Missouri communities divided over spreading meatpacking sludge
Submitted by editor on Wed, 10/16/2024 - 18:44By: Teagan King and Athena Fosler-Brazil - June 6, 2024 2:25 pm
Anti-sludge signs dotted the roadsides of rural Newton and McDonald Counties on Feb. 24 (Athena Fosler-Brazil/Missourian).
GRANBY — About a year after Blair Powell built his dream home in the southwest Missouri Ozarks, a noxious smell wafting from the farm next door ruined his son’s wedding reception in their backyard.
“It just was ungodly,” Powell said. “Just the worst, horrible, horrible smell. Eyes were burning, some were just nauseous, and some were sick, they had to leave.”
The source of the odor was a large waste lagoon on farmer Jerry Evans’ property, about a mile behind Powell’s house. The open-air pit contains “sludge,” as it is colloquially known, composed of animal parts and wastewater from meat and poultry processing facilities. According to neighbors, the material looks like a gray slurry, thick as a milkshake, and smells like a dead animal — which is what it is. Arkansas-based Denali Water Solutions made a deal with Evans and other farmers to house the lagoons and provided the material to area farmers as free “fertilizer.”
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