what's New This Page contains all Media posts

Arkansas Democrat Gazette

March 17, 2015

Hogs on the Buffalo: Review the permit

By Mike Masterson

Attorneys for environmental groups have asked the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (cough) to reopen C&H Hog Farms' operating permit for public comment and review because of all the flaws they've found in revisions to the owners' 2014 Nutrient Management Plan.

In response to a lengthy, specific list of significant changes in the way this factory says it will operate, Earthjustice attorney Monica Reimer tells agency leaders several of those alterations appear to deviate from the permit initially issued by the state.

In other words, these deviations clearly constitute a new ballgame when it comes to an operating permit in the Buffalo River watershed. While most are technical in nature, largely involving the amount of raw hog waste applied to various pastures called spray fields close to Big Creek, a major tributary of the Buffalo, they also question conflicting numbers and other relevant data left unexplained in the latest documents C&H has filed with the state.
For instance, Reimer's letter says the field areas reported to be available for waste spraying "have been significantly reduced to 335 acres with no explanation or relevant mapping. There is no way to determine slopes, where soil samples were taken or where waste was applied." This strikes me as especially important since it can only mean more waste will be disposed of in a significantly smaller area than originally stated.

The attorney contends the C&H revised equation of the rate at which soil erodes also has been changed without explanation. "They are much lower than in the original [Nutrient Management Plan] and it appears that low values were used in place of high values without explanation. These are extremely important values for calculating the [Phosphorus] index and are not values which should be changing rapidly over time. An explanation of this change should be required."

To her observation, this nonspecialist in soil erosion a common-sense "Amen."
Reimer adds, speaking of phosphorous, that Soil Test Phosphorus variations were significant, with large declines on some fields and large increases on others. But the problem is there are no maps to show soil-sampling locations so "these unexplained variations raise serious questions about their accuracy. Missing data should be provided by C&H."

OK, my turn again. Shouldn't our Department of Environmental Quality insist on such crucial data without outside attorneys asking for it?

The Earthjustice attorney, whose firm represents local, state and national groups, tells our state agency director: "While the Winter Revision does not appear to show over application, we note that nearly the full annual allowed rate of phosphorus was applied on fields 3, 15 and 17 even though crops were dormant. This would appear to be a case of waste disposal rather than nutrient management and is exactly the kind of disposal practice which should be prohibited in the Buffalo National River Watershed."

That argument makes perfect sense to me. I mean, If the factory's plan is to not apply more hog waste to these fields than the plant life in each field can absorb, why apply it when the plant life is dormant other than to dump the God-awful mess somewhere?

Reimer's concern then shifts to spreadsheets for the so-called 2014 annual report on the C&H Aggregate Phosphorus Index. Yeah, I know the language is enough to make one's eyes blur. Yet this matters a lot because it supposedly measures the amount and application of potentially polluting phosphorus to these spray fields.

The attorney says: "These spreadsheets, submitted in response to your request for seasonal, rather than annual, data, appear to be based on assumptions and data which are not supplied. They deviate significantly from the data provided in the revised [Nutrient Management Plan] and require further explanation."

For example, Reimer says the spreadsheet columns for Field Area and the Application Area deviate significantly from those in the revised plan and account for only 60 acres. She also says there's no data provided on the amounts of nitrogen or phosphorus applied to each field, "which makes it difficult to assure that application rates have not been exceeded."
And so the letter goes, asking why three different documents show three different numbers of millions of gallons of waste applied to all fields, and how many were applied versus being approved. And why the erosion data varies widely with what appeared in the Nutrient Management Plan.

The attorney said she contends these issues that include changing field dimensions without a map, apparently missing relevant data, unexplained assumptions and deviations from the originally approved Nutrient Management Plan together "constitute a substantial modification of the permit requiring that the full permit be reopened for public comment and review."

Stay tuned. We'll see how our state responds to so many legally valid points with this controversial factory supported and supplied by Cargill Inc.
------------v------------
Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at mikemasterson10@hotmail.com.
Editorial on 03/17/2015

Read the story with photos here: The Baxter Bulletin

Buffalo National River: Is industrial hog farm harmful?

