Enviromentalist now after farms

[victorcharlie]

environmental activists are teaming up with state attorneys general and trial lawyers to bankrupt the nation’s livestock farmers – in the name of saving the environment.

If the situation wasn’t so serious, it would be hilarious.

The activists – including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, and Union of Concerned Scientists – are trying to convince Congress that the nation’s farms should be treated as industrial waste sites and therefore subject to severe penalties under the federal Superfund law. Some state attorneys general, supported by trial lawyers, have filed lawsuits toward the same end.

Why? Because, they argue, animal manure is a hazardous substance.

http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,197884,00.html

[DWTim]

So serious, in fact, that it would (logically) immediately poison and kill everyone that consumes the resultant products. Oh wait...

[Sourdough]

Unfortunately, I feel that things like this is running this country into the ground.  The people in this country are so divided and pulling in differant directions, some of them utterly rediculious, that the government is not going to be able to stand.  Some slick smooth talker will get elected and get groups behind him and take over the government and these very people will think it the best thing.  Then we will become a dictatorship like Cuba.  

  One good thing all the Mexicians will go home.

[NYH1]

What do you call 100 environmental activists at the bottom of the Atlantic ocean.......































......a pretty good start!  :evil:

[williamlayton]

We have some pretty smart folks in this country--they don't think and reason very well--but they are smart.
I have no answer or solution for folks who have poor reasoning skills.
Blessings

[Questor]

I hate to say it, fellers, but farms are point sites for industrial waste and they have largely gotten a "pass" on compliance with pollution laws. I am in a farming family and I know what kind of pollution and runoff there is. There are few rivers and creeks in southern Minnesota farm country that aren't tainted to the point where fish should not be eaten from them. Most can only support rough fish.  The most polluted river in the state, the Zumbro, is in the heart of farm country and is so polluted because of farm run-off. I'm talking corn and soybean farms, not livestock.

Current mainstream farming practice is based on the "better living through chemistry" paradigm of about 50 to 60 years ago: apply pesticides and chemical fertilizers as much as possible.

Ironically, a lot of today's "organic" farmers have discovered that all this chemistry is not necessary and that good results are gotten without it, or with limited application of it.

[Land_Owner]

"Where's the Beef?"  Some environmental "weenies" have built themselves a wooden boat, paid their attorney's to join them for a ride, and invited the "blur the lines" liberal media to join them.  There is no wind, so now they collectively stand on the deck and blow into the sails trying to get underway.  

In Physics, matter is neither created nor destroyed and it has been stated that the "solution to pollution is dilution".  IMO there is no pollution whatsoever in this world, only the concentration of substance in one place.  

It is interesting to speculate what the consentration of "bull" today will morph into tomorrow.  I believe that American Agri-business will prevail.  There is no reason to open a "Pandora's Box" under Superfund in the creation of a list of what is to be and not to be regulated.  Any such list would be inherently flawed.

Land Owner
If it was easy, anybody could do it."[/b]

[victorcharlie]

"Where's the Beef?"  Some environmental "weenies" have built themselves a wooden boat, paid their attorney's to join them for a ride, and invited the "blur the lines" liberal media to join them.  There is no wind, so now they collectively stand on the deck and blow into the sails trying to get underway.  

In Physics, matter is neither created nor destroyed and it has been stated that the "solution to pollution is dilution".  IMO there is no pollution whatsoever in this world, only the concentration of substance in one place.  

It is interesting to speculate what the consentration of "bull" today will morph into tomorrow.  I believe that American Agri-business will prevail.  There is no reason to open a "Pandora's Box" under Superfund in the creation of a list of what is to be and not to be regulated.  Any such list would be inherently flawed.

Land Owner
If it was easy, anybody could do it."[/b]

But the government must control all things.  That's what happens when you have socialism, and that's just exactly what we've got now.......Liberty and freedom are things of the past.

[DWTim]

Current mainstream farming practice is based on the "better living through chemistry" paradigm of about 50 to 60 years ago: apply pesticides and chemical fertilizers as much as possible.

It's that way because we banned all the effective pesticides without a serious study of their long-term effects. No one would use "as much as possible", because that wouldn't be affordable, but we sure use a lot more. It's like those low-flow toilets. They weren't so effective when people flushed them 2 or 3 times to get the waste to go down.

If they're going to deal with the problem, please have some other group do it, not the whacked-out environmentalists who fantasize about the death and destruction of the human race. A quarter of the industrial zoned space in my town is tied up due to imaginary environmental problems. They can't tell us what they are, or what exposure will do, or what the risk is, but they can seal the doors and walk away for decades. And there's no point in arguing with 'em, because they won't accept any type of clean-up but theirs, where presumably an army of pony-tailed forty-somethings dress up in slickers and clean it one square inch at a time with q-tips.

[dave375hh]

Ron White of the Blue Collar comedy Tour summed it up pretty well,...............You can't cure STUPID!

