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MSU weighs in on digester bill
Michigan lawmakers are considering 15 years of digestate land application research from Michigan State University as hearings continue for pending bipartisan legislation.
Anaerobic Digestion Research and Education Center director Dr. Wei Liao testified this week before the Michigan House Agriculture Committee.
“We have a 15 wells on our southern campus, four of them exactly located on areas with land application,” he says. “We did not see contamination in these wells.”
He says research has also found manure odor has declined by more than 90 percent and E. coli forms are reduced by up to 80 percent.
Michigan Environmental Council’s Megan Tinsley argued against the move.
“If enacted, they would deregulate hazardous waste streams by not requiring a water quality permit through EGLE, if digestate is managed in compliance with the Generally Accepted Agricultural Management Practices or GAMPs,” she says. “True recommendations for this digestate state do not even exist.”
“Michigan could potentially be like #1 in the country for this industry if we could get our permitting in line,” he says.
MSU’s digester is fueled by depackaged food waste and livestock manure from campus farms. When questioned about researching the inclusion of food waste packaging, Liao says U.S. Army approval is needed to disclose related findings.
One of the top concerns from opponents is the impact of allowable mixed feedstocks.
Brownfield Ag News past hearing coverage.
However, at the same hearing, when asked about the depth of the campus wells, Dr. Liao replied that they were 350 to 500 feet deep. Most residential wells near digestate spread are less than 100 feet, and some older wells are in the 35 to 50 foot range. The likelihood of contamination by digestate pathogens, heavy metals, and PFAS is far greater in the average rural residential drinking water well. Drawing conclusions about the safety of digestate spread near drinking wells based on MSU’s very deep well test results is not sound science. It puts the health and well-being of millions of Michigan families at risk. MSU’s digester, while great to tour as an example of how a digester works, cannot be seen as how these systems operate in the real world , where inputs outside of “food waste” are fed to the digester (industrial food processing wash water containing disinfectant cleaners, biofuel production waste, pharmaceutical waste, etc.). Commercial, industrial-scale digester operations will not mirror those of a campus-run research digester. The problem with “food waste” digesters is “food waste” digestate. HB 4257 and 4265 would skirt environmental protections, putting the wishes and convenience of the biogas industry ahead of protecting Michigan residents’ health, the health of our soil, our waterways, and drinking water. We need more protective guardrails on digestate, not fewer. As many digesters move away from manure only to far more varied, ever-changing inputs compared to manure only, the chemical composition of the digestate changes. As a farmer myself, I asked, “Why? Why, on earth, when the industry claims their ‘ organic ‘ food waste digestate has such high monetary value, would they give it away to farmers for free?” Economics. It is far cheaper for them to give it away than to send it to a wastewater treatment facility where it belongs. HBs 4257 and 4265 are a biogas lobbyist’s dream come true, but they will be a nightmare for rural Michigan. Rural Michigan should not be made into a dumpster for the biogas industry’s wastewater.