UPDATE - US expands manure control on "factory farms"
Date: 18-Dec-02
Country: USA
Author: Charles Abbott
"These (regulations) absolutely move the country forward," EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman told reporters at a news conference.
Under the new rules, an estimated 15,500 so-called factory farms must obtain water pollution permits, write and implement nutrient management plans by December 2006 and submit annual reports detailing the number of animals on each farm, the amount of manure generated and disposal methods. At present, 4,500 operations are required to have pollution permits.
The farms will spend an estimated $335 million a year to comply with the rules, issued under court order by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The EPA said the rules would bring sizable reductions in pollution run-off from farms and fields.
Whitman said animals waste from large farms "pose a real threat to the health of America's waters."
But environmentalists called the rules a regulatory empty shell that limited public review of pollution plans, while shielding concentrated animal feeding operations - nicknamed CAFOs - from liability for pollution. Nor will the rules end the risk of spills from manure lagoons, they said.
Two groups, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Sierra Club, said they may challenge the administration's plan with a new lawsuit. The rules begin to take effect in 60 days.
SMELL, FISH KILLS
Since 1982, factory farms have grown 51 percent and some now have a capacity exceeding one million animals. Growth of large-scale feedlots was accompanied by complaints of offensive odors and fish-killing lagoon leaks into streams.
According to the EPA, the rules cover 60 percent of the 500 million tons of manure created annually at 238,000 feeding operations. Officials forecast a reduction of one-third in nitrogen and phosphorus runoff from fields treated with manure, often used as fertilizer.
But environmentalists see problems.
Factory farms will be able to keep the text of manure management plans on the farm, limiting public scrutiny. And the EPA did not set minimum standards for states. Melanie Shepherdson of the National Resources Defense Council said CAFOs were given "a largely self-permitting system."
Whitman said CAFO annual reports would give regulators and the public a clear view of manure control work. By comparison, the management plans might be modified frequently as operators alter their crop rotations or other operations, she said.
"This is a very open process. People are going to be able to see it," she said, referring to the annual reports.
COMPLIANCE CHEAPER THAN FEARED
Compliance with the rule was estimated to cost $335 million a year, roughly equal to expected benefits from cleaner drinking water, safer fish and shellfish habitat and more recreational use of waterways.
It would be one-third of the price tag feared by farm groups before the final rule was issued.
The EPA said it still may force out 3 percent of the CAFOs. Dave Roper, president of the National Pork Producers Council, said the rule meant "significant compliance costs."
Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman said aid will be offered to farmers "on an incentive-based approach." The USDA can spend $2.5 billion through 2007 in federal cost-share money for runoff control work on livestock feedlots, farms and ranches.
As part of the rule, the EPA refined its CAFO definition to mean livestock confinement operations with at least 1,000 head of cattle, 700 dairy cows, 2,500 hogs, 10,000 sheep, 125,000 chickens, 82,000 laying hens and 55,000 turkeys. The CAFO rule eliminated most exemptions from the requirement to obtain permit and, in a first, included "dry litter" poultry farms.
But Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin, in his final days as chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, called the new rules "a muddled result without a clear path to a cleaner environment.
"EPA's out-of-sight, out-of-mind approach will let Smithfield Foods Inc. (SFD.N) or DeCoster off the hook if only they contract with