Control Runoff From Your Farm – or Else
By Gary Baise • Feb 3rd, 2010 • Category: Environment
Learn how to control water runoff from your farm, or the government will force you to make changes in your business. That’s one message resonating from the latest battle over runoff into the Chesapeake Bay. The same regulations bay area farmers may face could be visited on other U.S. farms.
An article in the Virginia Farm Bureau’s January, 2010 magazine claims, “If new legislation to authorize the Chesapeake Bay program is passed, it poses a threat to the long-term survival of many Virginia farms.” The article goes on to claim that if you have a small farm, it will be almost impossible to expand; producers will have to fence their livestock out of streams. It is estimated, according to the article, the average farmer with livestock would have to spend approximately $100,000 to fence their farm.
Renewed commitment
What is causing this concern by the Virginia Farm Bureau? It is an Executive Order issued by President Obama on May 12, 2009, where he is requiring a renewed federal commitment to control all sources of pollution that run into the Chesapeake Bay. This means runoff from farms. It is also another attack on the agricultural stormwater runoff exemption set forth in the Clean Water Act.
An article in the February 2009 Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay Journal states, “Agriculture is responsible for the largest share of sediment and nutrient pollution which makes its way to the Chesapeake and any hope of meeting water quality goals depends heavily on the ability to ratchet up implementation of best Management Practices, or BMPs, on the 87,000 farms in the watershed.”
These actions for the Chesapeake Bay should serve as a warning to all of us in production agriculture as to what is coming in terms of controlling runoff from our tillage or animal production operations.
I have written before that a federal court Consent Order in Florida will require the setting of limitations on runoff from our farms. Two substances are targeted for control. Nitrogen and phosphorous are considered the main contributors to poor water quality, not only in the Chesapeake Bay but in any number of water bodies around this country.
You can expect to see similar proposals in your state if you have water bodies which are not meeting water quality standards. By the end of 2011 Virginia, for example, would be expected to reduce its nitrogen runoff into the Chesapeake Bay by 3.39 million pounds, and reduce phosphorus runoff by 470,000 pounds. To achieve these goals, the following will be required: 119,000 acres of cover crops planted; 12,500 acres of reforestation; 9,000 acres of stormwater management controls; 10,000 acres of forest buffers; 258,000 new acres of nutrient management control; 13,000 feet of agricultural stream restoration; 233,000 pounds of wastewater nitrogen reductions; and 126,000 pounds of wastewater phosphorus reductions.
It is estimated these actions will cost either the taxpayers or producers $1.2 billion.
Other states such as Pennsylvania would be required to plant 175,000 acres of late planted cover crops, and haul 56,000 tons of poultry litter out of the watershed. New York and West Virginia, to reach their goals, would require their farmers to have thousands of acres allotted for rotational grazing and both states would require thousands of acres to be fenced to protect water quality.
Old computer models
All of these requirements would be imposed based on old computer models. It is believed that when the new Chesapeake Bay Watershed Model is published this summer, it will show even more nutrient reductions will be needed from agriculture.
The goal of the President’s Executive Order is to reduce nitrogen, which is estimated to be 259.4 million pounds per year entering the bay, to 175 million pounds per year.
After reading these numbers, proposed requirements and the President’s goal, you can see why the Virginia Farm Bureau members might think that President Obama’s expansion of federal authority over water runoff from farms might lead some in Virginia to believe the survival of family farms is at stake in the Commonwealth.
Though his column does not explicitly address Virginia, Gary Baise, a Virginia resident and nationally recognized agricultural and environmental expert offers critical insight into issues that impact our state’s agricultural economy. Reprinted with permission from FarmFutures.com
Gary Baise , a principal at Olsson Frank Weeda Terman Bode Matz PC., specializes in Clean Water Act (CWA), Clean Air Act (CAA), National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), and Solid Waste Disposal Act (SWDA) litigation as well as agricultural corporate governance issues. Mr. Baise has over 30 years experience in government and private practice. He has represented agricultural associations, port authorities, housing and commercial developers, municipalities, and pharmaceutical, steel, farm, construction equipment and chemical industries. Mr. Baise was the first Chief of Staff to the first US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator and subsequently became director of the EPA's Office of Legislation. He served as executive assistant to the Acting Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Associate Deputy Attorney General, and Acting Deputy Attorney General in the US Department of Justice. He served as Chairman of the Virginia Air Pollution Control Board and Vice Chairman of the Virginia Water Control Board by appointment of the Governor of Virginia. Presently, Mr. Baise serves as the only attorney on USDA's Agricultural Air Quality Task Force.
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Although no one wants to unfairly penalize America’s farmers. However, I can’t made an addition to my home or to the my business buildings without making space for runoff retention and filtering. As a homeowner, I’m constantly admonished not to allow fertilizer from my yard to drain into the river in front of and behind it. Why should farmers be allowed to get around this? Allowing farmers an exception to environmental regulations completely undermines the credibility of expecting citizens and other kinds businesses from having to follow those regs.
The American public has shown its will to restore and protect American waters. (I suspect few people who value the Chesapeake Bay, for example, would like the idea that Pennsylvania chicken producers are dumping 56,000 lbs of “poultry litter,” including biomedical wastes, into the Bay’s watershed. If the cost of that is increased cost for farm-grown and raised foods, then so be it. Most Americans have no idea what the real cost of their food is. A little more knowledge might help them make smarter decisions about how and what they eat.
