Secretary Designees Discuss Ag, Environmental Topics
(Continued from Page A 1)
focus will be on strengthening
and growing the economy, “and
farmers know a lot about grow
ing,” he said.
The administration, county
and township governments, and
neighbors are necessary for in
vestment into agriculture and ag
related businesses, he said.
In addressing the environment,
Wolff noted how the focus on nu
trient loading has shifted from
point sources (a specific, discerni
ble location) to non-point sources
(such as parking lots, homes, or
farms).
“With this shift, we need to re
alize that we should approach the
problem in a different way,” he
said.
“We need a change in personal
habits to reshape how and
what people think through edu
cation, technical and financial as
sistance, and enforcement.
“Agriculture must leant how
to balance its role in producing
food and fiber with functioning
as stewards of the land.”
Part of education includes
township officials, he said. “We
think as a whole, township super
visors and farmers are on the
same wavelength,” although he
acknowledged that there were
also areas of disagreement.
Recently the Pennsylvania De
partment of Agriculture (PDA)
set up a tour for. township super
visors to help them understand
how responsible the producers
are, how they work under the re-
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At the recent Ag Issues Forum is, from left, Alan Bair,
Pennsylvania Dairy Stakeholders; Dennis Wolff, secretary
(designee) of agriculture; Karen McGinty, secretary (des
ignee) of the Environmental Protection Agency; and Mi
chael Brubaker.
strictions of laws, and the farms’
impact on the local economy,
according to Wolff.
“We started a dialogue that
needs to continue,” he said.
Wolff noted that the tour has
helped to waylay further regula
tions on concentrated animal
feeding (CAPO) operations.
“We must continue to educate
our society about what we’re
doing,” Wolff said.
According to McGinty, the
EPA will welcome dialogue with
What Do These Farms o
Have In Common
producers facing challenges with
environmental regulations.
“When I see people of good
faith coming to us, people who
are trying to do the right thing,
we try to come to the table to
gether,” she said. “The buzzword
is that we exercise our enforce
ment discretion.”
For producers who see future
requirements that would impose
a burden on their facility, and
come to the EPA with ideas to
meet and achieve those require-
ments with added flexibility from
the EPA, “you will have a part
ner in me with your ideas,” she
said. “If you have a better way,
I’d love to hear it.”
McGinty began by discussing
challenges with nutrient manage
ment and the Chesapeake Bay.
“We need to make sure that
we have a healthy, vibrant agri
culture industry,” she said.
McGinty is concerned “when I
see the magnitude of the chal
lenges of nutrient management
standards producers are going to
need to try to meet.
“I want to find ways in which
we can meet them in a way to
thrive and maybe find new eco
nomic activity.
“Meeting these challenges can
not fall wholly on the backs of
agriculture. The truth is that
there are a myriad of other fac
tors that lend themselves to nu
trient loading in the water.”
To meet these challenges, she
said, she hopes “to get everybody
at the table,” including other
headwater states in addition to
Pennsylvania.
McGinty has been pursuing an
option to transfer the air emis
sions trading paradigm to the
water arena. When meeting nu
trient requirements, there would
be an opportunity to partner with
another business that can reduce
their nutrients more inexpensive
ly, she said.
“I am 100 percent confident
that as we get into the program,
people will see the cost savings
available there and the system
will sell itself.”
A Better Way To Deal
With Cattle Runoff
CLAY CENTER, Neb. Elimi
nating odors from cattle waste run
off is only one advantage of a new,
environmentally friendly system de
veloped by Agricultural Research
Service scientists in Nebraska to
handle animal waste.
Another benefit of the new sys
tem is reduced costs for farmers,
since the nutrients will flow from la
goons onto nearby fields to fertilize
hay.
The feedlot at ARS’ Roman L.
Hruska U.S. Meat Animal Research
Center (MARC) in Clay Center,
Neb., is situated on top of a foothill.
Rainfall runoff from a series of
pens within this feedlot is directed
to a small basin that runs the length
of the pens. The runoff collects in
the basin for a short period of time,
allowing the solid particles to settle.
The runoff is then discharged to a
hayfield, where the water and nutri
ents are “recycled” to help the hay
grow without any additional water
or nutrients.
The retained solids have to be re
moved from the basin once a year.
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Additionally, nitrogen controls
are already in place at power
plants, so McGinty is looking for
ways to encourage the power
plant to run these controls year
round instead of only in times
of high ozone levels, as is the case
now in hopes that “the amount
of reduction achieved would
lighten the load on everyone,”
she said.
McGinty also discussed the op
portunities of biosolid use. She
would like to further develop the
idea of using biosolids as inputs
into biogasification plants, a
clean source of energy, she said.
She is researching using grant
money from the Growing Green
er program to help foot the bill.
CAFOs were also a part of her
agenda.
“Some in the environmental
community are opposed to
CAFOs,” she said. “I tell then
that I part company with them
on that issue.”
According to McGinty, the
EPA has a job to monitor and re
port nutrient pollution, and she
has found that it has been easier
for her to work with operations
that have the capital, technology,
attitude, and resources to change,
she said.
“I think everybody wants to do
the job of maintaining natural re
sources,” she said. “The issue of
biosolids is on many lawmakers
minds.
Biosolids, applied correctly to
fields, “can convert challenge to
opportunity,” she said.
But these solids are spread on corn
fields as fertilizer, thereby ‘recy
cling” them back to the production
system.
Cattle’s bodies cannot utilize all
the nitrogen, phosphorus and other
nutrients contained in their feed,
and the excess ends up in the ani
mals’ manure.
But with the new system, these
underutilized nutrients can be put
to work as fertilizer to help grow the
thousands of acres of com and hay
that are planted each year as food
for the MARC cattle.
This not only saves money on
commercial fertilizer costs, but also
helps keep nutrients such as nitro
gen out of water supplies by reusing
those nutrients as fertilizer, rather
than letting them wash away to
nearby streams or other bodies of
water.
In the three years that agricultur
al engineers have studied the sys
tem, there has been no runoff of ni
trogen or animal wastewater from
the hayfields to the surrounding
area.