June 2, 2008, New York, NY – Bion
Environmental Technologies’ nutrient credit calculation protocol has
received approval from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental
Protection (DEP).
June 2, 2008, New York, NY – Bion Environmental Technologies’ nutrient credit calculation protocol has received approval from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) .
The protocol determines how many nitrogen and phosphorus credits will be received for nutrient reductions achieved through installation of Bion's waste management technology. The DEP's approval extends to Bion's multi-media measurement protocol, enabling the certification of credits both for ammonia air emission reductions as well as significantly reducing the leaching and runoff potential of land applied nutrients.
This approval marks the first time the DEP has approved a nutrient credit protocol that has allocated nitrogen credits for ammonia air emissions reductions. The DEP's registry of approved credit proposals and contracts/trades can be found on the department's website.
“The Pennsylvania DEP's approval of Bion's credit calculation methodology and multi-media measurement protocol is a significant milestone for Bion: both in terms of acknowledgement of the significant role that ammonia emissions from livestock operations play in nitrogen deposition, as well as Bion's ability to largely eliminate this substantial, yet at this time unregulated, source of emissions,” said Mark Smith, president of Bion. “We look forward to continued work with the DEP and other stakeholders to provide solutions in the region.”
Bion recently signed a memorandum of understanding with a large dairy in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania to retrofit its existing dairy operation with a Bion Comprehensive Environmental Management System designed to reduce ammonia emissions and soluble nutrients in the effluent. The Bion installation will initially treat the manure from the main 1,400-head dairy barn, with follow-on expansions designed to capture the remaining manure from the milk house, heifers, dry cows, calves, and potentially the manure from the co-located chicken facilities.
Based on credit calculations approved by the DEP, Bion's Pennsylvania installation will generate one pound of nutrient credits for about every two pounds of nutrients mitigated, for a total of 175,109 pounds of nitrogen credits and 21,899 pounds of phosphorus credits annually from the initial 1,400 cows. These credits can be sold in advance of generating site-specific data, but need to be validated and trued up at the end of each DEP monitoring year.
Pennsylvania's nutrient credit trading program allows for voluntary credit trading between a non-point source (such as a dairy or other agricultural sources) and a point source of effluent releases, such as a municipal wastewater treatment plant or a housing development. The program is similar to the U.S. acid rain cap and trade program that achieved 100 percent compliance in reducing sulfur dioxide emissions in the 1990s at a fraction of the cost that was originally anticipated.
