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The Student News Site of Northern Illinois University

Northern Star

The Student News Site of Northern Illinois University

Northern Star

Macron to get hybrid car as France steps up climate fight

February 12, 2020

PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron's government announced a raft of plans Wednesday to curb its carbon emissions, including getting a new hybrid-engine armored car for the French leader.Other new steps include an annual bonus of 200 euros...

Push to scale back US environmental law draws ire at hearing

By JAMES ANDERSON | February 11, 2020

DENVER (AP) — The Trump administration on Tuesday hosted the first of two hearings on its proposal to speed energy and other projects by rolling back a landmark environmental law. Opponents from Western states argued the long-term benefits of keeping...

Global energy-related carbon emissions flat in 2019

February 11, 2020

BERLIN (AP) — Global energy-related emissions of heat-trapping carbon dioxide remained steady last year, with declines in rich countries balancing out a rise in poor nations, according to data published Tuesday.The International Energy Agency said emissions...

Amid uncertainty, French wine industry puts itself on show

By THOMAS ADAMSON | February 11, 2020

PARIS (AP) — France's big wine industry, shaken by U.S. President Trump’s painful tariff hikes and the threat of climate change, is hoping to re-energize global interest in its products with a big trade fair in Paris.Two thousand winemakers - including...

Daimler profits slump as auto industry comes under pressure

By DAVID McHUGH | February 11, 2020

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Daimler AG, maker of Mercedes-Benz cars, saw profit slump in 2019 and turned in a loss for the fourth quarter, underlining the pressures on the auto industry from economic headwinds and the need to invest in electric cars to...

Africa shouldn’t need to beg for climate aid: Bank president

By ELIAS MESERET | February 11, 2020

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) — Africa shouldn’t have to beg for help in addressing climate change, the president of the African Development Bank said Tuesday, adding that polluting global powers “have to pay.”Akinwumi Adesina told The Associated...

Trump calls for slashing funding for toxic Superfund cleanup

By ELLEN KNICKMEYER | February 10, 2020

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump called Monday for slashing funding for the Superfund hazardous waste program, even as the backlog of clean-ups has grown around the country for lack of money.The $113 million in Superfund clean-up cuts are part...

Pope to visit Italian region poisoned by toxic waste dumping

By NICOLE WINFIELD | February 8, 2020

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis will mark the fifth anniversary of his ecological manifesto by visiting a southern Italian region where decades of toxic-waste dumping by the mob have polluted the environment and sickened its people.The diocese of Acerra...

Administration ends antitrust probe of 4 automakers, Calif.

By MARCY GORDON and MICHAEL BALSAMO | February 7, 2020

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has ended its antitrust probe into a deal between California and four of the world's biggest automakers, after failing to find that the companies' conduct violated the law.The Justice Department's investigation,...

Accusations follow EPA’s ouster of California regional boss

By ELLEN KNICKMEYER | February 7, 2020

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency abruptly pushed out its top regional official for California and other points West, touching off an unusual public dispute between the two over the reason why.Mike Stoker, the EPA’s chief for California...

Trump administration to open free-trade talks with Kenya

By DARLENE SUPERVILLE, TOM ODULA, and CARA ANNA | February 6, 2020

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration announced Thursday that it intends to open free-trade talks with Kenya in pursuit of what would be the first trade agreement between the United States and a nation in sub-Saharan Africa.The announcement followed...

Factory farms provide abundant food, but environment suffers

By JOHN FLESHER | February 6, 2020

AKRON, Iowa (AP) — In recent years, Fred Zenk built two barns housing about 2,400 hogs between them — long, white, concrete-and-metal structures that are ubiquitous in the Midwestern countryside.

The Iowa farmer didn’t follow state requirements to get construction approval and file a manure disposal plan. But Zenk’s operation initially flew under the radar of regulators, as have many others across the United States because of loopholes and spotty enforcement of laws intended to keep the nation’s air and water clean.

Beef, chicken and pork have become more affordable staples in the American diet thanks to industry consolidation and the rise of farms with tens of thousands of animals. Yet federal and state environmental agencies often lack basic information such as where they’re located, how many animals they’re raising and how they deal with manure.

The animals and their waste have fouled waters. The enclosures spew air pollutants that promote climate change and are implicated in illnesses such as asthma. The stench of manure — stored in pits beneath barns or open-air lagoons and eventually spread on croplands as fertilizer — can make life miserable for people nearby.

