Volume 14: Responsibilities for Human and Animal Health
8. Pollution control and waste disposal
Introduction
The origins of pollution control

8.1 The main purpose of the livestock sector of the agriculture industry is to produce food for human consumption, whether as meat or dairy products. Accordingly, great efforts are made, as explained in Chapters 2, 3 and 4 of this volume, to maintain the health of farm animals while alive, and to protect public health interests by regulating the production of meat and offal destined for human consumption. But during their lives, and as carcasses, cattle produce a considerable quantity of material which does not serve the main purpose of human food production. Thus one dairy cow produces about 40 litres of excreta a day with a 90 per cent moisture content; ¹ only about 45 per cent of a cattle carcass is used for human consumption as meat or offal and of the remainder about half is moisture. All of this material is waste, to the farmer or to the butchery process.

8.2 Nonetheless what is waste to the farmer or to the producer of meat for human consumption does not necessarily have no further use. Cattle excreta contain significant amounts of nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus, and for this reason are a valuable fertiliser as manure or slurry. Similarly, the material from the slaughter of cattle, which is not carcass meat or offal used for human consumption and is referred to as animal waste, can be processed and used as a feedstock for a host of products, including animal feedingstuffs and fertiliser. Some of this material can be used without further processing, such as bovine eyeballs used for teaching purposes, and the blood and gut contents which also have applications as fertiliser. Accordingly what is waste to one process may be a valuable source of raw material for another industry, process or undertaking. Its utility for the purpose is affected by the cost of the material to the user and the availability of substitutes. Hence the availability of soya protein affected the price and utility of meat and bone meal (MBM) as a source of protein in animal feedingstuffs in the late 1980s, with consequent effects on the quantity of MBM used for this purpose.

8.3 Although most parts of the cattle carcass were used for some beneficial purpose, some material was not so used or cannot be used. In the case of certain highly infectious diseases, such as anthrax or foot and mouth disease, the entire carcass was a potential source of infection and had to be destroyed as soon as possible. Similar considerations applied to animals that died on the farm, whether of some less serious disease, or naturally; their carcasses could not be used for human consumption and, depending on the cost of transport and their value, they might have to be disposed of on farm, by a local hunt kennel or at a knacker's yard. Turning to the industries which process cattle waste into its many products, there were produced - during or at the end of those processes - quantities of materials which required disposal because they had no beneficial use to industry. Furthermore, during the various processes other substances, principally water but also some chemicals, were added to clean or cause or assist a reaction. These too had no purpose once they had done their job but had been contaminated or altered in the process and became waste to the industry.

8.4 Waste was often the hidden or forgotten component of activities such as livestock farming and butchery and its by-products because it had little or no value to the producer. Thus the producer of the waste usually had no self-interest in ensuring that it was dealt with in an appropriate manner - to do so might be a cost on the principal business with no return. Where waste was inert or harmless, the implications of this lack of value and consequent lack of producer self-interest might be of little wider importance unless the quantity was so great as to present a problem in itself. But where the waste was from live or dead animals, and hence was liable to contain pathogens or other organic material which could cause harm to human or animal health or the environment, it assumed a far greater significance because of its potential for pollution.

8.5 This distinction between pollution and waste is central to this chapter. Waste is a physical concept, and is applied here in its ordinary meaning of something which is discarded by its producer because it has no beneficial use to that individual or undertaking. Pollution, on the other hand, is the adulteration by substances harmful to human or animal health of any environmental medium - land, water or air. The concept of harm is the essence of pollution, for whereas some waste may cause no harm at all to the environment or health, pollution is intrinsically harmful in some way to some degree. Because both concepts are used in the legislation which governs waste, this chapter considers the responsibilities in this area from both points of view; it shows that the two strands of waste management (the containment and organisation of the physical material) and pollution control (the organising of measures to safeguard the health of humans, animals, and the environment) have remained distinct in relation to agricultural and animal waste.

8.6 This chapter is concerned only with waste in the agriculture industry and in the industries which use or process bovine material, from the slaughterhouse onwards. It does not examine in detail the systems which control animal by-products (animal waste) and waste food, because these are considered in Chapter 5 of this volume. Nevertheless, it does describe their general form and effect in order to give a complete picture of how that area of waste fits into the overall system of controls and responsibilities. Neither does it consider the effect of the BSE controls on waste - that is fully described in Chapter 9 of vol. 6: Human Health, 1989-96. Instead, the purpose of this chapter is to consider cattle, from the farm to the final disposal of every part of the cattle carcass, and to see where waste arises, whether in solid, liquid or gaseous form, and where the potential for pollution occurs in those processes. This in turn leads on to where the responsibilities lie for dealing with that waste, according to whether it is discharged to land, air or water, and which agencies have the responsibility for enforcement of the legislation.

8.7 As with the other chapters in this volume, this one first deals with the situation as it was in 1986, at the time BSE was first identified. It then turns to consider the changes to these powers and duties from then until 20 March 1996, where those changes were not driven by BSE.

The origins of pollution control

8.8 Before the Control of Pollution Act 1974, the handling of solid waste on land and the pollution of air and water were subject to separate and ad hoc systems of control. The animal by-products industries had been recognised as 'offensive trades' by the Public Health Act 1936 because of their potential effects on the surrounding environment, and had to be licensed by the local authority to operate for such purposes. But once established, the controls on any pollution or waste arising from the processes were principally the 'statutory nuisance' provisions of the Act, the enforcement of which depended on the approach and judgement of individual local authority officers and their legal advisers. Emissions to air were subject in a few cases to the strict controls of the Alkali, Etc, Works Regulation Act 1906 enforced by a central government Inspectorate, but otherwise the Clean Air Acts 1956 and 1968 and the smoke nuisance provisions of the Public Health Act, were the principal controls, and again enforcement relied on the subjective assessment of harm by local authority officers.

8.9 The discharge of trade effluents to public sewers was permitted provided that the occupiers served a notice on the local authority giving details of the nature and quantity of the discharge, and provided that the authority had given its consent. But existing discharges were exempt provided they did not increase their maximum quantity or rate of discharge (Public Health (Drainage of Trade Premises) Act 1937). It was an offence to pollute or knowingly permit the pollution of a watercourse, and some discharges to rivers were controlled by the Rivers (Prevention of Pollution) Acts 1951 and 1961 and the Water Resources Act 1963, and were monitored by River Boards, and after 1972 by the Regional Water Authorities. However, many existing discharges were exempt. As to the deposit of waste on land, the Public Health Act contained powers permitting a local authority to provide places for the deposit of refuse and plant or apparatus for treating or disposing of such material, but there was no duty to do so, nor to collect trade refuse. Nor was it an offence to deposit waste on land unless the quantity or nature of the waste gave rise to a smoke nuisance or statutory nuisance under the Public Health Acts. Similar situations existed in both Scotland and Northern Ireland.