Chesapeake Bay Action Plan

Despite all the rhetoric about how important it is to have an unpolluted and healthy Chesapeake Bay, sometimes you just have to wonder if anyone is really taking this Bay cleanup issue seriously. We’ve known for years now that agricultural operations in the Bay states are the number one source of nutrients and sediments to the watershed, yet neither state nor federal regulators have shown any willingness to do any of the things – permitting, compliance mandates and enforcement – that have worked well with so many other polluting industries.

While power plants, paper mills, sewage treatment plants and manufacturing plants have largely been cleaned up through the implementation of regulatory “stick” approaches, the chosen method of ag pollution abatement comprises of a series of unsuccessful, voluntary “carrot” approaches, including manure transport programs and nutrient trading.

After decades of failure, we’re about to reach new depths of futility with a bill, largely written by Maryland’s own Department of Agriculture, which was introduced this legislative session in Maryland by Senator Thomas Middleton. Middleton’s “Ag Certainty” bill will not only make certain that these highly polluting operations continue to pollute with officially sanctioned immunity, but it will also openly undermine the current Bay cleanup plan – the Bay Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL).

Ag Certainty refers to a program under which agricultural operations that certify that they meet pollution reduction goals or certain pollution-control requirements will be deemed in compliance with existing and/or future water quality regulations and standards. In short, it’s a blanket immunity program designed to offer Big Ag a continuing free ride from mandatory pollution control and enforcement. Even worse, it ties regulator’s hands when it comes to implementing more protective water quality approaches when needed.

MDA and Senator Middleton’s Ag Certainty legislation could give Maryland’s roughly 5,000 farmers 10 years of immunity from any changes in future state regulation in exchange for what they are already supposed to be doing: complying with their existing nutrient management and soil conservation plans so that they don’t foul our public trust waterways.

While getting Ag to commit to current pollution abatement measures might sound like a good idea, locking in 10 more years of paper compliance with secret Nutrient Management Plans (NMPs) is a death sentence for the Bay. The Maryland Department of Agriculture likes to boast that 99 percent of farms in the state have submitted NMPs to the agency and the vast majority of farmers are complying with these plans, yet agriculture still remains the number one source of pollution in the Bay.

If farmers are all truly in compliance with their plans, this can only mean that the NMPs are broken. Plus, thanks to the recent Perdue litigation, we now know that NMPs are subject to manipulation by industry to avoid controlling pollution sources. The bill also expands on Maryland’s improper system of “Ag secrecy” to go along with its newfound certainty. Under existing state law (and the Ag Certainty bill), citizens are not even allowed to see the NMPs with which these farms are purportedly in compliance.

Ag certainty, with its immunity from future pollution abatement measures, also makes a mockery out of the Bay TMDL. Two years ago, EPA finalized this comprehensive “pollution diet” to restore clean water in the Chesapeake Bay and the region’s streams, creeks and rivers. Most importantly, to account for the “dynamic” nature of the Bay watershed and uncertain efficacy of the current plan, EPA built into the TMDL a set of checkpoints that allow for fine-tuning in case standards aren’t being met. Included in this accountability process are two-year milestones that represent key check-in points on the way to having all pollution reduction measures in place by 2025 to restore the Bay and its tidal rivers. Come 2017, the Bay TMDL calls for an even more comprehensive refinement of the plan should there be insufficient pollution reductions. EPA considers these milestones to be “a critical part of an accountability framework agreed upon by EPA and the states to assure progress.”

According to EPA’s TMDL Executive Summary, the Agency even dropped protective federal “backstops” (regulatory safety nets in case water quality was not being met) from the TMDL in exchange for some assurances from the states. For example, Maryland, Delaware and Virginia agreed to consider implementation of mandatory programs for agriculture by the end of this year if pollution reductions fall behind schedule. Not coincidentally, these are now the three states in the Bay Region that are developing Ag Certainty programs that will stop regulators from being able to make any shifts in the way Ag pollution is controlled should the Bay TMDL benchmarks not be reached.

MDA and Middleton’s Bill expressly exempts Ag operations from compliance with any changes in state or local laws necessary to meet the TMDL or the state Watershed Implementation Plans. So now Maryland, and other Bay states, are going from “mandatory” to “immunity” and those two-year checkpoints and 2017 re-visitation are rendered meaningless when it comes to the watershed’s biggest industrial source of pollution.