Thomas Garrett, sgarrett@baxterbulletin.com 9:57 p.m. CDT March 12, 2015

 
Monitoring of the Buffalo National River in the area of a Newton County industrial hog farm showed runoff from a tributary sent E. coli concentrations above safe standards on the river for a month during 2014. While the study isn't conclusive, it does show potential for harm to the Buffalo, and that monitoring by the National Park Service will continue.

That's the gist of a presentation Thursday evening by NPS aquatic biologist Faron D. Usrey at Arkansas State University Mountain Home. The program was co-hosted by the ASUMH Stream Team and Friends of the White and North Fork Rivers.

C&H Hog Farms received clearance in 2012 from the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality for a feeding operation on Big Creek near Mount Judea for more than 6,000 sows and piglets. It's located five miles from the Buffalo.

Hog Farm concerns Buffalo River lovers.

Usrey told the audience that the operation was to have had 630 acres for application of hog waste, but has been using only a little more than 400 acres — 43 percent of which is in the Big Creek flood plain — to distribute 4,238,423 gallons of hog manure annually. That began in December 2013.

Since news of the hog farm first broke, there have been concerns that the operation poses a threat to the Buffalo, the country's first national river. The NPS had no jurisdiction over the area beyond the Buffalo's boundaries, according to Usrey, and received little input from state and federal agencies associated with authorizing the hog farm.
 
Monitoring the Buffalo

As background, Usrey explained to the audience of about 100, that while the NPS began monitoring the Buffalo's water quality in 1985, its priorities changed after a Marble Falls Sewer District lift station on Mill Creek failed after the ice storm of 2009. It dumped 6,000 gallons of waste a day into the creek. He said none of that ran into the Buffalo, but it did make the NPS shift its priorities to protecting people from poor water quality.

The Buffalo gets about 1.1 million visitors a year, and Usrey told the audience that April through August is the busy season for the river, with people canoeing, camping, swimming, hiking, picnicking and other activities. About 30 percent of those activities are on the upper and middle stretches of the river. He said annually the Buffalo generates about $47 million for Arkansas, with about $41 million coming from out of the area.

Between 2009 and 2012, NPS found, for the most part, the Buffalo's E. coli levels were below state Health Department safe standards, according to Usrey. E. coli can cause water-borne illnesses in people. However, it was learned that while about half the river's tributaries did develop a high E. coli level during some periods, they did not present a problem to the Buffalo itself.

"That's good news," said Usrey, noting that the study showed Big Creek did not have high E. coli.
 
E. coli spikes

After the hog farm began operation, NPS monitored Big Creek and two points on the Buffalo above and below the confluence of the two streams. Usrey said they took five samples a month from those sites between March 2013 and this January. He said they found spikes last year when Big Creek and the Buffalo at the monitoring sites were out of compliance with Health Department standards.

For two months between March and July 2014, Big Creek was above the safe standard for E. coli, and the Buffalo was higher than the safe standard for one month, according to figures presented by Usrey. Last year's runoff was higher because of more rain in the spring than in 2013 and would be expected to produce more bacteria in the runoff, according to the biologist.

So, to determine if the high E. coli on Big Creek was more a result of the rainy conditions than the hog farm, last fall NPS added two more monitoring sites on the river. One is below the Upper Buffalo Wilderness and the other is on the Little Buffalo River.

According to information provided by Usrey, with this spring's rains, they hope to determine if there is higher bacteria count in other tributaries because of the runoff, or if the higher concentration is unique to Big Creek.

What to do

One audience member asked what would happen if there was a big flood in that area. "Depends," Usrey replied, explaining the key factor would be if any hog waste had been applied to the fields beforehand.

The worst-case scenario, he said, would be a big flood before summer washing large amounts of bacteria into Big Creek and the Buffalo — which could send it downstream to the White River — then the bacteria settling into the river, reproducing and sucking the oxygen out of the water.

A big concern, said Usrey, is what NPS could do in the event of a high E. coli count. Speaking "off the hip," he said they have signs they could put up, and could make news releases warning about the situation. However, unlike a lake or the coast, the river is flowing, he said.

