More than five years after announcing tighter controls on industrial farm pollution in Michigan, state environmental regulators will finally begin enforcing them.
Regulations issued Wednesday by the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy require the state’s largest “animal feeding operations” — or cafes, facilities where hundreds or thousands of cows, pigs and chickens are raised in confined conditions — to be more aggressive about keeping manure and urine out of Michigan’s water.
Under the latest terms of Eagle’s general discharge permit, cored facilities are prohibited from spreading manure on farm fields in January through most of March, when it can seep into frozen ground and nearby waterways. Grass buffers are needed near streams and ditches. And CAFOs are subject to new reporting requirements, among other changes.
Eagle Director Phil Roos announced the permit decision Wednesday after years of legal battles with the Michigan Farm Bureau and other farming interests, which opposed the department’s earlier unveiling of stronger pollution controls in 2020.
“It’s been five and a half years—a lot of blood, sweat and tears,” Russo said before the announcement.
While Farm Bureau officials declined to comment, environmentalists declared a victory for public health and the environment.
Michigan’s CAFO industry has tripled since the turn of the millennium and now numbers 290 large operations that produce more feces and urine than the state’s entire human population.
“For people living with a very heavy CAFO presence, it’s not abstract,” said Katie Garvey, a senior attorney at the Environmental Law and Policy Center. “It’s reality. It’s in their water. It’s in their communities.”
During the hearing at which Russia announced the permit decision, a Farm Bureau lawyer appeared to leave open the possibility of an appeal.
“It’s been a five-and-a-half-year legal process, and we’re probably still not at the end,” said Andrew Cook, the group’s legal counsel. He added that farmers “have more of an interest than anyone in preserving the state’s ecosystems for the future.”
Unlike traditional farms where cattle graze in pastures, CAFOs are industrial-scale operations that produce large amounts of waste in small areas.
They usually dispose of it by spreading or spraying it on farm fields. In limited quantities, it is a useful fertilizer. But operators often spray more than plants can absorb, causing emissions.
Arguing that Eagle had gone too far in its efforts to prevent CAFO pollution, farm industry groups filed an administrative appeal and lawsuit after Eagle updated its CAFO regulations in 2020. The case made it all the way to the Michigan Supreme Court, which sided with the regulators last year. In a separate ruling, an administrative law judge ruled in January that Eagle had the right to issue the permit with some modifications.
On Wednesday, Russia accepted some of those amendments and rejected others, clearing the Eagle to implement the latest version of the 2020 permit.
Garvey said his group is now turning its attention to getting CAFO owners to comply with the new regulations.
“We can’t sit back and say OK, we’re done,” Garvey said. “There is still a lot that needs to be done in terms of implementation.”
Lake Erie has become a famous example of the consequences of agricultural pollution. Scientists and regulators have identified fertilizers from Kafus as toxic algal blooms that turn the lake green every summer.
Michigan committed in 2015 to reducing phosphorus loads in Lake Erie by 2025, but the state has failed to meet that goal and has not set a new deadline for achieving it.
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