Pam Nieberg (April 2005)

The Sierra Club has been working in Solano and Yolo Counties to encourage county officials to carefully consider the impacts of new or expanding large concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOS). These operations are polluting industries and must be strictly regulated to reduce their impacts on the environment and human health.

The Sierra Club has asked Solano County officials not to allow any more large CAFOs, like the nearly 4000-cow Heritage Dairy near Dixon, into the county until strong standards to regulate design, construction, and operation of these facilities are in place. In November 2003 the Heritage Dairy was responsible for a spill of 1.3 million gallons of liquefied animal waste into agricultural drains that empty into the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. This massive spill resulted from pump failure on one of the dairy's waste lagoons. The county required that the dairy owner/operator, Peter Albers, acquire more powerful pumps to help prevent future accidents of this kind.

On February 27 of this year, the Heritage Dairy again spilled animal waste from one of its lagoons. According to a county employee, the spill lasted 12 to 18 hours Sunday night to Monday morning. A worker for the Reclamation District discovered the spill, not the dairy employees. According to a County Environmental Health employee, the discharge was between 5 and 30 gallons per minute. Over 12 to 18 hours, this could equate to several thousand gallons of liquefied animal waste flowing off-site. Like the previous spill, the cause was pump failure. Though Albers had acquired new, more powerful pumps, he had not yet installed them. County officials are very unhappy with the recent spill and the lack of compliance by the dairy operator. On March 1rst the Board of Supervisors discussed the possibility of revoking the dairy's permit.

Mr. Albers received a $1.5 million, tax-exempt bond loan from a state program that provides financing for private businesses to build pollution-control facilities, but he built a system with no alarms, no back-up pumps, and no redundancy in containment to prevent or contain accidental spills from the waste manure lagoons.

A 4000-cow dairy produces as much organic waste as a city of 80,000 people. That is a lot of waste that can seep into our groundwater or end up in our surface waters through accidental spills or leaks. Large dairies also emit millions of pounds of smog-forming gases each year. Toxic gases emitted by large CAFOs contribute to increased rates of asthma and other respiratory diseases in the human population. The impacts of these animal factories on the environment and human health can be severe.

The Solano County Supervisors are continuing to work on new standards to regulate CAFOs to prevent incidents like the Heritage Dairy spills, and to address other impacts on air and water quality from these animal factories. Recent drafts of the two proposed ordinances demonstrate that county officials are finally listening to the public and environmental groups. The new language is much stronger and incorporates many suggestions made by the Sierra Club, neighbors of the Heritage Dairy and other members of the public, and by officials from Solano County cities. Recently, county officials also received a letter from the biotech firm Genentech expressing concern about having large dairies near its Vacaville plant. The company fears that bovine viruses and groundwater contamination from the facilities could pose a hazard to the firm. Genentech is one of Solano County's largest employers.

The Sierra Club is still asking Solano County officials to wait for upcoming new state regulations before finalizing the county ordinances. These state rules by the Regional Water Quality Control Board and the Yolo-Solano Air Quality District are required by new state and federal air and water quality regulations. The regulations currently considered by the Water Board apply to existing dairies, not to new or expanding facilities. Regulations for new or expanding facilities will come later. The Air District has not even begun a rule development process to regulate emissions at new or existing CAFOs.

Due to continuing concerns on the part of the public and environmental groups, the Solano County Board of Supervisors agreed to conduct one or more public hearings in conjunction with UC Davis scientists to discuss such issues as lagoon liners, buffers, and how future state regulations might affect the local ordinances. The first such meeting took place on April 5. A summary of the meeting can be found on page 1 of this newsletter.

Let Solano County officials know your concerns:

1. Contact the Solano County Board of Supervisors and ask for a moratorium on permitting any more large animal factories into the county until the new state air and water quality rules are finalized.
   
2. Insist on strong ordinances with strict guidelines for design, construction, and operation of such facilities and necessary oversight and enforcement.
   
3. Insist on extensive public notice and environmental review for any other animal factories applying to locate in the county. Ask to be put on a list of community members receiving notice of public meetings regarding CAFOs.
   

To deliver your message to all Solano County Supervisors, contact the Clerk of the Board, 675 Texas Street, Fairfield, CA 94533, 707-421-6100, FAX 421-7975.

To receive notices of future meetings on this issue, contact the Department of Environmental Management, 470 Chadbourne Road, Fairfield, CA 94634, 707-421-6765. Attend meetings of the Board of Supervisors (scheduling and agendas).