The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it is taking steps to revise wastewater discharge standards applicable to meat and poultry products facilities.
This proposed rule aims to align with the latest scientific insights, utilizing the EPA’s Clean Water Act authority to reduce nutrients and other pollutants discharged by slaughterhouses, as well as meat and poultry processing and rendering facilities, into waterbodies and publicly owned treatment works (POTWs), according to the agency.
Meat and poultry products (MPP) facilities contribute to the pollution of the nation’s waters and POTWs, the agency said. Wastewater from these facilities contains pollutants such as oil, grease, organic material, salts, ammonia and nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus.
The proposed regulation offers three options to revise discharge standards, with the EPA’s preferred option targeting existing facilities discharging directly to U.S. waters.
The preferred option aims to enhance effluent limitations, introducing more stringent controls on nitrogen and, for the first time, phosphorus discharges. It also proposes establishing pretreatment standards for indirect dischargers to control pollutants like oil and grease, total suspended solids, and biochemical oxygen demand.
The EPA said the preferred option applies to around 850 of the 5,000 MPP facilities nationwide.
The proposed regulation’s two additional options would also establish pretreatment standards for nitrogen and phosphorus for some indirect discharging facilities included in the preferred option.
Additionally, EPA is requesting comment on a provision mandating the segregation and management of high-salt waste streams produced at some facilities. Including E. coli bacteria as a regulated parameter for direct discharging facilities is also under consideration.
The EPA estimates that implementing the proposed regulation would result in a reduction of approximately 100 million pounds of pollutants discharged annually by MPP facilities.
Chris Young, executive director of the American Association of Meat Processors (AAMP), released a statement after reviewing the proposed guidelines from EPA.
AAMP expressed appreciation for the EPA’s efforts in safeguarding small business entities, a significant majority of its members. Despite initial apprehensions about potential compliance costs for small and very small processors, AAMP was pleased that the EPA addressed these concerns, minimizing the rule’s impact on these businesses.
However, AAMP remains cautious about the rule’s overall industry impact and suggests that a more extensive collaboration between the industry and EPA, involving data from a broader range of plants, would have provided more comprehensive and common-sense solutions to wastewater concerns.
EPA will accept written comments from the public for 60 days and will also offer two public hearings, an online-only hearing on Jan. 24 and an in-person hearing on Jan. 31. To view the proposed regulation, visit tinyurl.com/mtvcajxk. — Charles Wallace, WLJ contributing editor
