Environmental Defense Fund Urges Moratorium On "Factory Farms"

At a national panel addressing the growing problem of pollution from “factory farms,” the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) today urged the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and states to impose a moratorium on new and expanding factory farms until meaningful regulations can be put in place to deal with the waste produced by thousands of US factory farms. Livestock annually produce an estimated 5 tons of manure for every person in the US.

“Federal, state and local governments should feel a sense of urgency in dealing with this serious and long-standing problem, especially since production at factory farms has rapidly increased in the past few years and spread into many states lacking even minimal environmental controls on these industries,” said Dr. Joe Rudek, EDF senior scientist. “The line on new growth must be held until an effective plan is developed to clean up the environmental and health problems created by thousands of existing factory farms.”

According to EDF, any strategy to address the environmental and public health threats posed by factory farms must solve all problems associated with these facilities: contaminated groundwater (which can pollute well water and surface waters, spreading disease), nutrients and bacteria from manure (which can cause fish kills and shellfish contamination), and emission of dangerous and noxious air pollutants.

The Environmental Defense Fund’s general principles for the control of human health and environmental impacts resulting from animal waste management include:

• Prevent problems from getting worse by:
  • improving compliance with existing laws through better enforcement;
  • addressing growing threats associated with abandoned anaerobic manure lagoons;
  • holding owners of animals responsible for any environmental violations.
• Improve waste management systems for existing operations by:
  • phasing out the use of anaerobic manure lagoons and manure sprayfields;
  • eliminating atmospheric emissions to control odor and pollution;
  • ending groundwater and surface water contamination from manure runoff and spills.