How The Meat Processing Company Covers Its Manure Ponds For Environmental Safety

Handling manure should be done in a manner that does not affect people and the environment. That is why the biggest farm producing hog agreed to change its way of handling manure in over a thousand farms under its label. At Smithfield Farms, the management is putting plans to cover its manure ponds with plastic layers to protect the surroundings.

Inside the meat processing department owned by Smithfield Inc, the manure ponds have been done to handle the hog manure in and around North Carolina where it does not freeze during the winter. In places like South Dakota where lagoons fail to work, the company keeps manure in large pits under the hog houses. The bacteria allow the hog to decompose in the open-air lagoon with the liquid portion sprayed on fields as a fertilizer.

In surrounding areas, these lagoons have elicited debate. Some two decades, the state set laws to block construction of newer processing plants using lagoons. The residents neighboring the processor even went to court, filing lawsuits against Smithfield Farms, for the odor and flies coming from their processing plant. The lawsuits have been determined, and the judges gave a ruling in favor of residents forcing the business to pay millions. The Smithfield China allowed manure lagoon to overflow during Hurricane Florence. The farm made announcements that it will be paying farmer’s to install plastic covers in every lagoon handling effluent in hogs reaching full height in places like Utah, Missouri and North Carolina.

The cover will help to prevent water from entering and capture the bad smell. It is also helpful in capturing methane greenhouse gases. The farm will get the gas and process it to become natural gas used to power and heating. The environmental defense fund helping the farm argues this will cut on the environmental impact and get more than 85,000metric tones of the methane gas yearly. The converted natural gas will be used instead of fossil fuel. It is known that methane traps heat more than any other, and this will be vital in reducing the harmful gas emissions in over 0.7 million homes.

Experts who have been working with the management are in wait for the technical details used to ensure safety. The aim is not only to cover the lagoons and spray the fields. The experts want to see the other waste generated here cleaned and clear the bad smell and stop pollution to the environment.

Get further info by browsing this link -

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/food-processing