"If we put up signs, where are we going to put them?" he asked.

An audience member asked what could they do to help NPS, and another said write Gov. Asa Hutchinson, since the ADEQ is responsible for allowing the hog farm. Usrey agreed, adding, "and I will give him this same presentation."

Usrey pointed out what could be a key factor in how the state reacts to future findings. He said the hog farm is not a large employer, and is not that large a part of Newton County's tax base, compared to $41 million the Buffalo brings into Arkansas each year. The state would have to consider that, he said.

"That might be the deciding factor, not because they love the environment," said Usrey.

Massive amounts of manure spills from farm field into rural community

FULTON, Mich. (NEWSCHANNEL 3) - Thousands of gallons of manure has spilled into a West Michigan community.

It's happening in the Fulton area, which is in rural Kalamazoo County.

The manure is running off from a farmer's field and putting the surrounding area in danger.

This nasty situation is developing right near the Norris family's front yard.

"I don't want that in my yard, or in my area. It's kind of disgusting," said Lisa Norris, who lives across from the spill.

The manure was spread over this farmland outside Fulton last week.

"With the warmup on Sunday, that snow started to run off the field along with the manure," said Bruce Washburn, an environmental quality analyst for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.

A stream of feces formed, flowing over 42nd Street into ditches and neighboring properties.

The DEQ said it’s already working to contain it.

"Try to keep anymore contaminated water from heading down stream. They have it dammed at the field," Washburn said.

The big concern is this dirty material getting into waterways and hurting wildlife.

"And obviously human health is the other concern that we have. Swimming in it, drinking it, that's what the health department is looking into," Washburn said.

The farming company that spread the manure told Newschannel 3 that it wasn't prepared for a warm up like this.

It reported the spill to the DEQ after its own efforts to contain it failed.

"We haven't determined whether it was an improper application or whether it was bad timing. Winter spreading on snow-covered ground is a more risky practice," Washburn said.

Washburn said the farming company has been proactive in cleaning up the spill.

However, a warmer week ahead could mean trouble.

"Things could break loose and cause more problems," Washburn said.

Lisa Norris hopes this can be taken care of before it impacts her pets and the well water she depends on.

"Yeah I don't want to drink that, absolutely not," Norris said.

The farming company could be fined.

But the DEQ says they're still in the early stages of their investigation.

See link for full story and videos from The Center for Investigative Reporting website

http://www.revealnews.org/article/north-carolinians-say-expansion-of-chinese-owned-pig-farms-stinks/

This link is to an 8-minute report by Jacqueline Froelich for an Ozarks-At-Large segment on KUAF public radio, Fayetteville, AR http://kuaf.com/post/monitoring-buffalo-river-swine

The Institute for Southern Studies

Koch Industries tops list of water polluters spending big on politics

With corporate interests mobilizing to kill the Environmental Protection Agency's plans to restore Clean Water Act safeguards to thousands of waterways across the nation, an environmental advocacy group is shining a spotlight on major polluters' efforts to influence federal policymaking.

This week Environment America released "Polluting Politics," a report that analyzes spending on federal lobbying and campaign contributions by companies releasing the most toxic chemicals into U.S. waterways, more than half of which aren't safe for fishing, swimming or drinking due to pollution.

"As it turns out, the same companies that are polluting our waterways with toxic chemicals are also polluting our politics with their spending," said Ally Fields, the report's author.

The study comes as some members of Congress are trying to block the Obama administration's proposed clean water rule expanding the number of waterways protected under the landmark 1972 law. The proposal has gotten strong support from the American public, which submitted more than 800,000 comments in favor of the rule during last year's comment period.

According to data self-reported to the EPA's Toxics Release Inventory for 2012, the top 10 water polluters include nine corporations and one government agency. In all, industrial facilities reported dumping a total of more than 206 million pounds of pollution into U.S. waterways in 2012.

