An Opportunity to Reduce Water Pollution from Slaughterhouses

Industrial meat and poultry slaughterhouses dump millions of pounds of pollutants into the nation’s waters every year. The federal Clean Water Act directs the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set and enforce the rules that regulate this pollution. But the current rules, which were enacted two decades ago, are woefully inadequate at curbing the environmental and human impacts of this dirty water deluge. Fortunately, at the end of 2023, the EPA proposed strengthening the current standards—though the old rules still apply while the proposed changes are being debated.

From slaughter to dirty water

Wastewater from slaughterhouses—produced as workers wash animals, clean meat, sanitize equipment, and scrub work areas—carries pollutants into waterways when it is dumped directly into rivers, streams, or lakes, or when it is sprayed onto farmland, where the…