- During the past decade a new form of pollution has grown
into a serious problem -- one the framers of the Clean Air Act could never
have anticipated. It is caused by the consolidation over the past decade
of countless small farms into huge, factory farms that raise thousands
of hogs, heifers and chickens in impossibly cramped quarters.
-
- Euphemistically called "concentrated animal feeding
operations," or CAFOs, the giant facilities also raise an enormous
stench, as giant piles of rotting waste produce clouds of ammonia, hydrogen
sulfide, volatile organic compounds, and particulates. Their emissions
have become so obnoxious that news reports regularly pop up when area residents
demand that these corporate farms clean up their mess.
-
- There was little coverage, however, when on the day after
last month's presidential inauguration, one of the first acts of the second
Bush Administration was to hand these polluters a generous free pass. Judiciously
timed for release after the election -- and on a day when the story was
certain to be lost amidst inaugural euphoria -- the EPA offered CAFOs more
than two years' immunity from the Clean Air Act -- as well as from certain
toxic discharge standards -- in exchange for participation in a program
that would measure their air emissions.
-
- The problem, according to Michele Merkel of the Environmental
Integrity Project (EIP), is that EPA's two-year pass is superfluous: the
Clean Air Act already requires polluting facilities to provide this kind
of data. As Merkel pointed out in an interview with Grist Magazine, there
is no need to paralyze law enforcement for two years in order to collect
it.
-
- A former EPA attorney who brought the first CAFO lawsuit
five years ago, Merkel says the enforcement hiatus can mean increased health
risks for farm workers and nearby residents from emissions such as ammonia
and hydrogen sulfide. A 2002 study by Iowa State University found widespread
bronchitis in workers exposed to these pollutants.
-
- In the same Grist report, Ed Hopkins, environmental quality
director at the Sierra Club, described one egg farm in Iowa that was found
to have ammonia emissions on a par with a fertilizer plant ranked as the
ninth largest producer of hazardous gas in the country.
-
- Under the Clean Air Act, said EIP's Merkel, farms violating
the law can be fined $27,500 per day. CAFOs signing up for the new EPA
plan need only pay a "membership fee" of $2,500, plus a one-time
penalty of from $200 to $100,000 (depending on size) for "presumed"
past violations. That, says Merkel, is "chump change."
-
- Indeed, one of the biggest factory farmers, Tyson Foods,
had ante'd up $100,000 just the week before to enjoy an inaugural candlelight
dinner with President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
-
- Environmentalists still have one hope for reversing EPA's
amnesty. Thanks to a tip obtained by EIP, an EPA plan to omit the usual
30-day public-comment period was reversed when EIP prepared to reveal it
publicly. Knowing this would provoke unwanted headlines, EPA reversed itself.
A 30-day public-comment period is now underway.
-
- -----------
-
- TAKE ACTION Sign a petition with Organic Consumers. http://www.organicconsumers.org/epa4.htm
-
- Copyright © 2003 Environmental Media Services
-
- http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/mt_archives/000239.php
|
