywine in Prince George's County and Morgantown/Faulkner in Charles County.

Even if they do, Stoltzfus said, the liners do not meet standards set in new regulations the department issued in December.

MDE and Mirant disagree on whether the Dickerson/Westland landfill has a system to collect leached toxins. According to MDE records it does not, Stoltzfus said.

"They all have clay liners [and] leachate collection systems," Allen said referring to Mirant's Maryland landfills.

A report released last week by the Environmental Integrity Project and Earth Justice took the Bush administration to task for withholding information about health risks around coal waste dumps.

That report was based on data recently obtained from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, mostly from a 1995 study, said Lisa Widawsky, an Environmental Integrity Project lawyer.

The EPA data indicated that 1,300 such landfill acres in Anne Arundel, Charles, Montgomery and Prince George's counties and in Baltimore city lack even less-effective clay liners, according to the Environmental Integrity Project/Earth Justice analysis.

"It is possible that changes have been made since the EPA got the data," Widawsky said.

Although new ash is going into areas with better liners and no new ash is being deposited at Constellation's Brandon Shores landfill, that's little comfort because old ash dumps are a serious threat, Widawsky said.

"The highest risk from sites with no liners can come 78 to 105 years after the ash is placed at the site," Widawsky said. "The fact that they are not accepting more waste does not mean they are not causing harm."

And "the EPA study said the risks from a clay liner are very high," Widawsky said.

For individuals drinking water from a well within a mile of a clay-lined landfill, the cancer risk is 1 in 5,000. That's half the risk posed by an unlined landfill, but far above the 1 in 100,000 standard that the EPA has set as unacceptable.

On May 7, Gov. Martin O'Malley signed into law a bill that authorizes the Maryland Department of Environment to charge fees for every ton of ash, slag and sludge generated by burning coal.

The roughly $750,000 in fees will be used to implement new regulations that MDE enacted in December.

If the energy companies can sell the byproducts trapped by the scrubbers, they will avoid the fees. The gypsum is created when the scrubbers pass flue gases through a water and limestone spray. Sulfur dioxide gas reacts with the limestone to make gypsum.

The new regulations require more monitoring and controls on coal ash and waste and liners in landfills where it is disposed.

About 1 million tons of coal waste is recycled into beneficial uses now, Stoltzfus said. Beneficial uses of coal waste can earn exemptions from the fees under the regulations.