With Ag Certainty, we’ve just thrown a “critical” part of the TMDL out the window; the only real “certainty” that remains is that we’ll all be sitting down in 2025 again and try to come up with the next, great plan to clean up the Bay.

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Thousands of tons of raw animal manure is put on Maryland farm fields each year from tens of millions of chickens and hundreds of thousands of pigs, cows, and other farm animals. Under pressure to reduce this significant source of Bay pollutants, the Maryland Department of Agriculture proposed soft new nutrient management regulations to deal with this problem last October but withdrew them under pressure from the farm and environmental community. These regulations were to better manage the farm application of manure, human sludge, and other fertilizers but were greatly weakened to meet the objections of the ag lobby.

After eight months of negotiations and efforts to strengthen the regulations as we have advocated in our Bay Action Plan [Nutrient Management Letter to Governor-Bay Cabinet], new regulations were proposed and published in the Maryland Register on June 29. These regs are still much too weak and fall well short of the Senior Scientists and Policymakers for the Bay science-based positions. Representatives of our group had discussed our positions in detail with the Bay Cabinet at a meeting last September. We have continued to advocate these common sense positions and members of our group sent detailed letter to the Governor and published an Op-ed in the Baltimore Sun ]NMR Sun OpEd No more half-measures June 18 2012 detailing the need for better management of animal manure and other nutrients.

Essentially, our recommendations center on the belief that that all animal manure—and all biosolids—should be regulated the same as human sludge from advanced wastewater treatment plants is regulated under MDE regs when these nutrient-containing materials are applied to farm land. Working with all major Maryland environmental groups, our recomemndations were fine tuned and those of other groups were combined in a JOINT STATEMENT calling for the adoption of the proposed regulations with 8 ESSENTIAL CHANGES. These changes address the shortcomings in the proposed manure regulations. The 8 Essential Changes in the proposed regs would do a lot to reduce nutrients that are choking the Bay–more than almost any other proposed or current law or regulation. NMR ENVIRO STATEMENT W Sign ons July 3 2012

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

The conservation community needs your help in working to gain the changes we have long supported. Remember the serious diseased fish and human infections in 1997 linked to excess nutrients from manure and other farm activities? Here’s help you can help in our uphill battle to improve the regulations:

1. SEND IN AN EMAILED LTR OF SUPPORT TO THE AELR COMMITTEE.

The Joint Committee on Administrative, Executive, and Legislative Review held a legislative hearing on July 10 at which the Maryland Farm Bureau and rural legislators attacked the proposed regulations. Conservation groups testified in support of the adoption of the proposed regulations with the 8 Essential Changes. Please send a letter supporting the adoption of the proposed regulations with the 8 ESSENTIAL CHANGES. you should email it to the AELR Committee Chairs: Senator Paul Pinsky via Ian Ullman, <IUllman@senate.state.md.us> and Delegate Anne Healey at: anne.healey@house.state.md.us  Address the email to: Joint Committee on Administrative, Executive and Legislative Review, c/o Department of Legislative Services, Legislative Services Building, 90 State Circle, Annapolis, MD 21401 and send copies to the two Legislative Services staff members, Mr. Isaacson: evan.isaacson@mlis.state.md.ud and Ms. Razulis at: marie.razulis@mlis.state.md.us asking that your email ltr be delivered to all AELR Committee members.

2. ATTEND AND SPEAK AT A REGIONAL MDA HEARING ON THE REGS.

Our group of Senior Scientists and Policymakers is working with others in the conservation community to assure a good turnout and to present a unified stand at the MDA hearings on the regs. You can present your support for adoption of the regulations as in the Joint Statement and of the 8 ESSENTIAL CHANGES and add your own personal insights and try to have others attend the meetings in Easton and Prince Frederick. The meetings run from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.

Eastern Shore

Monday, July 23, 2012

Talbot Community Center

10028 Ocean Gateway

Easton, MD 21601

Southern Maryland

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Calvert County Fairgrounds

140 Calvert Fair Drive

Prince Frederick, MD 20610

3. SEND IN AN EMAILED OR FAX’D LTR OF SUPPORT TO MDA.

Written comments may be sent to Jo Mercer, Ed.D., Program Manager, MDA’s Nutrient Management Program, Maryland Department of Agriculture, 50 Harry S. Truman Parkway, Annapolis, MD 21401, or email: jo.mercer@maryland.gov, or fax to (410) 841-5950. Comments will be accepted through August 13, 2012. Urge adoption of the proposed nutrient management regulations with the 8 ESSENTIAL CHANGES.

