If Iowa farmers plant buffer strips alongside waterways, they “could get two-thirds of the way to the state’s goal for reducing phosphorus pollution and one-fifth of the way to the nitrogen pollution target,” says a report by the Environmental Working Group. It says a small proportion of landowners and “a vanishingly small percentage of row-crop acreage” would be affected, based on its examination of five typical counties. For the report, EWG considered the impact of streamside buffers of 35, 50 or 75 feet.
According to EWG, 71 percent of landowners could meet the 50-foot standard by planting an acre or less to grass. “If Iowa is serious about cleaning up its waterways, enacting a streamside buffer standard of at least 50 feet would be an excellent way to start,” said the report.
The Des Moines Water Works board voted last month to sue three northwestern Iowa counties as a way to force reductions in nitrate levels in the Raccoon River, a source of drinking water for Iowa’s capital city.
The EWG report, Iowa’s low-hanging fruit, is available here.