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MONITORING AND ASSESSMENT OF UTAH CAFOS
Impact/Purpose:
Utah is enacting a highly successful program to reduce water pollution from animal feeding operations. Hundreds of operations have been assessed and classified as AFOs, potential CAFOs, or CAFOs. All of the operations identified as CAFOs have been issued UPDES permits and potential CAFOs are being tracked by the Utah Farm Bureau Federation to ensure that unacceptable conditions are corrected. However, the lack of water quality monitoring of AFOs and CAFOs makes it impossible to fully gauge the effectiveness of regulatory and voluntary programs in improving water quality. In addition, the dearth of data on feedlot pollution is a sort of environmental hazard in itself, since the contribution of animal feeding operations to water quality problems in Utah has never been fully investigated.
The objectives of this project are to: Determine the effectiveness of the CAFO permitting program; - Determine the effectiveness of the voluntary compliance program; - Develop new middle tier criteria; - Analyze BMP effectiveness (future objective) and - Develop Utah Feedlot Risk Index. (future objective)
Description:
A comprehensive water quality monitoring and on-site assessment program will target CAFOs and potential CAFOs. Ten operations that are representative of other CAFOs will be selected, with a special emphasis on operations that are preparing to implement CNMPs or to correct unacceptable conditions. Water quality monitoring stations will be established upstream and downstream of the operations. Water samples will be collected monthly and following major runoff events for a period of two years. On-site assessments will collect information on facility characteristics and management practices. The data collected in the monitoring and assessment program will be analyzed to address the effectiveness of the permitting and voluntary compliance programs in protecting and improving water quality. In addition, the data collected will be used in the future to analyze the effectiveness of BMPs and to develop a Utah Feedlot Risk Index that will assess the risk an AFO poses to water quality. Deliverables include: 1) Determine the effectiveness of the CAFO permitting program; 2) Determine the effectiveness of the voluntary compliance program; 3) Develop new middle tier criteria; 4) Analyze BMP effectiveness (future objective) and 5) Develop Utah Feedlot Risk Index. (future objective). Project Update (6-12-03): Extended until 1/13 04. Monitoring wells placed 100 ft. apart and 3 ft. downgradient from each other. A value of 2 mg/L nitrate MCL. The thickness of the contamination was estimated at 20 ft. Monitoring shows that contamination migrated down-gradient from the area of research. A model of the plume was constructed using Patch 3dExcel and GMS. The model considered an aquifer with a hydraulic conductivity of 35 m/day, a velocity of 0.19 m/day, a hydraulic gradient of 0.005, and a porosity of 0.3. The longitudinal dispersivity of 1.5 m, a transverse horizontal dispersivity of 0.2 m and a transverse vertical dispersivity of 0.01 m. These values are not final and will be modified as field measurements and tracer tests are done. Determination of bacterial filtration rates during transport in the shallow saturated aquifer and during transport from the lagoon linear to the water table in the saturated zone will be conducted this spring.