Waste Not
Industry runs in muck
This week, the dairy industry filed a lawsuit that, if successful, will remove regulatory guardrails on concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) in the state of Wisconsin. The lawsuit asserts that CAFOs should not have to apply for permits to release animal waste and manure any longer. Even with permitting requirements, waste and manure are a significant threat to public health and water quality. The step stunned even the Wisconsin Farmers Union which has publicly opposed the lawsuit.
In the last few years, we have begun to understand the mistakes we have historically disposing of waste. We’ve only begun to unravel the health effects experienced in our communities — far behind the knowledge the industry has had for decades. For example, DDT was banned 50 years ago but it’s still killing birds in Michigan.
Because so many consumer products, animal feed, and foods have chemicals that persist or do not break down in the environment, they wind up in wastewater treatment plants and septic systems. Using sewage waste sludge (greenwashed by calling them “biosolids”) to make compost or to spread on farmland has long been touted as an organic compost or nutrient source. Historically, wastes have also been trucked and dumped in old, unlined landfills and more recently in “engineered” landfills (with liners) without any treatment for these chemicals. But now we know that sewage sludge waste is contaminated with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (called “forever chemicals” or PFAS), pesticides, and other chemicals that persist after commonly used wastewater treatment processes and threaten drinking water and food supplies wherever they have been deposited.
Now, landfills struggle with what to do with the leachate (liquid waste) that leaks out of the landfill. A few years ago, we exposed how Waste Management was trucking leachate to Lowell, Massachusetts to be dumped directly into the Merrimack River. As soon as the story broke in the Boston Globe, the Lowell wastewater treatment plant refused to accept Waste Management’s waste. Where is it going now?
We should have known that this wasn’t a good thing, right?
The problem is, we are always snookered by industry and their lobbyists who have a plan to disrupt and misinform about threats way before we understand why.
Recently, I found an article entitled “The Case for Biosolids” in an old issue of Organic Gardening Magazine (see below) that warned about the unknown risks of sewage waste used as a fertilizer and for land farming in 2014. The 10-year-old article does a good job of explaining the issues.
An out-of-print book “Poisoning for Profit,” helped me piece together my exposure to “black dirt farm” raised food growing up in upstate New York that could have caused some of my health challenges. My family thought that the beautiful vegetables were the foundation of a healthy diet. So, as a young girl, I ate lots of tomatoes, corn, and other vegetables grown at the farms that surrounded the area. A few years ago, it was shocking to read about the fact that sewage and chemical wastes from New York City and other areas were likely dumped in my hometown.
As a legislator in the state of New Hampshire, my efforts to regulate PFAS chemicals made our state one of the first to set protective enforceable drinking water standards. But at first, it perplexed me to see regulators express concerns about the impact on the wastewater and see fervent pushback from cities and towns and the biosolids industry. Now, I know why.
I fear that our current understanding of this issue is only the tip of the iceberg. Recent examples of the impact of these poor practices are an organic farm in Maine that shut down immediately upon discovering high levels of PFAS and a dairy farm in Maine where the cows and milk and nearby town water supply are contaminated. PFAs have also been found in organic kale and many other foods.
Regulation lags far behind and all these past and current practices represent significant threats to water supplies, lakes, rivers, streams, and the humans, animals, fish, and birds that interact in those environments.
Instead of loosening restrictions on industry practices, we must learn from past mistakes. States like Maine banned land spreading of wastes but steps like these are challenging with industry and their lobbyists constantly pushing back and working behind the scenes to undermine protections in New Hampshire, Wisconsin, and other states and at the federal level.
That’s why we called upon the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to act to protect our food and food supply. Read more about our call to USDA for action here. I also continue to work with legislative colleagues and speak to students and the public across the country to inform people about the need to address these issues.
Mindi Messmer is an environmental and public scientist and author of Female Disruptors that is available on Amazon. Please let us know if you wish to arrange a speaking engagement to learn more about this and other issues.