The top water polluter was Ohio-based AK Steel Holding, a steel company that released over 19 million pounds of toxic chemicals to U.S. waterways. It was followed by meat processor Tyson Foods of Arkansas (18.5 million pounds), the U.S. Department of Defense (10.8 million pounds), the Minnesota-based international food conglomerate Cargill (10.6 million pounds), Perdue Farms of Maryland (7.4 million pounds), Kansas-based oil and chemical conglomerate Koch Industries (6.6 million pounds), Colorado-based chicken producer Pilgrim's Pride (6.5 million pounds), chemical giant DuPont of Delaware (5.5 million pounds), Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel (5.2 million pounds), and Phillips 66, a multinational energy company headquartered in Houston (5.2 million pounds).

Of those top polluters, Koch Industries spent the most by far on lobbying in 2014 at $13.8 million. Based in Kansas, the privately held oil and chemical conglomerate has operations nationwide and across the South. It was followed by DuPont ($9.2 million), Phillips 66 ($3.7 million), U.S. Steel ($1.8 million), Cargill ($1.3 million), Tyson Foods ($1.1 million), AK Steel (over $739,000) and Perdue Farms ($40,000). Pilgrim's Pride and the Defense Department reportedly did not spent anything on lobbying in 2014.

Among the top 10 U.S. water polluters, Koch Industries was also the leading spender on campaign contributions in the 2014 federal election cycle at over $7.7 million. Other top 10 water polluters who were also major campaign contributors were Phillips 66 ($362,315), Cargill ($336,907), U.S. Steel ($301,677) and Tyson Foods ($281,280). Koch, DuPont, Cargill and Tyson are also members of industry associations that are working to kill the proposed clean-water rules.

In North Carolina, the state chapter of Environment America highlighted political giving by Smithfield Foods, the Virginia-based pork processor now owned by the Shuanghui Group of China. The company operates the world's largest meat-processing plant in Tar Heel, North Carolina -- a facility that dumped over 2.3 million pounds of pollution into the state's waterways in 2012. In the last federal election cycle, Smithfield spent $1.4 million on lobbying. The company is also a member of the National Association of Manufacturers, which submitted public comments opposing the rules.

"It's clear that our nation's polluters have deep pockets, but hundreds of thousands of Americans have raised their voices in support of doing more to protect our waterways, from the Chesapeake Bay to Puget Sound," Fields said. "It's time for Congress to listen to citizens, not the polluters, and let the EPA finish the job to protect our waterways."

Sue Sturgis By Sue Sturgis on March 2, 2015 3:21 PM

 Business Insider
The secretive Cargill family has 14 billionaires thanks to an agricultural empire — more than any other clan on earth

DRAKE BAER

MAR. 2, 2015, 
 

Cargill is the largest privately held company in the US.

The Minnesota-based agriculture giant has 75 businesses employing 143,000 people in 67 countries. In 2013, yearly revenue topped $134 billion.

That money has made the Cargill clan very, very rich.

As Forbes reports in their annual billionaire list, the Cargill family now has 14 billionaires, more than any other family in the world.

To put this in perspective, if the Cargills were a country, they'd have as many billionaires as Sweden or Israel. That's enough to make them the 31st-most billionaire-filled nation around.

It all started back in 1865.

"W.W. Cargill founded the business on the Iowa frontier at the end of the Civil War, and his descendants still own 88% of the agricultural conglomerate 150 years later," Forbes reports.

Heirs to the family fortune include James Cargill II, Austen Cargill II, and Marianne Liebmann.

While huge, Cargill is famously quiet as a company and a family.

"The Cargills live extremely private lives, many of them on ranches and farms in Montana," Forbes reports.

A 2011 Fortune profile helped to put the reach of the company in perspective:

You don't have to love Egg McMuffins (McDonald's buys many of its eggs in liquid form from Cargill) or hamburgers (Cargill's facilities can slaughter more cattle than anyone else's in the U.S.) or sub sandwiches (No. 8 in pork, No. 3 in turkey) to ingest Cargill products on a regular basis.

Whatever you ate or drank today — a candy bar, pretzels, soup from a can, ice cream, yogurt, chewing gum, beer — chances are it included a little something from Cargill's menu of food additives.

Its $50 billion "ingredients" business touches pretty much anything salted, sweetened, preserved, fortified, emulsified, or texturized, or anything whose raw taste or smell had to be masked in order to make it palatable.

