WASHINGTON -- The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday made public a list of 26 communities in 10 states where residents are potentially threatened by coal ash storage ponds similar to one that flooded a neighborhood in Tennessee last year.

North Carolina has the most sites on the list, a dozen. The largest concentration is near Cochise, Ariz., where there are seven storage ponds.

Sites in the Tri-State that were included on the list were:

American Electric Power's Big Sandy plant in Louisa, Ky.

American Electric Power's John E. Amos plant, St. Albans, W.Va.

American Electric Power's Gen. James M. Gavin plant.

The EPA said it will inspect each of the 44 coal ash sites located near communities to make certain they are structurally sound. The sites are being classified as potentially highly hazardous because they are near where people live and not because of any discovered defect.

"The high hazard potential means there will be probable loss of human life if there is a significant dam failure," said Matt Hale, director of EPA's office of research, conservation and recovery. "It is a measure of what would happen if the dam would fail. It is not a measure of the stability of the dam."

Coal ash, a product of burning coal, is kept in liquid or a slurry, in containment ponds or dams. The EPA lists more than 400 such impoundments across the country, but the 44 singled out Monday represent those that are near populated areas, posing a higher risk of danger.

Last December, two days before Christmas, a coal ash pond broke near Kingston, Tenn., sending 5 million cubic yards of ash and sludge across more than 300 acres, destroying or damaging 40 homes. The incident prompted a review of the safety of such storage ponds that hold the coal-burning waste byproduct near large coal-burning power plants.

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