The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is considering a rule to establish new water pollution control standards for slaughterhouses and rendering facilities discharging waste into U.S. rivers, lakes, and streams, a leading cause of the nitrogen and phosphorus pollution that fuels toxic algal blooms and “dead zones” throughout the country.
That is why we are calling on the agency to establish the strongest possible water pollution standards for the discharge of all regulated pollutants in slaughterhouses and rendering facility wastewater.
EPA has proposed three options to this problem. It is imperative that we let them know that only the most protective option will suffice.
Specifically, EPA must:
Follow the requirements of the Clean Water Act and modernize badly outdated technology standards
Adopt the pollution standards included in proposed rule Option 3, which included limits on 133 direct dischargers and nitrogen, phosphorus, and other harmful pollution limits on an estimated 1,485 facilities that discharge to municipal sewage treatment plants,
Establish a deadline for compliance with new rules as soon as possible and, at a minimum, no later than three years as required by the Clean Water Act, and
Provide additional, meaningful opportunities for impacted communities to engage in the rulemaking process through local, in-person hearings, not just online and in D.C.
Now is the time to finally address this serious, well-documented source of industrial pollution that endangers clean water and safe communities. We can not afford further inaction or half measures.