Sounds like a dynasty, huh?



 

Arkansas democrat Gazette

Columnists:
Best check records

To ‘assume’ makes . . . you know
By Mike Masterson
 

Steve Valentine of Mount Judea was fit to be hog-tied when he discovered a wooden platform on his property at the convergence of Dry Creek and Big Creek not far from the controversial C&H hog factory (that some in the industry like to mislabel as a farm).

No one had asked Valentine about constructing what looked at first to him like a hunting stand. So he called the Newton County sheriff and asked what he could do. He said the sheriff told him do whatever he wanted since it was on his property. So he cut the thing down and had it hauled away.

Several weeks later he learned from a friend the mystery stand had been constructed as part of Dr. Andrew Sharpley's ongoing attempts to monitor water quality around the factory our state permitted to house up to 6,500 swine.

The University of Arkansas environmental sciences, soils and crop professor is being paid a lot of money by our state to monitor this factory our state wrongheadedly allowed into our state's treasured Buffalo National River watershed. The professor's team is tasked with examining the effluent from surrounding fields that are regularly sprayed with raw hog waste.

Confused, Valentine said he couldn't understand how, since Mount Judea is a place where everyone knows everyone else and their relatives, the professor's folks would apparently ask everyone but him for permission to built a stand on his property.

" I learned Sharpley had contacted my neighbors, whose properties also butt up against Dry Creek, for permission to build his monitoring station on their land. But they turned him down.

"This is where it gets interesting," he continued. "At no time did Sharpley contact me for my permission. Instead, he contacted the Newton County judge, Warren Campbell, for permission--and [apparently] got it."

In addition, Valentine heard through the grapevine how Sharpley intended to build another monitoring station over the remains of the one he'd removed.

In the process, news of the university's mysteriously destroyed monitoring station had made news.

After discovering what this structure had been, Valentine did what most of us would do. He contacted Sharpley directly with an email that read in part: "... I don't recall giving my written permission to have any structures built on my land ... If it were not for the assistance provided to me by an activist opposed to the hog factory, I would never have known who constructed the platform ... I learned that it was put there by the University of Arkansas ... so my question to you, sir, is do you have any documentation from me that grants you or the university permission to build anything on my land? If you do, please contact me as soon as possible with a copy of that documentation ... Believe me, sir, I do not enjoy writing this letter, but I believe you have the right to defend your actions ..."

I can only imagine Sharpley's expression when he got that bit of news on University Hill in Fayetteville.

The professor responded basically by saying oops, but the county judge told us in writing it would be all right. "Thank you for giving us the opportunity to respond to your concerns," he wrote Valentine. "Last year, an External Review Panel recommended that we monitor the quality of Dry Creek as it enters Big Creek, as three large fields, which are permitted to receive slurry [hog waste], have the potential to contribute chemicals to Dry Creek.

"Agreeing with the Panel's recommendation," Sharpley continued, "I started the process of getting landowner permission before doing anything else. Thus, at the beginning of September 2014, I obtained information on the ownership of land adjacent to the proposed Dry Creek sampling site (map attached). From that map it appeared that the main landowners around that bridge were Sam Dye and Ronnie Campbell, who had worked with Dr. [John] Van Brahana to conduct dye tracer studies.

"On September 15th and 22nd, I called Dye and Campbell and left a message. Not hearing back, I wrote them on September 29th, requesting permission. As I did not receive a response, I decided to contact the County Judge [Campbell], who agreed to give us permission to place the stand and monitoring equipment within the easement of the county road and bridge. On October 20th, Judge Campbell signed a Memorandum of Understanding for us to install our monitoring equipment. This agreement was the same as those signed by landowners of all our other sites.

"I can assure you it was never my intent to encroach on anyone's property without their expressed written and preferably verbal consent and have obtained landowner permission prior to conducting any monitoring work on any private property. If I had known or been told that this stand would be on your property, I certainly would not have proceeded without contacting you and your approval.

