Dairies
Managing Waste to Protect Clean Water
California's dairy farmers lead the nation in production and make up the state's largest agricultural sector. They contribute more than $7 billion to the state's economy each year, and produce an enormous amount of milk, cheese, ice cream and other dairy products to feed people around the world. Dairies also produce an enormous amount of manure - more than 65 billion pounds per year. That's about as much waste produced by California's entire human population.
When efficiently utilized, this dairy manure is recycled to fertilize more than 500,000 acres of silage corn and winter forage needed to feed some 2 million dairy cows. In addition, some manure is captured in lagoons and transformed into renewable energy. However, excess manure, in liquid form, can run off fields and pollute local waterways and groundwater with nitrates and salts.
Already, some communities in California's Central Valley are living on bottled water because of nitrate pollution, which may come from synthetic fertilizer, animal feedlots, septic systems and other sources, as well as from dairy waste. The risk of nitrates in surface and groundwater from many different sources threatens the quality of drinking water for millions of Californians.
In light of this and other environmental health risks, California dairies are heavily regulated. Federal, state and local rules regulate how they manage manure, as well as their air emissions and water discharges. And, these regulations are intensifying. At a time when dairy farmers face rising costs and low milk prices, the cost of regulatory compliance can put additional financial pressure on dairies.
Our Role
Sustainable Conservation finds ways that dairy farmers can protect clean water cost-effectively in their day-to-day operations. We see the opportunity for them to integrate environmental protection into their farming practices. In partnership with dairy farmers, government agencies and environmentalists, we find and demonstrate technologies and practices that simultaneously protect clean water, yield agricultural benefits and make economic sense to implement. We provide practical guidance and resources so dairy farmers can make sensible choices and stay in business.
Our work includes:
- Improving nutrient management: Sustainable Conservation promotes farming practices that use manure nutrients efficiently to fertilize crops while protecting local waterways and groundwater.
- Promoting biological wastewater treatment system: In partnership with California Polytechnic State University (Cal-Poly), Sustainable Conservation has managed the building and testing of a biological wastewater treatment system that utilizes naturally occurring microorganisms in dairy wastewater to reduce nitrogen levels, thereby reducing the risk of excess nutrients polluting water sources.
- Facilitating on-farm water quality projects: Sustainable Conservation oversaw State grant funding for dairy projects that improve wastewater management.
- Accelerating best practices: In partnership with American Farmland Trust, Sustainable Conservation co-sponsors the Best Management Practices (BMP) Challenge, which gives dairy farmers the chance to try out beneficial nutrient management practices in their own operations risk-free - because the program reimburses them for any potential reduction in their crop yields.
- Turning manure into energy: Sustainable Conservation continues to lead the charge for more biogas digesters on California dairy farms - a technology that traps methane (a potent greenhouse gas) from dairy manure and converts it into biogas, which can generate electricity or power vehicles.
- Education and outreach: Sustainable Conservation hosts workshops and on-farm demonstrations to give dairy farmers the concrete information they need in order to implement environmentally beneficial practices. We also present important new studies and trial results at industry events, distribute a newsletter and published a respected field guide on nutrient management.
Since the inception of Sustainable Conservation's Dairies Program in 2000, hundreds of dairies have implemented these practices on their farms and more than 1,000 dairy farmers have completed an environmental stewardship and certification course designed in part by Sustainable Conservation. We continue to expand our work throughout California. More and more dairy farmers understand the value of integrating environmental protection into their farming practices.