A report released this month by the Environmental Working Group (EWG), Troubled Waters: Farm Pollution Threatens Drinking Water, claims that farm runoff of nitrogen and phosphorus is causing a “cascade of harmful consequences” to drinking water, lakes, and rivers, and calls upon Congress to address remedies for these “potent pollutants” in the new Farm Bill.
The report produced a quick response from The Fertilizer Institute on April 12, which said U.S. farmers are growing corn with record efficiency, but work still needs to be done to help farmers implement conservation and stewardship practices.
EWG, a non-profit environmental organization headquartered in Washington D.C., said in its report that nutrient overload in surface and groundwater is “a significant water quality problem” in the four states that the report focuses on – Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin.
The report says nitrate “is directly toxic to human health,” citing links to blue baby syndrome in infants and an increased risk of thyroid cancer in adults. The report blames phosphorus runoff for “explosive blooms of aquatic algae,” some of which produce the cyanobacteria toxin that can be deadly to pets, livestock, wildlife, and people.
“Toxins produced by cyanobacteria can harm the nervous system, cause stomach and intestinal illness and kidney disease, trigger allergic responses and damage the liver,” the report states. “Even after a brief exposure, cyanobacterial toxins can cause skin rashes, eye irritation and breathing problems.”
The report says the problem is amplified when utilities try to combat these pollutants by treating drinking water with chemical disinfectants such as chlorine. “Treating algal contamination this way gives rise to carcinogenic disinfection byproducts,” the report states, and adds “hundreds of thousands of dollars annually to water utilities’ treatment costs.”
The EWG report claims that USDA economists estimate that removing nitrate alone from drinking water costs more than $4.8 billion a year. “The cost of dealing with algal blooms is particularly daunting,” the report says. “The total capital cost of water treatment that would address cyanobacterial blooms and cyanotoxins, can range between $12 million and $56 million for a town of 100,000 people.”
EWG argues in the report that the best way to confront these pollution issues is to address them upstream at the farm level, and to do so through the farm bill. “This year’s debate over renewing the federal farm bill is a referendum on America’s commitment to protecting our drinking water supplies at the source,” the report says. “With the exception of large animal feeding operations, farm businesses are exempt from the pollution control requirements of the federal Clean Water Act, and few states have authority to compel farm businesses to adopt practices that reduce the amount of farm pollution reaching our rivers, lakes and bays.”
The report presses Congress to take several steps with the new farm bill. First, to reform farm subsidies by ending direct payments, reducing subsidies for farm insurance programs, and refusing to create new farm entitlement programs “that encourage all-out production to the detriment of the environment.” Second, to renew the “conservation compliance” provisions of the 1985 farm bill by re-linking wetland and soil protection requirements to crop insurance programs, and by requiring farm businesses that receive subsidies to update their conservation plans. And third, to strengthen conservation incentive programs and provide adequate funding to expand “collaborative conservation” tools among groups of farmers working together to protect drinking wate