"As this is the only logical location to locate a sampling station for Dry Creek, we will not pursue or try to relocate this site unless you agree to our presence. I would be more than happy to visit with you at your convenience to explain exactly what we would be specifically doing at that site and what we are doing in general for our monitoring and why."

Valentine says, in light of the inexplicable way this encroachment occurred, he's decided against giving Sharpley that permission. Can't say as I blame him.

Arkansas Democrat Gazette

Relevant findings
Swine and health

By Mike Masterson

I concede that the Ozarks of Northwest Arkansas are not located in the similar verdant hills of North Carolina.

I'll agree the climates of each state can differ, especially considering we are landlocked while eastern North Carolina has a scenic and historic coastline.

But I draw the line at believing the potential contaminating effects of raw waste emanating from swine factories on pristine freshwater streams located near them is different at all. And none of it is good.

With that in mind, I read with interest an article published the other day by Environmental Health News about the big stink groups there are raising over high levels of bacteria being discovered in North Carolina's rivers and the science reportedly linking such contamination directly to that state's large swine factories.

The story raises so many pertinent questions about the possibility of similar off-site pollution leaking into Big Creek and waters flowing alongside and beneath the controversial C&H Hog Farms our state wrongheadedly permitted in 2012 to operate in the Buffalo National River watershed.

The magnificent Buffalo is our country's first national river, designated as such in 1972.
While research groups (such as that headed by University of Arkansas' geoscience professor emeritus John Van Brahana and his volunteers) continue to examine the quality of water around the C&H factory and the creek which empties into our revered Buffalo six miles downstream, academic researchers in North Carolina say they've already connected elevated bacteria levels to swine.

Those findings come from their own streams flowing around such factories. They say they have identified specific markers in the waste attributable solely to swine.
Of course, the state environmental agency has done its best to discredit the study, calling it "inconclusive," as has the industry that supports the millions of swine. Why would we the people expect anything less regardless of scientific findings in 2015 America?
These discoveries, in my mind, certainly have meaningful relevance to our ongoing situation at Mount Judea. Brahana and his crew already have been using dye testing to determine how rapidly and widely the runoff flows after being absorbed into the fractured karst subsurface.

Come this spring I expect Brahana's team to begin using even more sophisticated methods to determine possible links with what elevated E. coli levels are already being discovered in the watershed.

Back in eastern North Carolina, the battle continues, according to the article published Feb. 18: "[H]ealth and environmental groups continue to pressure the state, the second leading pork producing state behind Iowa, to more strictly regulate large pig farms. Meanwhile evidence continues to mount of the industry's impact in the region: A study published in January concluded that streams near large industrial farms in eastern North Carolina are full of pig poop bacteria."

"People just can't ignore this," Naeema Muhammad, a co-director and community organizer at the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network told Environmental Health News. "The air stinks, the water is contaminated and property values are depleted."
As in our own state, the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources considers large swine operations with thousands of pigs as "non-discharge facilities," thereby exempt from state rules on having to monitor the waste they dump in rivers and streams.

Environmental Health News also reports that Steve Wing, a professor and researcher at the University of North Carolina who co-wrote the January study, believes the case for that exemption is dubious. Researchers from Johns Hopkins University and UNC for about a year tested water upstream and downstream from swine waste dispersal fields in eastern North Carolina.

"You have evidence of pig-specific bacteria in surface waters, next to industrial swine operations," he told the publication.

Wing went on to contend the farms generate so much waste that it would be too expensive to transport by pipeline or truck; the manure is dispersed by pumps through pipelines and sprayers across fields. The sprayers shower hundreds of gallons per minute.
Brahana said C&H has applied to the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (cough) for a similar pipeline and spraying operation in their waste fields around Big Creek, rather than continuing to truck the waste from lagoons to dispense.

Environmental Health News reported the North Carolina study found the "highest concentrations were found 'immediately downstream' of swine feedlot spray fields and during the spring and summer seasons. ... Of 187 samples, 40 percent exceeded state and federal water guidelines for fecal coliforms, harmful bacteria from animal feces. In addition, 23 percent and 61 percent of the samples exceeded the water quality standards for E. coli and Enterococcus respectively, two other feces-derived bacteria harmful when they're ingested."
------------v------------
Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at mikemasterson10@hotmail.com.
Editorial on 02/22/2015

Environmental Health News

Pig poop fouling North Carolina streams; state permitting questioned.

