Please consider boycotting Cabot Cheese and other Cabot products

[cali]

I've debated posting this. I live near Cabot and it's a pretty vital part of the economy but this just sucks in a major way. Although I was aware that Cabot spread liquid whey waste on fields and on site, I had no idea that they spread the chemicals they use to clean machinery on fields. They refuse to build a wastewater treatment plan and want to expand spreading chemicals.

MARSHFIELD - Barry Irish said he once worked at Cabot Creamery and can remember the chemicals that were used to clean equipment at the cheese company's plant. He's shocked some of those same chemicals are in wastewater the company spreads on farmers' fields in northern and central Vermont to dispose of excess fluids created in the cheese making process.

"The chemicals we used to clean with are being spread out on fields. What's that going to do to the animals? It's not going to grow stuff; it's going to kill stuff," Irish said.

Irish was one of about 40 people who attended a public hearing Wednesday night regarding Cabot Creamery's request to expand the number of fields where it can spread wastewater. The hearing was a chance for officials from the Agency of Natural Resources to get input from the public.

Irish was one of several people opposed to Cabot's wastewater disposal practice, but there are also residents who think the practice is harmless and helps irrigate and fertilize farmers' fields.

snip

http://www.timesargus.com/article/20091203/NEWS/912039999

[skygazer]

1. I'm really surprised they got a permit to do that

Vermont has always been pretty forward ecologically. Disappointing.

[CoffeeCat]

2. Just a note...

I am an avid couponer. I know it's geeky, but I belong to a coupon club. I've never
noticed any Cabot Cheese coupons until about a month ago when I found some. They could be having
financial troubles if they're spending more on marketing and offering these price
breaks. I'm not sure why, but it is worth noting that they hadn't done this
until very recently.

[Better Today]

3. Though it might be an issue for ground water seepage, it isn't

necessarily a bad thing. Ammonia for example is fine for gardens, so is soap. I think you are wrong on this and that they are probably not hurting a darn thing.

Probably much ado about nothing. Honestly.

[MattBaggins]

10. They are most likely using "in place" cleaning methods

with non toxic detergents, hydroxide or ammonia in very low quantities. They most likely have a steam system for actual sterilization.

This may be much ado about nothing.

[hedgehog]

14. I'm thinking that spreading a little hydoxide on the fields may counteract the acid rain.

[MattBaggins]

16. Yes but no one would do that

They would treat it with a weak acid to bring the pH back within parameters.

[hedgehog]

21. I've spread lime around my maple trees to counteract for acid rain.

I'm thinking that the diluted hydroxide is a weak base that counteracts acid.

[FBaggins]

17. Much ado about nothing indeed

Or rather... there's nothing at this point to hint that it's anything more.

Note that the OP also expressed concern about spreading the "whey waste" on the fields? There's nothing wrong with that at all. Just adding the word "waste" to something doesn't make it dangerous.

[Better Today]

31. Gleaned from the article, they have to be assured that all cleaners are

fully removed from the equipment after cleaning, therefore a lot of otherwise wasted water with very dilute amounts of cleaners (again unspecified, but I agree with you, it can only be mildly toxic if its used on food prep) are then sent to water farmland.

I could see them needing a treatment plant consideration if the water was going into the drinking system (though my understanding is that the current treatment plants use a butt load of chems to clean our water prior to reuse or discharge). But for watering farmland, this is a non-issue in my mind at this time.

[hedgehog]

4. Is there any information on the specific chemicals involved?

After all, water is a chemical.

We'd all be appalled at sulphuric acid or caustic soda being dumped in our waterways, but these chemicals are often used to treat waste water to bring the pH back to neutral before returning water to a lake or river.


Cabot really is a co-op (http://www.cabotcheese.coop) , I know some of the people who sell their milk to them.

