AP Environmental Science
Mr. McDowell
Name:
Date:
What is a CAFO?
A CAFO, or Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation, is an industrial-sized livestock operation.

The quantity of urine and feces from even the smallest CAFO is equivalent to the urine and
feces produced by 16,000 humans.

A CAFO can house anywhere from hundreds to
millions of animals.
 The animals in CAFOs are most often dairy
cows, hogs, or chickens.
 CAFO animals are confined at least 45 days or
more per year in an area without vegetation.
 CAFOs include open feedlots, as well as
massive, windowless buildings where livestock
are confined in boxes or stalls.
 Other terms used to describe a CAFO: mega
farm, animal factory, hog motels, poop factories, industrial farms.
What pollutants do CAFOs produce?
CAFOs produce huge amounts of animal sewage and other pollutants.
CAFO owners and operators spend millions of dollars on technologies
that make it possible to produce massive quantities of milk, eggs, and
meat, yet they resist investing in technologies and practices to properly
treat the wastes that are by-products of this industry:

The amount of urine and feces produced by the smallest CAFO
is equivalent to the quantity of urine and feces produced by
16,000 humans.
 CAFO waste is usually not treated to reduce disease-causing
pathogens, nor to remove chemicals, pharmaceuticals, heavy metals, or other pollutants.
 Over 168 gases are emitted from CAFO waste, including hazardous chemicals such as
ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, and methane.
 Airborne particulate matter is found near CAFOs and can carry disease-causing bacteria,
fungus, or other pathogens.
 Animals frequently die in CAFOs. Their carcasses, often in large numbers, must be dealt with.
 Infestations of flies, rats, and other vermin are commonplace around CAFOs and therefore
around CAFO neighbors.
Often you'll hear owners of CAFOs argue that the wastes produced by the livestock provide nutrients
that help them offset the use of synthetic fertilizers. The sheer amount of wastes produced, however,
often overwhelms the ability of the land and crops to absorb CAFO wastes.
Are there different kinds of CAFOs?
Yes.
One type of CAFO houses livestock in buildings the animals seldom leave. Removing wastes from
these buildings is a major challenge.


Dairy and hog CAFOs often use clean water to wash animal wastes and contaminants from
the buildings into waste-storage structures or lagoons.
Poultry CAFOs use dry-waste systems. The waste falls from animal cages to the floor, where it
is scraped out of the building periodically or collected on conveyer belts and moved to
composting or storage sites.
Another type of CAFO is the feedlot, which keeps the animals outdoors in pens. Here the
manure waste accumulates on the ground, often washing off into nearby ditches and streams.
What's in CAFO waste?
In addition to plant nutrients such as phosphorus and nitrogen, CAFO waste is likely to contain:


antibiotic-resistant bacteria
 hormones
 chemicals used in livestock care
 milk house wastes
 cleaning agents
 ammonia and heavy metals
 silage leachate
millions of gallons of water contaminated by all of the above.
CAFO waste is often stored untreated in gigantic anaerobic waste storage structures or pits for up to
six months. After storage, it is spread on farm fields for disposal. This is where CAFO wastes often
enters surface water.
Nutrients in this CAFO waste can cause bright-green algae blooms in
ditches, streams, and lakes. As these surface-water algae blooms die
off, the oxygen in the water is depleted. What does this do? It can lead
to fish kills. Additionally, drinking-water plants must remove these
nutrients before water is fit for consumption.
Pathogens such as E.coli bacteria, cryptosporidium, and salmonella,
all of which can cause sickness or death in humans and animals, may
be present in CAFO wastes.
How do CAFOs pollute water?
Water pollution is possible at virtually any point in a CAFO's operation.

