AUGUSTA — Maine is the primary state within the U.S. to ban using industrial and municipal sewage sludge as fertilizer. The Legislature handed LD 1911 April 15 and Gov. Janet Mills signed it into regulation April 20.
Unfold as a soil modification on Maine farmland over a interval of a few years, the sludge was the supply of widespread contamination from PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), generally known as “ceaselessly chemical substances.” The presence of PFAS has compelled household farms to close down and poisoned consuming water wells. Waldo County farms are amongst these impacted.
In a February press convention to rally assist for the laws, Adrienne Lee of New Beat Farm in Knox spoke alongside her husband, Ken Lamson, and their daughter in regards to the impacts PFAS is having on their farm and their household. Their effectively water examined constructive for the substances at a stage 100 instances above secure consuming water requirements, Lee mentioned.
The federal EPA has set 70 components per trillion because the higher threshold for PFAS in consuming water, whereas in June 2021 the Maine Legislature established an interim state consuming water normal of 20 nanograms per liter for the mixed sum of six totally different PFAS substances: PFOA, PFOS, PFHpA, PFNA, PFDA and PFHxS, in accordance with maine.gov.
New Beat Farm had been rising natural greens, lower flowers and pasture-raised lamb till Lee and Lamson acquired the PFAS outcomes on their property. As soon as they discovered their effectively was polluted with the chemical substances, they pulled all of their merchandise from the market and began consuming bottled water. The state started working with the household to place a filtration system of their effectively.
Different Waldo County farms have since found PFAS of their soil, crops and water. The ceaselessly chemical substances are additionally turning up in native milk, harvested deer and freshwater fish.
“We can not afford to disregard this contamination within the useless hope it’s going to simply go away. We can not go alongside the errors of previous generations to our kids for them to take care of,” Rep. Invoice Pluecker, I-Warren, the lead sponsor of the invoice, mentioned when he launched it. “Passing LD 1911 is important to the prevention of additional contamination. This laws allows us to take decisive motion to assist future farmers and provides our kids secure land, able to rising wholesome meals that may feed Mainers for generations to return.”
Whereas the Maine Division of Environmental Safety started limiting some makes use of of contaminated sludge in 2019, important loopholes remained. Contaminated sludge was nonetheless allowed to be composted, and the ensuing materials was allowed to be bought to farmers, landscapers and residential gardeners. The brand new regulation ends all use of sludge for amending soil and mixing with compost.
LD 1911 confronted opposition from Casella Waste Programs, which operates the Hawk Ridge compost facility that generated PFAS-contaminated compost to be used in Maine from predominantly out-of-state municipal sludge.
Different payments to handle PFAS contamination
One other PFAS invoice that turned regulation this session is LD 2019, which strengthens the state’s plan to section out PFAS pesticides.
As well as, the Legislature on April 25 handed LD 1875, sponsored by Rep. Stanley Paige Zeigler, D-Montville, which is a plan to deal with PFAS effluent in state-owned landfills. Zeigler aimed the invoice notably on the Juniper Ridge Landfill in Previous City, the place leachate from the state-owned facility is contributing to PFAS contamination of the Penobscot River.
LD 1875 requires state-owned waste disposal services to deal with leachate, liquid that has handed by means of matter and accommodates soluble or suspended solids, to cut back the focus of PFAS to the extent potential. The invoice requires therapy to happen previous to its cargo to a wastewater therapy facility or for the leachate to be despatched to a facility that has the required know-how to cut back the focus of PFAS.
The invoice additional requires the Maine Division of Environmental Safety to undertake guidelines to determine know-how necessities, making certain the implementation of these necessities inside three years and for the monitoring of the efficacy of the put in system.
“The impression of leachate from Juniper Ridge coming into the Penobscot River is of serious concern, particularly for the reason that Penobscot Nation is dependent upon the fish within the river,” Zeigler mentioned. “We all know from the dairy farm in Arundel, the personal wells in Fairfield and the ‘don’t eat’ advisory on deer harvested within the communities surrounding Fairfield that PFAS has a long-lasting impression on each the setting and the human physique.”
One more invoice this session, LD 2013, referred to as for aid for affected farmers. In its April 28 bulletin, Maine Natural Farmers and Gardeners wrote, “Maybe essentially the most extraordinary bipartisan assist for taking motion on PFAS is LD 2013, which requires $100 million in direct assist for farmers affected by contamination and established a committee to make sure acceptable allocation of funding.”
MOFGA praised Mills’ signing of the supplemental finances, “which incorporates $60 million in PFAS emergency aid — not all that LD 2013 requested, however nonetheless a vital begin to the fund.”
Data and assist for farmers affected by PFAS, in addition to hyperlinks to associated state authorities web sites, will be discovered at MOFGA.org.
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