[cali]

9. Yes, it's a coop but it doesn't have a stellar record environmentally speaking

abot Creamery incurred two major pollution incidents resulted in penalties from the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources. In 2000 Cabot Creamery was cited for "indirect discharge permit and land use permit."<7>

In 2007 Cabot Creamery paid a $50,000 fine with an additional $50,000 funding of a Supplemental Environmental Projects.<8> On November 27, 2007, Cabot Creamery agreed to plead guilty to violating the Clean Water Act after an ammonia spill killed thousands of fish in the Winooski River, in July 2005. The spill destroyed all aquatic life for five and a half miles.<9>

[hedgehog]

18. The spill was a result of well meaning ignorance, not malevolence:

The ammonia was discharged when employees were replacing a 30-year-old cooling system. Any of the refrigerant spilled during the changeover should have been contained by the plant's "closed-loop" wastewater processing system. But during the early morning hours of July 17, 2005, a Sunday, an employee placed a 55-gallon water drum being used to absorb ammonia vapor from the cooling system on the edge of the road, outside the wastewater system's collection area. The U.S. attorney's office said that over the next several hours, the employee and his supervisor drained ammonia from the refrigeration system's condenser into the drum through a plastic tube while water was left running into the drum from a hose. The ammonia-laden water overflowed into a storm drain and from there, into the river.

The next day, when employees found that a pipe on the new unit needed to be replaced, they repeated the procedure used Sunday and the drum overflowed again. MacDonald characterized the accident as "a fluke" that resulted from "a very conscientious, long-term employee thinking he was doing everybody a favor" by moving the water drum to a spot where the smell wouldn't bother anyone.

Immediately after the incident, Cabot instituted new protocols for handling hazardous materials. Jim Pratt, Cabot's senior vice president for operations, said all the refrigeration equipment has been totally enclosed, so if there were any accidental spillage in the future, it would be contained within the plant's water reclamation system.

In addition, a select group of maintenance technicians has received a minimum of 24 hours of training on how to maintain ammonia refrigeration systems, and each has passed a test on it. No other employees are authorized to work on the system, Pratt said. The lead technician has received more than 100 hours of training, he added, and the whole group will receive refresher trainings every year.

http://www.timesargus.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071128/NEWS01/711280346

My reading of this is that the drum was originally in a diked area where any overflow would have been contained, but that someone on back shift moved it outside without telling anyone.

Other articles indicate that it took only 3 gallons of ammonia to cause the damage.

[rd_kent]

20. You did not answer the question. What chemicals are being used?

And what are the concentrations and effects?

[zipplewrath]

5. What are the "cleaning chemicals"?

I'm curious what they are. The reason being that chemicals used on food processing equipment usually are pretty benign. It could be ammonia for example, which is already spread on farmers fields. And the article specifically states it is highly diluted precisely because it is used on food processing equipment.

[Cant trust em]

6. This will be an easy one since I've never heard of it.

Your wish is my command.

:)

[arcadian]

7. What? A crack in the Utopian shell?

:rofl:

[cali]

12. utopia? the only person claiming that is you.

pathetic.

[arcadian]

22. The Kingdom?

Isn't that what you call it?

[cali]

38. That's the name, genius- The Northeast Kingdom

From wiki:

The Northeast Kingdom is a term used to describe the northeast corner of the U.S. state of Vermont, comprising—approximately—Essex, Orleans and Caledonia Counties. In Vermont, the written term "NEK" is often used. The term is attributed to the late George D. Aiken, former Governor of Vermont (1937-1941) and a U.S. Senator at the time of a 1949 speech, the first recorded use of the term. The area is often referred to by Vermonters simply as "The Kingdom."

The Northeast Kingdom is bisected by Interstate 91/U.S. 5. On the east it is bordered by the Connecticut River. The highest point is Jay Peak at 3,681 feet (1,122 m).<1>

The NEK encompasses 56 towns and gores, with a land area of 2,027 square miles (5,250 km2), about 21% of the state of Vermont.<2> Newport is the single incorporated city in the tri-county area.

The area is a year-round recreation destination known for skiing, fall foliage viewing, and production of maple syrup .

As of 1997, 80% of the Northeast Kingdom was covered by forest.<3> 59% was northern hardwood, 29% spruce or fir.

The Northeast Kingdom has been listed in the North American and international editions of "1,000 Places to See Before You Die", the New York Times best-selling book by Patricia Schultz. In 2006, the National Geographic Society named the Northeast Kingdom as the most desirable place to visit in the country and the ninth most desirable place to visit in the world.<4>

<snip>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_Kingdom

[MattBaggins]

8. What chemicals are they talking about?

With out knowing exactly what they are using this story is quite meaningless.

[rd_kent]

11. So you want a boycott of a company without really knowing what they are doing?

I mean, it seems that a reasonable question is "What kind of cleaning products are being used?" and perhaps "What are the concentrations and side effects of spreading those products in fields?"

