Why Nutrient Trading is Scarier Than You Think. [And what you can do before Aug 26]
If you’ve never heard of nutrient trading, there are those in Northwest Arkansas who are pleased at that.
If you live in Fayetteville, you’re one of just a small handful of people that can help us prevent a terrible regulation from going into effect that has the potential to degrade water quality throughout the state. City leaders from Fayetteville, Bentonville, Rogers, and Springdale make up NANTRAG – the group currently trying to establish a statewide nutrient trading program. If you’re not familiar with the concept, it’s pollution swapping. A community that isn’t very polluted can “sell” the rights to its purity to a community that is polluting it’s waters beyond the legal limit. It’s great if you are on the “winning” side of that trade, but someone’s favorite swimming or fishing hole will further degrade for the sake of somebody else. Even worse, it poses a HUGE threat to your drinking water.
Beaver Water District, your drinking water provider, has been trying to get Springdale and the other cities to adopt reasonable, common-sense changes to ensure your water quality isn’t degraded. Fayetteville City Council supports this effort, proposing its own changes. But, unfortunately, any changes requires unanimous support. The changes are reasonable definitions and clarifications that would tell people trying to implement it how to actually be effective.
Jessie Green, White River Waterkeeper, has put together a TOOLKIT for background information, contacts, and a sample comment you can copy, paste, and edit. Deadline for comments is MONDAY Aug 26.
Here is Jessie’s toolkit: NANTRAG: Please Trade Responsibly https://omnicenter.org/tell-nantrag-today-please-trade-responsibly/
Nutrient Trading Call for Action – what to do next https://omnicenter.org/nutrient-trading-call-for-action/
Please reach out to your elected officials before August 26 – the looming deadline. And please forward to your neighbors, friends, co-workers – anyone in one of the four cities that doesn’t want to see reports of blue-green algae killing pets in their backyard due to a poorly developed pollution-swapping plan ripe for abuse … and ask them to reach out to their representatives, too.
On August 26th, individual NANTRAG designees from each city will submit a list of amendments they would like included in Rule 37 – this rule. On September 5th, NANTRAG will meet to discuss proposed amendments. All changes require unanimous support to adopt. With your backing, the Fayetteville representative will stand up to pressure to just pass the thing and defend the demands to trade res. Get your comments in to your City Council, Mayor, and state representatives NOW! Contact information is in the toolkit. Check it out.