How can these herbicides be so bad?
If you haven’t experienced the effects of persistent herbicides, it is important to know them anyway. Here is an example of the terrible outcomes of having these herbicides in your compost.Green Mountain Compost, part of a waste program of the Chittenden Solid Waste District (CSWD) in Williston, Vermont, experienced first-hand the effects of persistent herbicides in 2012. The operation suffered major losses and found that the cause was Aminopyralid, a potent herbicide used widely in the agricultural industry.
The company actually sold the compost with this herbicide in it, which resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses. They had to respond to and compensate more than 500 customers. Were it not for the municipality, the operation would likely have shut down.
Learning from the past
After the disaster Green Mountain Compost suffered from because of persistent herbicides, improvements had to be made. The product is not marketed in the Northeast but can be purchased online. Also, its patent goes out in 2021. This means that it will likely be more available to consumers and less controlled by manufacturers. Here are some ideas for preventing future losses associated with Aminopyralid contamination in your commercial compost.-
- Use more testing within your facility.
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- The industry needs to focus on increasing the availability of testing as well because it is currently limited.
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- Make sure your waste suppliers know what is in their material. The entire composting process should be secure.
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- Incidents are actually underreported due to the stigma surrounding this issue. This should change so that progress can be made.
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- The EPA needs to understand how big the problem is for the commercial composting industry. The ag industry makes millions of dollars off of herbicides and pesticides, so composters may not be on their radar as much.