Environmental justice groups are suing the California Air Resources Board (CARB) for allegedly failing to consider local impacts from an incentive program for businesses that produce “biogas” fuels from manure at centralized farming operations.
Food & Water Watch and a Central Valley environmental group are among the plaintiffs that filed the lawsuit on Dec. 18 in Fresno County Superior Court, arguing that the state agency’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) failed to recognize that the program could cause public health issues due to future expansions of industrial farming activities in the San Joaquin Valley.
The program aims to provide credits for producers of low-carbon biofuels, including large dairies and other agricultural interests with large manure-management systems, the lawsuit says.
“The effects of avoided methane crediting have been catastrophic, encouraging factory farms across the nation to install digesters and expand operations, thus intensifying their environmental impacts,” the complaint states. “The LCFS amendments drastically increase the already substantial incentive for factory farms to expand their operations. …”
The plaintiffs argue that the new rules will likely lead to increasing numbers of farm animals at large farming operations, causing higher emissions of potent greenhouse gases such as methane and nitrous oxide. These effects pose hazards to humans and nearby environments because nitrates can contaminate groundwater, they contend.
“In California, almost all of the state’s dairy cows are now concentrated in the San Joaquin Valley, severely impacting communities already confronting the dual threats of environmental degradation and economic insecurity,” the lawsuit states.
The plaintiffs say the expansion of intensified farming operations would be a likely impact from CARB’s new fuel standard, leading to the installation of systems such as anaerobic digesters associated with the production of biofuels. In addition, CARB violated the California Environmental Quality Act by failing to require mitigation measures to reduce the impact of expanded farming operations, the complaint says.
A CARB spokeswoman said the board could not comment on pending litigation, but she defended the board’s decision to move forward with its efforts to counter climate change.
“The Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) reduces carbon emissions from transportation fuels used in California,” Lys Mendez said in an email to the Southern California Record. “It is a successful policy tool among California’s portfolio of innovative measures to address climate pollution and improve air quality.”
The amendments approved by the board in November aim to attract private funding to help the state meet its climate-change targets, according to Mendez.
“The amendments channel global, national and local private sector investment towards increasing cleaner fuel and transportation options for consumers, accelerating the deployment of zero-emission infrastructure, and keeping the state on track to meet legislatively mandated air-quality and climate targets,” she said.
But LCFS opponents argue that the new policy will only make the lives of people living in Central Valley communities already affected by “factory farming” more problematic.
“By rewarding methane production on factory farms, the LCFS incentivizes the concentration of animals and animal waste production and exacerbates the negative health impacts of industrial factory farming, including mortality risks, kidney diseases, respiratory conditions, blood pressure elevation and low birth weight,” a news release from the Animal Legal Defense Fund states. “These impacts disproportionately fall on communities of color and low-income communities.”