[Land_Owner]

Microbiologists in the latter half of the 1900's used to sample for infinitesimally minute substances.  Their lab reports used to indicate "0.00" as undetectible.  Regulations were promulgated on these two decimal place detectible (or not) amounts.  

Vanishing Zero refers to the ability of analytical instrumentation to push the realm of the immeasurable down to unimaginably small levels. "Zero" keeps getting farther and farther away, both in distance and understanding. It is particularly manifested in the widening gap between instrument detection limits below parts per billion (sub-ppb) and toxicological regimens parts per million (ppm).

In the world of politics, regulation, and legislation, Vanishing Zero affords an excuse to advocate extreme measures to counter indeterminable or even negligible probability of risk. In other words, “If you can detect it to that limit, you should regulate it to that limit.

http://vanishingzero.org/

Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

http://www.law.indiana.edu/uslawdocs/declaration.html

That knife cuts one way, for the organized and against the disorganized.  Special Interests control Government.  Laws are made to give one group a edge over another.  Environmental "weenies" band together like lemmings, but with no cliff from which to leap.

Land Owner
If it was easy, anybody could do it."[/b]

[stimpylu32]

I may be way off base here BUT if you feed enough of anything to a lab rat he will die . even the stuff thst is good for you .   :?  :?

[Mauser]

Great move environmentalists!  Make sure the farmers are fined to death so that they can't make a living on their land and then they'll sell their land and turn it into wal marts or subdivisions.  Talk about unintended consequences!

[WylieKy]

I have family in Denmark that own and run a hog farm.  They ferment the waste and supply the farm with all of it's electricity by using methane. They even sell excess back to the government.  The waste goes through 3-4 tanks and what comes out of the last tank is used for fertilizer. Any excess is dried and burned along with the garbage, which they use to make the hot water for the radiators and faucet use for the farm and household.  They then make cinder blocks out of the ash and sell it to the government for public works or donate it to charity.  Not much room for the enviromentalists to bitch there.

[victorcharlie]

Great move environmentalists!  Make sure the farmers are fined to death so that they can't make a living on their land and then they'll sell their land and turn it into wal marts or subdivisions.  Talk about unintended consequences!

Think about what a T-bone steak is going to cost.......

[stimpylu32]

WylieKy

Intil we can get away from big oil running this country , methane and other alt. fuels will never be used to the extent that they are in Europe and other parts of the world .

They have started to build an ethanol plant here in Lima but the big NYC bank wants them to make x-number of gal. per year or they will not put up the rest of the money to finish it .

The problem is that if the thing dose not get done till sept. they still want a years worth of production .

Sounds to me like someone does not want this plant to run .

[DWTim]

Seems pretty silly to me to ferment tons of manure for a piddly amount of electricity, when the farmers can turn around and sell it for a big profit. That's quite a difference. On the one hand, the Danish government has to subsidize the farms by buying all the remants of the waste, whether there is a market or not. In the USA, there is a big market for the waste that requires no government intervention.

[WylieKy]

They supply all of their own plus sell quite a bit back.  This is a huge operation, thousands of head and a large pig can go 1000 lbs.  As a side note, he also used to own and run a mink farm, but was put out of business by.....gues who?  He was put out of business within a year from when the Danes wore seal fur coats to the winter Olympics.

[DWTim]

Maybe I'm just thick-headed today, but I can't quite grasp what's going on over there in Denmark. Why is the government buying back farm waste, and where is the money coming from to buy that? How come they don't just wind-dry the excess, bag it, and sell it to places that have bad soil?

Aren't they worried about the fact that methane digesters produce up to 40% CO2, but the resultant gas contains about half the energy of LPG? If your car's exhaust had that much CO2, the emissions testers would probably call you a bambi-hater, and throw into a crusher on the spot. And how about the dangers of a colorless, odorless, highly-flamable gas that tends to hug the ground?

If it's for energy independance, that's one thing, but not something we could do (us personally). But it doesn't seem to make much sense from an environmental perspective.



Also, Check this out:
http://www.vincentcorp.com/applications/issue100.html

[WylieKy]

They don't buy the waste, or the gas, they buy the excess electricity the farm generates.  I don't know exactly how it works, as I'm neither an engineer, nor do I speak Danish.  I was getting everything translated to me through my grandfather as his (our) cousin was giving us the tour.

I do know that that part of Jutland is EXTREAMELY protective of their livestock.  We had to put on disposable suits that looked like biowarfare outfits AND get sprayed going in and out of where they kept the pigs.  I think it had something to do with hoof and mouth disease contamination.  So, that may be why they don't sell the waste.  What dried waste they don't use on their own property is burned.

[DWTim]

I believe they just run the meter backwards when they're supplying on the grid. Some states allow that here, but in Connecticut, you can never get lower than zero. Apparently CT Light and Power will terminate your service rather than send you a check.

Interesting stuff, though.