Friends of Rural New York

09/14/2007

Utilities press lawmakers on CAFO pollution

Source: WaterWeek Staff

Efforts by U.S. water suppliers to stop Congress from exempting concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) from cleanup liabilities under Superfund legislation continued during a Sept. 6 hearing by the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

Speaking on behalf of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies, Tom Bonacquisti of the Loudon County (Va.) Sanitation Authority urged panel members to reject legislation backed by the animal feeding industry to exempt manure from Superfund requirements.

AWWA joined AMWA earlier this year in expressing such opposition to all Senators.

Noting that 54 percent of livestock generating 575 billion pounds of waste annually are held on concentrated feeding facilities, Bonacquisti cautioned that improper management of such waste threatens the safety of nearby drinking water supplies with pollutants such as phosphorus, nitrates, ammonia and arsenic.

“When deposited into the drinking water supply, community water systems must take additional steps to remove these toxins and keep the water potable, regardless of their original source,” he said. “If water systems were unable to recover excessive costs from polluters, all the citizens of the community would see their water rates increase just to maintain their previous level of drinking water quality, and outcome that is unfair and in direct conflict with the Superfund law’s ‘polluter pays’ philosophy.”

His concerns were echoed by Committee Chairperson Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., who opened the session asserting that proposals “to weaken accountability for concentrated animal feeding operation pollution undermine public health and the public’s right to know about pollution, and would be bad news for the American taxpayer.”

She also cited “serious consequences associated with such operations, noting that such waste “can increase phosphorus levels in water, causing algae blooms that can foul drinking water supplies, increase treatment costs, and cause massive fish kills.”

USEPA Water Office chief Benjamin Grumbles detailed recent agency efforts to strengthen controls on runoff pollution from such operations.

Montezuma pig farm raises concerns

Saturday, September 22, 2007 11:20 PM EDT

We as members of Environmentally Concerned Citizens of Montezuma (ECCOM) are very concerned about the environmental impact that the proposed 2,000 head swine farm CAFO (concentrated animal feeding operation) will have on our health and our beautiful, natural resources that some people take for granted.

The location is on the south end of Denman Road, on the farm previously run by Jim Thurston.

Now owned by Mike Shoots, the farm is to be purchased by Richard Snyder, who has informed the town board that he intends to build a CAFO with over 2,000 swine.

We the members and supporters of ECCOM have requested a moratorium to be granted for an impact study to be conducted in this location.

This study would create a base-line for any required testing that may be needed in the future.

We believe, as taxpayers, that we deserve this study. We ask for your support.

The saying that “what happens in Montezuma stays in Montezuma” will not be true, as the effects of this proposed CAFO will carry over to neighboring towns.

Google CAFO and you too will be concerned.

Dan Randolph

Montezuma

The Buffalo News has updated the story it did a year ago about water pollution in Western NY.  They almost reluctantly mention agricultural runoff.  There is a whole series of this story.

AND IT’S NOT JUST BUFFALO !! It’s Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico and on and on and on. When will we stop the corporate farming criminals?

http://www.buffalonews.com/320/story/151627.html

By Michael Beebe
Updated: 08/30/07 5:27 PM

Buffalo’s booming industry near the turn of the previous century had so polluted the Buffalo River that scientists in 1929 could not find a single living fish in the river. The oxygen level was zero. Not even a sludge worm was found. The Buffalo River was dead. By that standard, the river’s comeback is remarkable.But now that the industrial pollution has all but ended, a new threat sullies the river, one that comes from the outlying towns and suburbs.Bacterial pollution from failing septic systems, agricultural runoff and sewage overflows in the suburbs adds more bacteria to both the Buffalo River and Scajaquada Creek than anything Buffalo’s sewer system adds to those waterways, researchers have found. Buffalo, however, is where these pollutants land, and the city finds itself across the table from both state and federal environmental officials demanding a cleanup...........
But what surprised scientists who studied the river is that more bacteria enter the Buffalo River from the suburbs and rural areas than from all of Buffalo’s combined sewer overflows.  Upstream pollutants from Buffalo Creek, Cayuga Creek and Cazenovia Creek were 125 percent to 750 percent greater than what city’s combined sewer overflows add to the river, according to Kim Irvine, a geology professor at Buffalo State College who studied the river with his colleagues.  The bacteria came not only from 17 other combined sewer overflows from outside the city, but from failing suburban septic systems and AGRICULTURAL RUNOFF.