For most of the nation’s history, meat and dairy products came from independent farms that raised animals in barnyards, pastures and rangeland. But the system now is controlled by giant companies that contract with farmers to produce livestock with the efficiency of auto assembly lines inside warehouse-like barns and sprawling feedlots.

The spread of corporate animal farms is turning neighbor against neighbor in town halls and courtrooms. Iowa, the top U.S. producer of swine and egg-laying chickens, has been a major battleground.

“It’s a fight for survival,” said Chris Petersen, who still raises pigs in outdoor pens.

Michele Merkel, a former EPA attorney who quit over the agency’s reluctance to punish polluting mega-farms and is co-director of the advocacy group Food & Water Justice, said the industry “has avoided any effective regulation and accountability for a long time.”

Industry groups say there are plenty of regulations and livestock agriculture is simply adapting to improved technology, equipment and methods.

“We’re responding to what the market is giving us,” said Brady Reicks, whose company runs numerous large hog structures in northeastern Iowa. “We’re doing it responsibly; we’re passionate about doing it. It increases growth in rural Iowa and it helps feed the world.”

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency began to count the nation’s factory farms during the Obama administration but retreated when industry groups sued. Instead, the agency uses state data to produce annual statistics about only the biggest operations.

As of 2018, the nationwide EPA tally was about 20,300 — a roughly five-fold increase over nearly four decades.

Yet it’s a tiny fraction of all confined animal operations. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates there are more than 450,000, most too small for inclusion in the EPA count.

Iowa has 80 million farm animals and 3 million people. Yet in 2017, regulators didn’t know how many livestock farms were in the state. Under federal pressure, the Department of Natural Resources pored over aerial photos, discovering 4,200 previously unknown facilities.

Zenk’s Plymouth County farm was among them.

“We knew nothing about his operation,” said Sheila Kenny, an environmental specialist with the state agency.

Zenk acknowledged breaking the rules but said no harm was done. He paid a $4,500 fine.

“You think you can get by with something once in a while and you can’t,” he said, strolling among his barns, tractor and feed bins.

To state regulators, such discoveries mean the system works. Critics say the Iowa experience shows how easily livestock operations can escape detection.

Putting thousands of animals in one enclosure produces huge amounts of manure. Unlike human sewage, which is treated and released to waterways, animal waste is stored, then spread on croplands as fertilizer.

Farmers insist they are careful.

“We take soil tests, we decide how much manure it needs and that’s how much we apply,” Reicks said.

Environmental groups say fields often can’t handle the volumes of manure produced, leading to runoff. Such pollution is exempt from regulation under the 1972 Clean Water Act, even though agriculture is the biggest contaminator of rivers and streams, according to the EPA.

In Emmett County, Iowa, small farmer Gordon Garrison sued a nearby operation with 4,400 hogs, contending manure from its croplands fouls a creek that runs through his property and feeds the Des Moines River.

“They’re using me for a waste disposal site,” Garrison said.

Livestock farms generate about 70% of the nation’s ammonia emissions, plus gases that cause global warming, particularly methane.

Yet they aren’t required to get permits under the Clean Air Act. The government hasn’t decided how to measure emissions from barns, feedlots, storage lagoons and croplands.

And under President Donald Trump, EPA has exempted livestock operations from requirements under other laws that industries report significant releases of air pollutants including ammonia and hydrogen sulfide.

Critics say yesteryear’s barnyard whiffs were nothing like the overpowering stench from today’s supersized operations.

“You don’t want to be anywhere near them,” said Brad Trom, a crop producer in Minnesota’s Dodge County, who lives within three miles of 11 structures housing 30,000 swine. He says he’s been staggered by powerful odors barreling across his fields.

Farmers say they’re trying to reduce the smells but contend they’re a normal part of country life.

“I’ve never lived on a farm that didn’t have nature’s fragrances on it,” said Gary Sovereign, a swine producer in Iowa’s Howard County.

Research has linked proximity to factory farms to various health risks. But scientists acknowledge it’s nearly impossible to pin someone’s illness on a certain polluter.

Jeff and Gail Schwartzkopf say after a hog mega-barn was built a quarter-mile from their home in northern Iowa, they developed burning and itching eyes, throat soreness and body rashes. They fear the manure odors are making them sick and ruining their home.

“Nobody’s going to want to buy it. We’re stuck,” Jeff Shwartzkopf said

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Follow Flesher on Twitter: @johnflesher

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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