Does Iowa's New Manure Policy Threaten Water Quality?

Iowa slashed safeguards for water quality this year. Does this new policy threaten local waterways?

A new regulation, which became effective last month, permits manure truck operators to sidestep the water-quality regulations that wastewater operators are bound by.

The rule passed in legislation previously known as HF 583. The law regulates “the control of effluent from animal truck wash facilities, by requiring certain permits, regulating storage and application of effluent, and making penalties applicable.”

The law “allows for the effluent and resultant solids from these operations to be treated as manure rather than industrial wastewater,” The Des Moines Register reported.

According to Republican State Rep. Mike Sexton, the legislation unburdens manure truck operators of cumbersome and unnecessary rules. He wrote in a Messenger commentary:

The biggest change this legislation makes is moving livestock truck wash regulations from the Wastewater Section of the Iowa Code Chapter 455 to the Livestock Section of the Iowa Code 459A. The movement of sections is important for a couple reasons. This allows for the effluent and resultant solids from animal truck wash facilities to be treated as manure rather than industrial wastewater.

Sexton argued that since the manure winds up on farms, and not in waterways, it does not have to be as heavily treated as wastewater.

The treatment of industrial wastewater has regulations that are much more expensive than the treatment of manure. The reason for this is that wastewater from chapter 455 is treated to a level so it can be discharged into waters of the U.S. The effluent from livestock truck washes will be spread on farm fields and never discharged to waters of the state of Iowa.

Environmentalists and locals in Iowa often argue manure should be more strictly regulated in the state. Rivers near Des Moines are highly polluted, according to the Associated Press, with 2013 registering a spike in nitrate levels.

"Two rivers that supply water to 500,000 people in the Des Moines area [showed] nitrate levels spiking to levels that make it unsafe for some to drink, a concentration experts haven't before seen in the fall that likely stems from especially wet weather in recent months," the AP reported at the time.

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