Lawmakers Block Requirement To Report Toxic Emissions From Manure

A court ruling last year ended an EPA exemption from emissions reporting for agriculture. Congress could respond with new protections for farmers.

By Mose BucheleApril 5, 2018 9:30 am,

From KUT:

If you’ve spent your life in the city, maybe you’ve never experienced the smell near a dairy farm, cattle feedlot or a newly fertilized field.

Tiffany Lashmet has.

“If you lived up in Amarillo, where I’m from, everybody is real familiar with [it],” says the agricultural law specialist for Texas A&M AgriLife Extension.

It’s manure, a constant part of raising animals.

Manure also emits chemicals like hydrogen sulfide and ammonia, and under federal law, most businesses are required to report those toxic emissions when they reach a certain level. But for years, most farms, ranches and other livestock facilities have been exempt from the requirement.

That changed last May.

“The District of Colombia Court of Appeals issued a decision that essentially said that the EPA did not have the authority to make that exemption,” Lashmet says.

Read more.