In the production area, spills, overflows, and tracking of wastes on tractor and truck tires can
cause surface runoff of contaminants.
 Storm water that mixes with manure wastes, silage leachate, or milk house wastes can flow
into drains.
 Pipes or hoses carrying wastes can break or become unattached. Waste storage structures
can overflow or burst.
 Field tiles or catch basins can be installed that drain wastes directly into surface waters.
It may take dozens of trips per day by semis or tanker trucks to dispose of
CAFO waste. These trucks haul the wastes from the production area wastestorage structures to fields that are often many miles away.
One of the main sources of CAFO-caused pollution comes from discharges
of manure and other wastes through the soil into field drainage tiles, which
carry the wastes directly into county drains and streams.
When CAFO wastes are applied to farm fields, water pollution can be caused by over application of
wastes, direct runoff into surface waters, or by traveling through the ground- or catch basins into field
tiles or drainage ditches that discharge directly into surface waters. Tests have shown that waste
applied to the surface of a field can take a little as 45 minutes to reach the field tiles three to four feet
below the surface.
Manure wastes are also sprayed from travel irrigators, trucks, or tractors. This waste can flow
directly into surface waters due to wind, by direct discharge from running over a drain or waterway, or
through malfunctions of the equipment.
Groundwater pollution can be caused by leaking waste storage structures, and improper or over
application of wastes on fields. The use of injection systems for shooting wastes directly into the soil
is encouraged as a method to keep odor from CAFO land application down, however there is
significant concern that this could simply lead to quicker travel time through the soils into field
drainage tiles. Some CAFO owners have converted field drainage tiles into de facto septic systems
by plugging them with gate valves and other devices. These systems at best only delay the pollution
and don't keep pollution from flowing to groundwater. They certainly don't remove pathogens.
Groundwater is difficult to monitor, so the extent and source of contamination are often harder to
pinpoint than surface water contamination.
How do CAFOs impact human health?
CAFOs may cause health effects to their neighbors from pollution damage to the air, land and water.
Over 168 gases are emitted from CAFO waste, including hazardous chemicals such as ammonia,
hydrogen sulfide, and methane.
Hydrogen sulfide poisoning can cause irreversible brain damage, dizziness, headache, nausea, sore
throats, sinusitis, burning eyes, and other illnesses.
When phosphorus and nitrogen are over applied to fields, the nutrients can move through the soil into
field tiles to surface water, or through soil to groundwater and drinking water.
Elevated levels of nitrates in drinking water can cause "blue baby syndrome", a potentially fatal blood
disorder.
Are CAFOs sustainable?
No.
 CAFOs are resource-intensive and unsustainable.
CAFOs animal-raising practices are neither economically viable nor sustainable.
 CAFOs use large amounts of electricity for lighting, equipment, milkers, pumps, and irrigators.
 CAFOs use fuel in tremendous quantities to run tractors, gas motors, and pumps, and to
transport milk, waste, supplies, and chemicals.
 CAFOs use millions of gallons of Michigan's clean fresh groundwater every day to dilute waste
and to wash manure from milking parlors and CAFO barns.

How are CAFOs regulated and permitted?
Federal laws establish minimum standards for the regulation of any activity that causes air pollution or
water pollution. However, through aggressive lobbying by the promoters of CAFOs, federal laws for
the environmental oversight of CAFOs are extremely weak.
Currently, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency provides no regulation of air pollution problems
from CAFOs. Under the Right-to-Know provisions of CERCLA 42 U.S.C. §11001 et seq. (1986). Also
known as Title III of the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA), the
Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act - otherwise known as EPCRA
(pronounced EP-kra) - was enacted by Congress as the national legislation on community safety.
This law is designed to help local communities protect public health, safety, and the environment from
chemical hazards. CAFOs are required to report emissions of some pollutants, most notably
ammonia. This requirement led to disclosure that the largest emitter of ammonia in the country is a
dairy CAFO in Oregon.
The federal Clean Water Act does provide some regulation of CAFOs, although interpretations of the
extent of those requirements are being litigated. State laws must be at least as restrictive as the
federal law, but in Michigan and some other states it has required citizens to bring challenges to
state's delegation under the Clean Water Act to force the agencies to implement the laws. Federal
law requires that any CAFO which has had an illegal discharge into surface waters must obtain a
National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit in order to continue operations.
Several states (including Michigan) now require NPDES permits for all CAFOs, including new ones.
THE ASSIGNMENT
CAFO’s and Nutrient Cycling
After reading the article about CAFO’s, write a well-organized 1-page
essay that explains the following:
-What a CAFO is, and why they are used.
-The kinds of pollution that they create.
-How they handle their waste currently.
-Their relationship to nutrient cycling and nutrient pollution. Be specific
about what type of nutrients.
Their relationship to the concept of Environmental Unity.
How we could fix the problem (not only “NOT EAT MEAT”).