Streams near large factory pig farms have high levels of bacteria. Health groups are raising a stink.

February 18, 2015

Brian Bienkowski
Environmental Health News

Few people know the pig business like North Carolina’s Don Webb.

Webb raised pigs in Wilson County, North Carolina, until, in the late 70s, residents told him the smell near his farms was unbearable. He tried some solutions. They didn’t work.

“I was riding down the road and got to thinking of my own mother and father and what would I do if one of these was their homes [near the pig farms],” Webb said in his heavy Southern drawl. “So I got out of the business.”

Webb, 74, soon went from pig farmer to vocal critic. Over the past few decades he’s frequently done battle with the large pig farms in North Carolina over their waste management. He once took former state Sen. Wendell Murphy, owner of Murphy Farms and notorious for pushing industry-friendly laws, for a ride in his pickup truck to show him his farm's impacts.

He brought the senator to a home where a woman lived with her husband, stricken with tuberculosis. Their home was a trailer. The couch had springs sticking out, Webb recalled.

The stench was noxious.

“She told Murphy ‘if you could please do anything to help us, I can’t put my clothes out sometimes and my grandchildren won’t visit me,’” Webb said.

Other neighbors Murphy visited had similar pleas.

"I was riding down the road and got to thinking of my own mother and father and what would I do if one of these was their homes. So I got out of the business."-Don Webb

Things haven’t changed much since that tour two decades ago. The battle in eastern North Carolina persists as health and environmental groups continue to pressure the state, the second leading pork producing state behind Iowa, to more strictly regulate large pig farms.

Meanwhile evidence continues to mount of the industry's impact in the region: A study published in January concluded that streams near large industrial farms in eastern North Carolina are full of pig poop bacteria.

For those battling the state for more stringent regulations, it's another knock against an industry that heavily impacts their lives.

“People just can’t ignore this,” said Naeema Muhammad, a co-director and community organizer at the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network. “The air stinks, the water is contaminated and property values are depleted.”

State permitting questioned
 

The North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources treats large swine farms – operations with thousands of pigs and up – as "non-discharge facilities," exempt from state rules on having to monitor the waste they dump in rivers and streams. The case for that exemption is dubious, suggested Steve Wing, a professor and researcher at the University of North Carolina who co-authored the January study, published in "Science of the Total Environment."

"You have evidence of pig-specific bacteria in surface waters, next to industrial swine operations,” he said.

For about a year, from 2010 to 2011, researchers from Johns Hopkins University and the University of North Carolina tested water both upstream and downstream from fields in eastern North Carolina where pig poop from large factory farms is applied.

"You have evidence of pig-specific bacteria in surface waters, next to industrial swine operations."-Steve Wing, University of North Carolina

The farms generate so much waste that it would be too expensive to transport via pipeline or a truck, Wing said. So manure is dispersed via big pumps and sprayers that act like “a lawn sprinkler," Wing said, and spread the slurry across fields.

The sprayers shower hundreds of gallons per minute (household lawn sprinklers average about two or three gallons per minute).

The highest concentrations were found “immediately downstream" of swine feedlot spray fields and in the spring and summer seasons, the authors wrote.

Of 187 samples, 40 percent exceeded state and federal water guidelines for fecal coliforms, harmful bacteria from animal feces.

In addition, 23 percent and 61 percent of the samples exceeded the water quality standards for E. coli and Enterococcus respectively, two other feces-derived bacteria that can hurt people when ingested.

Sampling took place in Duplin County, a place with more pigs than people: 2 million vs. 60,000. Wing and colleagues tested water from Goshen Swamp, a tributary of the Northeast Cape Fear River.

Big “cesspools”
 

But a spokesman for the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources said the study “seems to be inconclusive.”

“The information presented provides an indication of overall water quality in these [waters]; however, it is not an indication of a discharge of waste,” Drew Elliot, communications director for the department, wrote in an email after sharing the study with state water quality experts.

