EPA Settles Pollution Lawsuit, Agrees to Tighter Regulation of CAFOs

The Environmental Protection Agency has agreed to impose tighter water discharge permitting regulations for concentrated animal feeding operations that would require all CAFOs to submit details to the agency about their operations and to update the information every five years.

The Environmental Protection Agency has agreed to impose tighter water discharge permitting regulations for concentrated animal feeding operations that would require all CAFOs to submit details to the agency about their operations and to update the information every five years. EPA also said it would issue its new CAFO regulations within one year.

In settling the lawsuit, EPA agreed to gather more information about CAFOs, including the number of animals, how much waste they produce and how waste is stored and disposed of - whether it is applied to farm land as fertilizer, shipped to another location or used for other purposes.

Under the final settlement agreement, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans, EPA said the new requirement to submit information would apply to all CAFOs, not only those that are now required to have permits under the Clean Water Act.

EPA also agreed to publish a guidance document to help authorities implement National Pollution Discharge Elimination System permit regulations and effluent limitations guidelines and standards for CAFOs by specifying exactly what circumstances trigger the duty to apply for permits.

The agreement resolves a case that originated in December 2008 when the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, and Waterkeeper Alliance petitioned a federal court to review a regulation under the Clean Water Act that required only certain CAFOs to apply for wastewater discharge permits.

Natural Resources Defense Council attorney Jon Devine said it could improve pollution control standards for all CAFOs. "This settlement puts EPA on the path to collecting more data about factory farms and it will in turn give us the tools we need to determine which ones are polluting and how best to regulate them," Devine said.

Michael Formica, chief environmental counsel for the National Pork Producers Council, criticized EPA for making the deal without talking to farmers. "There was no outreach to the other side," he said. "It was a one-sided sweetheart deal."

Formica said the settlement conflicts with multiple court decisions and if implemented, would lead to a larger concentration of livestock as producers grow their herds to offset the costs of manure management systems the EPA could require.

Formica also said that while the pork industry has taken steps over the past 15 years to control the runoff of waste into waterways, other sectors of the livestock industry, such as beef and poultry, don't have the same measures in place.

EPA defines a CAFO as any farm with any of the following: 700 dairy cows; 1,000 veal calves; 1,000 cattle; 2,500 swine weighing more than 55 pounds or 10,000 swine weighing less than 55 pounds; 10,000 sheep or lambs; 55,000 turkeys; and between 30,000 and 125,000 chickens, depending on the manure handling system used.

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