Hallway family farm in NY. (Photo by Keith Weller, courtesy of the USDA)
A federal plan to exempt livestock farms from
reporting on air pollution has environmental groups upset.
Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
A federal plan to exempt livestock farms from
reporting on air pollution has environmental groups upset.
Chuck Quirmbach reports:
More farms are getting bigger. With the larger numbers of cows, chickens and
other animals, come sizable amounts of gasses such as ammonia and hydrogen
sulfide.
The EPA wants to change an emergency response law to exempt farms from
reporting large airborne emissions connected to animal waste.
Barry Breen is a Deputy Administrator with the EPA. He says the regular release
of animal gases is not the kind of thing that should trigger a rapid response from
his agency.
“Even if one of our folks showed up, we wouldn’t quite know what to do. It’s not any
different today than it was yesterday or last week or any other time.”
Breen says the EPA or states could take clean up action, if need be, under other
rules. But environmental groups say the current reporting requirement is very
helpful to neighbors and communities that want to know what’s in the air at
nearby farms.
For The Environment Report, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.