The department questioned whether the researchers analyses met the state’s water analysis requirements and pointed out that sources of such fecal pollution could include “any warm blooded animals and failing septic or sewage collection systems.”

But Wing's study accounted for this: Since the fecal bacteria potentially could be from leaking residential septic tanks or other animals, Wing and colleagues tested markers in the bacteria and found the majority matched what would be found in pigs.

A spokesperson for Smithfield Foods agreed with the state’s critique. Smithfield’s subsidiary, Murphy-Brown LLC, is the world’s largest producer of pigs and headquartered in North Carolina.

“The information presented in this study does not accurately reflect waste management practices at Murphy-Brown, and unfairly vilifies North Carolina's agricultural community,” Kathleen Kirkham, director of corporate communications, wrote in an email.

"The information presented provides an indication of overall water quality in these [waters]; however, it is not an indication of a discharge of waste."-Drew Elliot, North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources

The study is not able to “legitimately differentiate the type of feces in the river between swine, goose, deer or human that will also be there from the natural environment surrounding waterways,” she added.

Wing said the latter is a recurring industry argument and that the bacteria markers they used to pin the pollution on pigs were quite conclusive.

The National Pork Producers Council did not respond to multiple requests to comment for this article. A spokesman for the North Carolina Farm Bureau said the organization doesn’t “typically provide comment on academic studies.”

Wing’s study suggests that the methods for getting rid of animal waste from huge farms are not working.

“The farms hold the waste in lagoons, as the industry euphemistically calls them, which are big cesspools,” said JoAnne Burkholder, a professor and aquatic ecologist at North Carolina State University. The waste can run off from such areas and get into waterways.

The large farms are located in rural areas where many people use private wells. But due largely to a lack of funding, studies on groundwater effects of human health are rare, Burkholder said.

Poor, minorities most impacted
 

North Carolina environmental and health groups are fed up -- not just about the farms’ impact, but who is most impacted.

“It seems that the industry goes into an area that they think is perfect for their needs: lots of land, and people without a voice and not many of them,” Burkholder said.

But Kirkham, Smithfield's spokeswoman, said people from Smithfield are members of the community too.

“We live here, work here, and raise our families here. We have a vested interest in the health and well-being of these communities,” she wrote.

She said the company averages about two or three notices per year from neighbors concerned about the operation.

Duplin County, where Wing’s study took place, is 26 percent black and 21 percent Hispanic, according to the US Census. Duplin’s median income is 25 percent lower than the rest of the state, and 26 percent of its residents live below the poverty line.

"It seems that the industry goes into an area that they think is perfect for their needs: lots of land, and people without a voice and not many of them."-JoAnne Burkholder, North Carolina State University

Earthjustice - along with the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network, Rural Empowerment Association for Community Help and Waterkeeper Alliance - filed a civil rights complaint with the EPA against the North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources, which states in part, “lax regulation of hog waste disposal discriminates against communities of color in eastern North Carolina.”

The complaint is a response to the state’s renewal of a general permit for large pig farms to continue operating and storing waste as they have been for years.

“We’ve been asking the state and our representatives for years to do something different about how this industry operates in the state of North Carolina,” Muhammad said. “It was an insult to the community and to the people of the state of North Carolina to renew those permits.”

The complaint was filed in September. Earthjustice is still waiting to hear back from the EPA.

“They’ve been dragging their feet,” said Jocelyn D’Ambrosio, senior associate attorney with Earthjustice.

Forced “bondage of feces”
 

Webb still makes his home in Wilson County, North Carolina. He works with a group called the Alliance for a Responsible Swine Industry to find solutions to the pig farm waste.

He’s animated when he talks about pig farming. But he strikes a somber tone when he recalls the people impacted.

“The woman taking care of her husband with tuberculosis? She died. Her husband died. They were forced to live years in the bondage of feces and flies,” Webb said.

“So a rich man can have hogs.”

 EHN welcomes republication of our stories, but we require that publications include the author's name and Environmental Health News at the top of the piece, along with a link back to EHN's version.

For questions or feedback about this piece, contact Brian Bienkowski at bbienkowski@ehn.org.