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FOIA’d
documents obtained by Sierra Club and ECCSCM point to the ultimate,
self-created Catch 22 -- Vreba-Hoff Dairy CAFO now has enormous amounts of
waste in their many, enormous waste storage structures, but because the
treatment system they selected and installed is not adequately treating the
waste, they have been prohibited by the DEQ from spraying the waste onto fields.
This fortunately stops the CAFO operators from turning on an estimated 10
Irrigators, which would now be spraying liquid manure on many fields, adding stench
and aerosol and particulate contaminants to the air and quite possibly causing
water pollution as well. CAFOs
don’t come with on/off switches because living animals both need to eat
and need to excrete. Once again Vreba-Hoff seems to think they can either
build their way or talk their way out of a simple math problem: too many
cows = too much waste to be spread on too few fields with too little treatment.
AW From
ECCSCM’s website (www.nocafos.org ) Recent
Michigan DEQ documents show serious problems with the EarthMentor
"treatment" system at Vreba-Hoff facilities in Note
- 313 violations since 2000. June, 2008 - Vreba-Hoff ordered not to spray-irrigate animal wastewater from EarthMentor system. Water tests by DEQ and Vreba-Hoff show the EarthMentor system "does not meet the treatment standards provided in the Interim Order...Based on the split samples, the waste in the irrigation cell at Vreba-Hoff Dairy II exceeds the stand ards by two to three times." |