A boycott, when done by many, can have serious effects on a company and should not be taken lightly. You call for one yet really provide nothing more than an article you read as the reason. Where is your investigation, your proof, your evidence? Without any of that, this is just an emotional, knee-jerk reaction on your part, right?

[cali]

no, it's not.

I live here. I remember what happened to the river when they spilled Ammonia into it.

[rd_kent]

15. So what? Without anything more than this article, you are just spewing nonsense.

I want to give you the benefit of the doubt, but there are TOO MANY unanswered questions to justify a boycott. An ammonia spill in the past has nothing to do with why you called for a boycott. Give me the details on what is really going on.

[Skidmore]

13. I can't afford Cabot products, although I see that our local coop

that sells organic products carries them.

[MattBaggins]

19. Cabot cheeses were my indulgence before my heart attack

Their Hunters Seriously Sharp Cheddar was to die for... and I almost did. I guess eating pounds of cheese a week and smoking for 20 years wasn't so smart.

No more cheese these days.

[young_at_heart]

26. Mine too---until my gallbladder objected

I've been buying Cabot's "Extra Sharp" for years----it's great melted with corn chips. Last week I had to have my gallbladder removed (lots of pain involved). I'm convinced I ate too much cheese over the years and I will never have it again!

[kestrel91316]

23. Don't they clean the equipment with acetic acid? That's vinegar.

Anybody who thinks that's NOT ok to spread on fields has got major screws loose.

[MattBaggins]

28. I doubt vinegar

I worked in drug manufacturing with biologics and we used sodium hydroxide. Since Cabot is working with milk fats I would guess that they use it as well. Sodium hydroxide is very effective cleaner especially for fats and lipids.

[hedgehog]

32. Sodium hydroxide is really funny stuff. Get some concentrated

sodium hydroxide on your skin and you'll find a nasty deep burn later on ( you won't feel any pain). It is also used in very small amounts in toothpaste to counteract the acids in your mouth.

As I noted above, unless we know what chemicals are being sprayed and what concentrations are involved, we can't judge the hazard.

[kestrel91316]

34. Oh, that's right. Well, knowing the chemistry of soapmaking, when you mix

sodium hydroxide (lye) with fats, you get SOAP (saponified fat), which is environmentally benign and biodegradable.

Soapy wash/rinse water is innocuous and is no differenct from greywater from kitchen drains.

[rd_kent]

24. Cali, after reading the linked article and the subsequent postings, I find that I will NOT boycott.

You seem to be on a mission here and are finding wrongdoing where there really may not be any at all. You repeated attempts to ignore the critical questions posed to you regarding this company by myself and others in this thread lead me to believe that you have an agenda or are so ill-informed and ignorant of the true situation that you should lead not a boycott, but jack and shit...and jack just left town.

I will happily retract my statement and sarcasm if you would provide answers to the questions being asked of you.........

[rd_kent]

25. Oh, and an UNREC too....

[trotsky]

27. Glad I read thru the whole thread first.

Otherwise I probably would have given it a Rec.

[hedgehog]

29. I tried to follow this story through old articles. I'd have to say that the

process probably smells terrible since in effect most of what they are spraying amounts to sour milk. One article claimed that there are antibiotics in the spray, antibiotics that are in the spray because they are in the milk. I have no idea if that charge is accurate, but I'd be more worried about the antibiotics in the milk than in the spray!

Other articles make noises about benzene or other petrochemicals. The chemicals used in cleaning dairy pipes have to be food safe. I doubt there are benzenes in the waste water.

In my mind, if the fields can absorb the spray, then this is an accepted and acceptable dairy practice. Some of the waste water goes to farmers who use it to dilute the manure in their lagoons for field spraying. Again, this is smelly as hell but perfectly reasonable if it is done properly. The practice of returning manure to the fields that the animals have grazed or to the fields where their feed was raised makes sense to me. The real problem we face is that industrial farms truck in feed from miles around to animals confined in barns and then spray the manure on a very limited area and rapidly saturate and ruin the soil.

One of the articles mentioned a woman discussing the cancer cases in her town. I suspect that she may be right that the cancer cases are due to environmental exposures, but that the exposures come from packaging, auto exhaust, power plant exhaust, food additives etc rather than the spraying by Cabot.

There is a hint of conflict between family dairy farmers and people who have moved into the area who love the rural setting but don't want the smells sometimes associated with farming.


