4
Your Fellow Food Champions Speak Out!
Reasons Why Factory Farm Gas is a Bad Idea
Senator Cory Booker from a recent Livable Future LIVE event (fwwat.ch/LFLfarmbill)
Factory farms produce millions of tons of manure and waste every day. Big energy companies say they can turn this waste into gas, which they falsely market as green. Here are some reasons why it’s a bad idea.
We can make real progress, to start to transform our broken food
system and shift subsidies away from these factory farms and toward farmers that are growing healthy foods and using regener- ative practices. Everyone deserves access to healthy, affordable food that’s good for them and good for our environment. We can empower farmers and farm workers and protect our environment. This is why I am so proud to have Food & Water Watch’s support on these issues.
Factory Farm Gas Is a Dirty Energy Source Burning factory farm gas releases CO2 and other pollutants like ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, and nitrogen oxides. It’s transport- ed through pipelines that can leak vast amounts of methane. Factory Farm Gas Takes Money Away from True Renewables Factory farm gas is created in anaerobic digesters, which are incredibly expensive. Most rely on government subsidies to be built, funneling millions of taxpayer dollars to factory farms instead of to actual clean energy projects, like wind and solar. Factory Farm Gas Won’t Reduce Environmental Hazards Factory farms often spread untreated waste onto fields as a common practice, resulting in runoff that pollutes our water and harms wildlife. When anaerobic digesters produce gas, they leave behind digestate, a concen- trated form of manure and other pollutants. Digestate is also commonly spread on fields, leading to similar environmental hazards. Factory Farm Gas Adds Injury to Environmental Justice Communities Factory farms disproportionately build their facilities near low-income communities and communities of color, knowing that many residents don’t have the resources or politi- cal power to stop them. Adding gas produc- tion to these farms adds insult to injury.
Iowa dairy farmer Francis Thicke commenting on our report, The Economic Cost of Food Monopolies: Dirty Dairy Racket (fwwat.ch/DairyRacketReport)
Food & Water Watch has done a great job of describing today’s dairy crisis. They are right on target that we need to stop the monopolization of dairy markets, stop the proliferation of unsustainable mega dairies, and implement a supply-control system for dairy production in the U.S. Without supply manage- ment, small and mid-size dairies cannot survive.
4
5 | FALL 2023
Made with FlippingBook. PDF to flipbook with ease