Lawsuit criticism misses the mark

There are some pretty stark numbers that you will have to deal with if you want to argue against Bill Stowe and the Des Moines Water Works lawsuit. I will go through only a few below.

At any time now in Iowa, we have some 20 million pigs in confinement buildings. Because of the way those buildings work, and because pig waste is 5 times more polluting than raw human waste, it is like having 100 million people living in Iowa (not the 3 million we have) just walking outside their houses and peeing and crapping. And that 100 million number is just for pigs. We also confine dairy cows, chickens, and turkeys; and most beef cows today are kept in feedlots which act like uncovered confinements. We at least treat human waste.

Simply using no-till as a practice has resulted in new or expanding dead zones in the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico. It turns out that no-till releases 'dissolved reactive phosphorus” from the soil. That phosphorus then runs into rivers and streams and lakes contributing to the problems we see in our waters that affect the Des Moines Water Works and that led to Toledo, Ohio's drinking water problem in August of 2014. How does the Iowa Nutrient Reduction Strategy, or any new future regulation, affect this no-till pollution avenue?

Organic nitrogen has always been in our rivers. But today most nitrogen put on crop fields is synthetic nitrogen manufactured in factories like those being built in Iowa on the Mississippi and the Missouri rivers. In the 10,000 year history of agriculture before World War II, agricultural nitrogen was organic and naturally occurring. Organic nitrogen is much harder for plants to break down than the nitrate form of nitrogen manufactured today. Nitrate nitrogen is in a form readily available for plant uptake and its use is one of the main contributors to the pollution we see in our rivers, streams and lakes.

Between 2008 and 2012 7.3 million acres of mostly grasslands were converted to row crops in the US (this still is ongoing). Southern Iowa followed only North and South Dakota in the number of acres converted. That conversion was and is mostly for corn for ethanol which is a commodity and not a food. Iowa farmers who use cover crops estimate that there are 130,000 acres of cover crops in Iowa. We have 24 million acres just in corn and bean row crops in Iowa and only 130,000 acres of cover crops. That is 0.5 percent.

Pollutants from this industrial ag model are considered 'externalities” by industrial agricultural entities. The public is expected to bear the brunt of the cost, monetarily, human health wise, and environmentally, that these 'externalities” bring. This is the basis of Bill Stowe's 'rate payer's argument.” Ag pollutes the water and you pay to clean it up through ever higher water and sewer bills.

As long as we use this corn and beans, confinements and feedlots post World War II industrial model of agriculture, we will always have unsolvable pollution problems. Fortunately we can, almost overnight, end these pollution problems by adopting crops and cropping systems that exist today that would clean up our agriculture without harming our food or manufacturing needs. But that would take telling the truth and making changes to the farm bill. And that is something that the corporate commodity masters in Iowa have not yet allowed.

We don't need to have a polluting agriculture. You should be asking questions of agricultural leaders, not bashing Bill Stowe and the Water Works lawsuit.

' Bob Watson, of Decorah, is an environmental activist who works in the wastewater industry. Comments: bobandlinda@civandinc.net

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