Two Views of the New Phosphorus Tool

There were a couple of competing news stories on the new phosphorus regulations in the Chesapeake Bay news feed today, one from the point of view of the regulators and scientists who provided the information on the regulations, and the second from the point of view of the farmers whose businesses and lives are going to be negatively impacted by the new regulations.  

First, the pro-reg article: Science for Phosphorus Management Tool is solid, say scientists, environmental groups:

...According to federal TMDL data, in 2012 the total phosphorus load to the bay from the state was 3.2 million pounds, while almost 50 million pounds of nitrogen and 1.4 billion pounds of suspended solids make it to the bay each year as well. Farmers wonder why there is a need for them to implement costly regulations to address phosphorus when the overall load is smaller.

Doug Myers, Maryland scientist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, said the numbers may be a little misleading. It takes less phosphorus to create an algae bloom than nitrogen, he said. “Phosphorus is a more powerful nutrient, and it does not take very much of it to make algae bloom happen,” he said.

Also, phosphorus loads from agriculture made up 49 percent of all the phosphorus making its way into the bay in 2012, according to TMDL data. This makes a clear case that agriculture is a major culprit of phosphorus pollution, according to environmentalists.

Myers said there are many local bodies of water in Carroll County that are impaired due to pollution as well, which will benefit as a result of the regulations. Farmers are not the only ones being asked to make changes under the WIP, Myers said.

The state has also mandated stormwater management and wastewater treatment plant upgrades that jurisdictions will have to deal with.

“Across the entire watershed — all kinds of residents, businesses — are seeing increased costs for various things they will have to do for their sector,” he said. “Long story short, farmers are not being singled out.”

Now, from the farmers side: Farmers speak out on latest nutrient regulation:

...In basic terms, many farmers who are now using the organic manure from their poultry houses to fertilize their fields will not only have the expense of hauling that away, but will have to purchase man-made chemical fertilizers and new equipment to enrich their soil.

Some of the concerns raised at the recent farmer briefings include:

• The research by the University of Maryland scientists is still evolving and is expected to be updated again in the next 6-8 months.
• No analysis has been done on the overall impact to the Bay of substituting commercial water-soluble nitrogen for the slow-release organic nitrogen currently used. In a wet spring, like the one experienced in 2013, we could end up with a nitrogen impact on the Bay in the effort to limit phosphorus under the new tool.
• The cost to the state to subsidize the movement of so much poultry litter at one time may be unreasonable with the current budget conditions.
• If implemented under the current schedule, one poultry litter hauler estimated that 450,000 tons of poultry litter will have to be moved to the mid-shore or across the Bay Bridge annually. That’s 18,000 truckloads or 72 trucks every day, 5 days per week.
• Farmers have already made tremendous progress on phosphorus reductions. Through work with Extension researchers, farmers have reduced the amount of poultry litter applied to fields. What started out as 15 tons to the acre decades ago was reduced to 5 tons per acre in 1996. Under the current nutrient management program, most farmers apply at the crop removal rate of 2 tons every 3 years.
• The Chesapeake Bay model does not recognize the phosphorus reductions that have already been made. The earliest the model will change is 2017.
• An organic grower said he will have to take land out of organic production under this new rule because he cannot get organic nitrogen without phosphorus attached to it.
• Phosphorus in the soil is not always plant available. Tissue samples have demonstrated that plants in high phosphorus soils do not have enough phosphorus for optimal growth.
• The anticipated additional costs to farmers for cleanout, replacement fertilizer or new equipment could mean the difference between making a mortgage payment or not – between failure of a business or not. Implementation without additional time to plan will have a meaningful and negative impact on the economy of the entire eastern shore.

All of which is leading up to a hearing on P regulations in Annapolis on Nov. 20.  Expect no one to be happy when it's over.