When dealing with CAFOs (confined animal feedlot operations), Americans need the whole story. To be blunt, we need the poop, the whole poop, and nothing but the poop.
To see why, let’s turn our attention to a Maryland chicken farm and a giant pile of…something.
The Waterkeeper Alliance and the Assateague Coastal Trust have claimed that the poop pile is chicken manure. A reasonable assumption, since the farm on which it lies steaming is home to 80,000 chickens (yup, four zeroes). They believe this because they tested runoff water in a trench near the pile and found high levels of E. coli and arsenic, which are consistent with runoff from chicken farms. “Obviously there’s something getting into that ditch from that farm to cause those huge spikes in E. Coli and fecal coliform,” said Scott Edwards, Director of Advocacy for the Waterkeeper Alliance.
The operation in question, Hudson Farm, and its parent company, Perdue (the third largest chicken corporation in America) say that the two environmental groups are mistaken. Perdue and Hudson Farm say that the pile is not chicken manure but Class A biosolids, that is, human poop that has been composted, pasteurized, and perhaps even zapped with gamma rays (like the Hulk) to render the biosolids fit for use on agricultural lands as fertilizer. The sewage sludge was composted at an Ocean City treatment facility. (Wikipedia has a nice breakdown on the agricultural use of biosoldis, if you want to get up to speed on why and how human poop is kosher for farming.)
The groups counter Perdue’s claims, saying that “It’s not really about the pile. It’s about the discharge coming off the farm. It’s about getting the ditch cleaned up,” according to Kathy Phillips, the Assateague Coastkeeper.
As a result, the two groups are upping the ante and “have filed a formal notice of intent to take legal action against Hudson Farms in Berlin and Perdue Farms Inc. for alleged violations of the Clean Water Act. The two groups, part of an international coalition of watershed watchdogs headed by environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr., contend that manure from the farm is washing into a drainage ditch that ultimate drains into the Pocomoke River, a tributary of the Chesapeake Bay.” (Baltimore Sun)
In the end, Perdue and Hudson Farm may slip free on this one, I think, since Class A biosolids have been afforded the most liberal, fertilizer-usage in agriculture. If the farm purchased what it thought was Class A biosolids, then they may not have knowingly violated the Clean Water Act. In short? Perdue and Hudson farm are hanging the Ocean City waste treatment facility out to dry on this one, since they may not have properly composted and pasteurized that pile of poop.
Unless of course, it really is chicken manure. In that case, Hudson Farm’s got some ‘splainin’ to do.
For her part, Kathy Phillips says that if Perdue and Hudson want to use the Human Poop Defense, that’s fine with her.
