Court Rules EPA cannot require CAFO's to obtain permits
A federal court ruled March 15 that the Environmental Protection Agency cannot require livestock operations to obtain Clean Water Act (CWA) permits unless they are discharging manure into a waterway of the U.S. The decision is a major victory for pork producers, according to a statement from the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC).
NPPC, the American Farm Bureau Federation, the United Egg Producers and several other agricultural groups sued EPA over its so-called CAFO rule, which was issued in 2008 after EPA's core provision in the initial 2003 regulation was struck down by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York City, the NPPC statement noted. In that 2005 decision, the court ruled that CWA requires permits only for producers who actually discharge. EPA had sought to require permits even for operations that had a "potential" to discharge.
The 2008 regulation, which set a zero-discharge standard, included a duty to apply for a CWA permit for all CAFOs that discharge or propose to discharge.
Industrial agriculture is one of the leading causes of water pollution today
In the 2000 National Water Quality Inventory conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), agricultural activity was identified as a source of pollution for 48% of stream and river water, i and for 41% of lake water.ii
Most of the water pollution from industrial livestock farms comes from the storage of animal waste...don't want to ruin your breakfast but waste pollution from giant livestock farms threatens public health
Factory farms known as feed lots produce staggering amount of animal wastes. The storage of these wastes has huge effects on public health and the environment
On most factory farms, animals are crowded into relatively small areas; their manure and urine are funneled into massive waste lagoons. These cesspools often break, leak or overflow, sending dangerous microbes, nitrate pollution and drug-resistant bacteria into water supplies. Factory-farm lagoons also emit toxic gases such as ammonia, hydrogen sulfide and methane. What's more, the farms often spray the manure onto land, ostensibly as fertilizer -- these "sprayfields" bring still more of these harmful substances into our air and water.
So we worked hard to get the 2008 EPA regulations in place and now are back to square one. The industry lobbyists are in control and until we can get them out of the equation market pressure may be the only way we are going resolve the factory farm issue.
For almost three years in my series Macca's Meatless Monday I have been advocating for eliminating or reducing meat consumption. For any meat that you do chose to buy check out this site for access to sustainable local products available near you.