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(Posted by Gerald Winegrad)
 
The Maryland Department of Agriculture announced the development of weakened proposed regulations that are well short of the positions advocated by the Senior Scientists and Policymakers for the Bay to address the pollution from millions of tons of chicken and other farm animal manure that is poisoning ground and surface waters.  Some key elements of the proposals don’t even go into effect until 2016, allowing four more years to do just some of what has been required for land application of treated human sludge since 1985!

The reports from the University of Maryland scientists appointed by the Administration were kept from us and the public until just before the announcement of the proposals for regulations. These scientists recommended much more than was incorporated into the regulations and noted that the EPA’s Bay Program found that farm animal manure is responsible for 24 percent of the phosphorus (this is more than all the municipal WWTPs and industrial dischargers) and 15 percent of the nitrogen flowing to and choking the Bay. This does not include the atmospheric contribution of nitrogen from the volatilization of manure and fertilizer, and subsequent atmospheric deposition of the nitrates estimated at 7% of total bay nitrogen. Septic tanks Baywide are somewhere around 3 percent of the nitrogen, near zero of the phosphorus and for Maryland it’s 6 percent of the nitrogen and near zero of the phosphorous.

Please see our letter to the Governor’s Bay Cabinet urging action on new regulations. The new regulations ignore our science-based recommendations to conform chicken manure and other animal waste and nutrients placed on farm fields with the 1985 requirements for treated human sludge including:  prohibition on winter application after November 1, better buffer requirements including a 100′ buffer in the Critical Area, and a prohibition on the application of manure and other nutrients with phosphorus when the soils are already super-saturated with phosphorus. Also rejected was a requirement that there be adequate monitoring and enforcement of the Nutrient Management Regulations, which is currently lacking.

Please see The Sun article on the cozy relationship between Governor O’Malley and Perdue’s General Counsel and the Food and Water watch release on this issue.

It’s hard to win when you are playing against a stacked deck.

Also see the letter from two full-time working farmers on the need for better nutrient management regulations and in support of our positions.

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(Posted by Dawn Stoltzfus.)

Today, standing in front of the M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, to represent the enormous amount of chicken litter produced each year in Maryland (a pile twice as high as the stadium!), Environment Maryland released a new report detailing the problems with Maryland’s current manure regulations and, in particular, with too much phosphorus in our soil and our waterways, including the Chesapeake Bay.

Among the findings in An Unsustainable Path: Why Maryland’s Manure Pollution Rules Are Failing to Protect the Chesapeake Bay are:

• Large-scale chicken growing on Maryland’s Eastern Shore generates high volumes of manure that contain more phosphorus than can be used by local crops. Soil test data show that more than 60 percent of soil samples from four Maryland counties had more phosphorus than crops need.
• Maryland’s current rules allow farmers to spread manure on fields where phosphorus is likely to run off and pollute the bay, and they appear not to be solving the problem. In at least one major chicken-producing region, water quality has not improved since Maryland adopted its current rules. In the Choptank River, phosphorus levels have risen by an average of 1.9 percent per year from 2000 to 2008.

The report is particularly timely as Maryland considers updates to its rules on how and when manure and sewage sludge (or biosolids) are spread on the land. In a recent letter, the Senior Scientists & Policymakers for the Bay urged Governor O’Malley to issue rules that treat manure in much the same way as sewage sludge.

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(Posted by Dawn Stoltzfus.)

Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley is generally viewed as a friend of the environment. He has championed initiatives on growth, wastewater treatment, renewable energy, climate change, funding for environmental programs and other issues. He earned a grade of B+ from the Maryland League of Conservation Voters. But, many believe that the Administration has done too little to address Chesapeake Bay pollution from the agriculture sector, which accounts for nearly half of the pollution entering the bay.

A revision of rules regulating the spreading of manure on farmland is long overdue. Here is a recent letter from the Executive Committee of the Senior Scientists and Policymakers for the Bay urging the Governor to issue rules that treat manure in much the same way as sewage sludge.

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