Edit: just idle speculation, but there are indications that the flow in the local river varies from season to season. In that case, treating the waste water and returning it to the river may be more disruptive than spraying it on fields. A constant flow to the river may result in most of the river water being waste water and being high at times when it should be low flow. Spraying the fields passes the water slowly back to streams and rivers.

[trotsky]

30. I think you nailed it.

There is a hint of conflict between family dairy farmers and people who have moved into the area who love the rural setting but don't want the smells sometimes associated with farming.

NIMBY

[rd_kent]

33. Yup, and not a word from the OP, cali, about all the evidence that this is NOT an issue.

[cali]

37. I'm right here and I'll

admit that it's not clear cut, but I did just talk to a farmer friend of mine about it and his take is that it's not something he'd ever want on his fields.

[hedgehog]

40. The standards to obtain an Organic label are very, very strict.

It's entirely possible for the stuff being sprayed on the fields to be relatively benign gray water and also be banned from use on organic farms. I think organic gardeners got burned by sludge from sewage plants, so they are now extra cautious.

[rd_kent]

41. WTF does that mean?

You want a boycott of a company based on what a friend thinks is not good?

[hedgehog]

43. Easy there - this is a discussion site, not an echo chamber. If you don't have all the

facts, what Cabot is doing can look really bad. Cabot already has a bad reputation in some quarters because of the ammonia spill. My reading is that that incident was due to employee error rather than deliberate dumping.

Organic farmers will be suspicious of this spray process because it looks like a combination of theover-spraying of manure on fields by factory farms and spreading sewer sludge as compost. A lot of farmers got burned when it turned out that sewage sludge contains heavy metals.

Since the news reports have devolved into a lazy he said/she said, it's hard for someone to judge what's happening unless you're familiar with dairy operations. If someone told me that Cabot is spraying benzene, and I don't know any different, I'd be calling for a boycott, too.

If Cabot isn't overloading the fields and if the stuff is free of harmful chemicals (or chemicals in harmful amounts/concentrations), I don't see a problem.

[graywarrior]

35. I never use dairy for any reason EVER.

Stopped eating it in 1994. Ever since, my health improved. No more cysts, no more endometriosis, no menstrual cramps. Avoided a hysterectomy that doctors SWORE I'd need by age 45.

[TheMightyFavog]

36. Screw Cabot. Wisconsin Cheddar > anything from Vermont.

No ifs, ands or buts.

[hedgehog]

39. Well, maybe I'd consider Wisconsin cheese if you couldn't get the good stuff from New York.....

[cali]

42. Not even close

Wisconsin produces nothing like Grafton Village Cheddar or Shelburne Farms Cheddar- let alone the clothbound Cheddar that's a joint venture between Cabot and Jasper Hill Farms:

"Since the forging of this partnership Cabot Clothbound has been decorated with one of the highest honors in the world of American cheesemaking- the prized Best in Show award presented annually at the American Cheese Society conference. The Cabot Clothbound project has also created a unique opportunity for Jasper Hill Farm to build an expansive cheese aging facility in Northern Vermont- truly the first of its kind in the United States."

[hedgehog]

44. New York has the wine to go with the cheese:

[realVTer]

45. Dairy Facts

As a VT dairy farmer I must add a few comments:

The major reason Agri-Mark did not build the waste treatment plant was that preliminary surveying showed that the Winooski is too small and has too variable a flow to absorb the discharge from such a facility.

Dairy equipment is cleaned in place with a chlorinated detergent followed by an organic acid. These are diluted (I believe about 1/3200)before use and further during storage with rinse water, whey or manure. Remember, we are talking about the sanitation of food handling equipment, as required by law and as practiced anyplace handling "conventional" or "organic" milk... or fruit juice or whatever

Dairy handlers are not allowed to mix "waste" milk (every load is tested for quality and antibiotic residue before unloading)with waste water or whey.

As an aside, my guess is that many of those opposed to Cabot's spreading are also those who are uninformed enough to also oppose liquid manure storage and application, ignoring the huge environmental benefits to capturing and carefully recycling ALL liquid and solid nutrients and byproducts.

Another site referenced the "willy nilly" spreading of manure mixed with whey/waste water by farmers as if we are not governed by nutrient management rules and guided by regular soil testing.


I'll also add that I find the lack of information and haste to judge without the same appalling yet all too typical of urban and ex-urban consumers these days.