Farms May Be Exempted From Emission Rules

In a petition hand-delivered to Johnson in 2005, however, the National Chicken Council, the U.S. Poultry & Egg Association and the National Turkey Federation called the ammonia reporting rule "inappropriate, unwise public policy, which does not reflect the nature of poultry management practices, and does not improve environmental or public health outcomes in any way." The groups also said the reports put farms at risk for lawsuits.

Lawmakers from farm states have repeatedly tried to attach provisions exempting farms from emissions reporting. Last March, House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.) and more than 130 lawmakers from agricultural states sponsored a bill that would delist manure as an environmental pollutant under the Superfund law.

The measure came after the cities of Waco, Tex., and Tulsa, Okla., and the state of Oklahoma filed lawsuits charging factory farms nearby with polluting water sources.

Lawmakers who oppose the bill, led by Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and House Transportation Committee Chairman James L. Oberstar (D-Minn.), wrote in a May letter to colleagues that the bill "would protect bad actors" and "eliminate all existing authorities from the Superfund statute that have been used by [cities and states] to protect local watersheds and drinking water supplies."

Peterson responded that "Congress never intended for Superfund to apply to farms, but the judicial system has done just that, threatening the livelihood of farmers and ranchers everywhere."

One point of contention in the dispute involves a conference call with state and local air pollution control agencies, organized by the EPA in the fall of 2006, that discussed lifting the reporting requirements. Becker of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies said that in the call, the association's members told the EPA that the health risks posed by the emissions argued against a blanket exemption.

But when Johnson testified before Congress last year on the proposed exemption, the association said, he did not tell lawmakers of the local officials' opposition. Asked why by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, the EPA responded in writing, saying that the agency "did not interpret the discussion as representing an opposition of state and local air pollution control agencies to our proposed plan."

The EPA said support for the rule change was expressed in 26 "very similar" letters it received from local governments whose emergency responders said they "do not believe such notifications would be of value."

The leadership of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, believing that the letters were part of an industry-orchestrated campaign, asked the Congressional Research Service to review them. In a Jan. 28 report, the service said that most of the letters were identically worded and that they "represent only a small fraction of the 4,491 [local emergency responders] that are included in EPA's database."

On Dec. 28, with Congress away for the holidays, the EPA published a notice in the Federal Register of its plan to proceed with the rule change. The public comment period ends March 28.