What a twisted world we live in!! We are now told we need to base our decisions on feelings, not facts. Here we go!
Example 1: Back in December 2009, then U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack announced an agreement with the dairy industry to reduce industry greenhouse gas emissions 25 percent by 2020, mostly by convincing farmers to capture methane from cow manure otherwise released into the atmosphere.
According to the December 2009 AP article, “Agriculture accounts for 7 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. The plan will persuade more farmers to purchase an anaerobic digester, which converts cow manure into electricity. Now, only 2 percent of U.S. dairy farmers use the technology, mostly because it is too costly for family farmers.”
Yes, they have followed through with this lunacy. The EPA is overseeing the project. Today their website has anaerobic digester guidelines, codigestion guidelines – which goes into more detail about codigestion feedstocks, biochemical methane potentials, anaerobic toxicity assays, total solids and volatile solids, alkalinity or pH, chemical oxygen demand and laboratories that conduct testing of anaerobic digester feedstocks. Then the farmer must connect to the power grid in order to help save the planet through all that “methane-produced power”. Oh yes, and he cannot forget about permits to do all this! From the EPA website – “Anaerobic digesters must meet local, state and federal regulatory and permitting requirements for air, solid waste and water. These requirements are in addition to permitting requirements for Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). Anaerobic digester permit requirements vary by location and change frequently. Local, state and federal resources can help you navigate the permit process.”
The EPA website also lists the hazards of these anaerobic digesters. They are drowning, fall protection, burns, entanglement hazard, feedstock and digestate spills, mechanical failures, lockout/tagout, ignition sources and noise levels.
So, the federal government wants farmers to regulate cows. Also from the EPA website: “AFOs (Animal Feeding Operations) that meet the regulatory definition of a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) are regulated under the NPDES permitting program. The NPDES program regulates the discharge of pollutants from point sources to waters of the United States.” NPDES is the acronym for National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System.
Of course, none of these mandates impact the costs of beef or milk! Who says we don’t live in a regulatory nightmare? Why can’t we just let cows back out in the pasture to leave their cowpies??
Click here to read the full article and the next three examples.
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