Community Dairy Letter (Scoping Plan) 06.23.22

Over the course of the past several years, Merced County has approved permits for two factory farm gas pipelines — one cutting through Stanislaus County into Merced County, and another cutting through Merced County into Madera County. There are also two factory farm gas clusters in the County.

Pixley has 26 dairies, housing approximately 140,000 cows. At least nine of these dairies have digesters and most are connected to a massive factory farm gas cluster. Residents complain of breathing complications, nose bleeds, and headaches, and constant smell of manure due to the surrounding industry.

Industrial dairies in the San Joaquin Valley, packing thousands, and sometimes tens of thousands of cows into a single facility, are a major source of local air and water pollution, nuisance odor, groundwater overdraft, and greenhouse gas emissions.