A study was done a few years ago by the USGS in Inwood WV and they found over 50% of pollution in waterways came from “natural” sources, i.e deer, geese, fish, etc. From what I’ve seen, most farmers are doing whatever they can to limit fertilizer use to the minimum required. Fertilizer costs money and less fertilizer reduces costs. The bigger problem are homeowners who don’t know what or how much fertilizer to use. To them, more is better. Then you add golf courses and the like. Politicians like to take the path of least resistance when it comes to regulations and there are less farmers than homeowners that vote.
Every decision we make has an impact on the world we live in. I personally would like to trust that when I turn on the tap I get fresh clean water. I appreciate farmers, but feel that if they cannont afford to fence their livestock and it creates environmental harm then they do not have a realistic business model. I live across a street from a small spring fed lake. Years ago all my neighbors insisted on having beautifully manicured weed free lawns. Everyone was hiring a chemically based lawn management company to maintain our middle class utopia. The price was horrible. The lake reeked from rotting algae. There were no more birds. The neighbors finally got it and our lake is once more a healthy microcosm. For too long businesses have been allowed to ignore their impact on our common resources. I love the Chesapeake bay and feel that we should all want to honor it and protect it. Without clean water there is no life.
I’m going to register two disagreements and one agreement.
One disagreement is to remind everyone that this is not an “Obama” rule. This issue has been going on for years and I’m getting real weary of anything/everything perceived bad is got to be his fault.
I AGREE that we need to be using correct science – and I want to see those models validated such that when the model predicts something – you can actually measure it and get agreement.
dirty rivers don’t come from wild animals. if you think that – go to a wilderness area and look at the water quality. Making a statement like that is purposeful ignorance in my view.
but we KNOW the Bay has problems and we KNOW that it comes from runoff. I personally think the storm water runoff is far worse than farm runoff but if the science implicates farming – then they need to do their share – and it may actually require that the rest of us pay taxes to help pay for fences.
I think the Farm Bureau is shortsighted in it’s “alarm” advocacy. WE know there is a problem. The FB folks are basically saying it doesn’t matter – that farms can’t do much more.. and they say it in such a way to scare the farmers and that’s wrong in my view. The FB needs to take a principled stand that acknowledges the issues and helps get on board with solutions. Many farmer DO want to do the right thing. I’ve seen farms with newly-planted trees and fences along streambeds..
I like the headline, control your run off or the gov’t will do it for you.
Personally this makes sense. It’s a lot cheaper to keep water clean than it is to clean it up. Every ounce of water pollution raises the cost of water treatment. So if agriculture can’t do a better job on their own I personally think imposing consequences is reasonable.
Yet, nobody I know has any interest in driving farms out of Virginia or Pennsylvania. Clean water is everyone’s life blood and most vital asset. I believe there need to be legitimate partnerships established between farmers and the public (probably;y through government) that will help farmers do the right thing and help all of us keep clean water intact.
Clean water will no doubt become an even more precious resource in the future. We need to make sure that we can help farmers implement better practices where they can. We subsidize the oil industry, the housing industry, the nuclear industry, commodity agriculture. I have much greater confidence that subsidizing farmers to keep our water clean –and their farms prosperous — would be a viable strategy and probably worth far more in the long run than all the other subsidies.
Let’s get our priorities straight; 1. Clean water 2. Food 3. Prosperity.
The ag industry isn’t going out of the food business – let’s add the clean water business to their operation.
Let’s realize that the “old computer models” do not take into account the extensive nutrient management practices that farmers have already put into effect, such as buffer zones, conservation tillage, and livestock management reforms. Straightforward economics have encouraged such actions: farmers lose scarce money when fertilizer (including manure and litter spread on cropland, not “dumped into the watershed”) washes downstream. Economic forces also dictate that if expensive requirements are added to farmers’ costs, the result must be (a) food scarcity, (b) higher food costs, and/or (c) taxpayer subsidies. If we don’t like any of these options and still want a pristine bay despite burgeoning population increases in its watershed, then let’s hope everyone thrives on an all-seafood diet.
“old” or “new” computer models don’t do anything in terms of actually verifying the water quality and providing data and evidence about runoff and runoff practices.
You cannot pursue significant policy restrictions successfully based on models that have not been validated and reliably predict the real-world situation.
Trying to use models without validating them is going to lead to more delays and more challenges and it should because we cannot be imposing additional costs on anyone including farmers based on fanciful thinking which is what a model is that cannot reliably predict the actual.
We don’t want nor need a pristine bay at least not right now. Right now, we need a process we can trust to help determine policies that make sense and are cost-effective.
We have way too much advocacy and way too little practical science in my view and in the longer run this is bad because we do not reach consensus and the process turns into a never-ending political tug of war.
The folks who say they are REALLY interested in improving the Bay – take responsibility for doing what it take to move the ball forward and to stop blaming others for refusing to do a right process that provides the actual facts and puts everyone on the dime to respond and make changes.
this idea that if enough of the activists go running to the EPA to bring them down on the “bad guys” is going to fail.. it’s going to end up mired in court… and administrative and bureaucratic gridlock.
We MUST do the science right – from the get go if anyone is going to trust the process.