The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency has issued a violation notice to Vistra Energy Corporation for alleged violations of the Illinois Environmental Protection Act at the Vermilion Power Station near Oakwood, Illinois. In May the Illinois EPA conducted a stream survey of the Middle Fork Vermilion River near three coal ash ponds owned by Vistra, and found water with “heavily stained reddish-brown discoloration” seeping from the riverbank. The violation notice says the seeps were discharging into the river, staining sediment and rocks, and creating “offensive conditions in the Middle Fork.”

A clean water advocacy group says two thirds of water bodies in Illinois are unsafe. Those water bodies include streams, lakes and rivers across the state. 

A local environmental group is suing Dynegy to force the energy company to clean coal ash pits along the Middle Fork of the Vermilion River west of Danville.

The Middle Fork of the Vermilion River is the only river in Illinois protected under the federal Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. But the group American Rivers has placed the east central Illinois waterway on its annual list of Most Endangered Rivers.

Prairie Rivers Network and Earthjustice say they will sue the energy company Dynegy for allowing toxic waste to leak into the Middle Fork of the Vermilion River.