IATP Hog Report - Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Section 5
alternatives to the proposed project as required, other than a "non-action"
alternative.
Nevertheless, on August 14, 1998, the local (Aberdeen) office of BIA
issued a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) and notified the public
that the BIA would be approving the lease arrangement.
In the EA, RESPEC estimated that water use at the facilities would be
1.686 million gallons per day. The Tribe would supply approximately 400
gallons per minute from existing wells installed into the Ogallala Aquifer.
This Ogallala water would be pumped north to the hog sites via
distribution pipes constructed for the Mni Wiconi pipeline, a public works
project that will supply Missouri River water to the Lower Brule, Pine
Ridge, and Rosebud Reservations and nine counties in Southwestern
South Dakota when it is completed. 48 The Mni Wiconi project was
authorized by Congress in 1988 at $87.5 million and expanded in 1994 to
include the Lower Brule and Rosebud Reservations, raising the cost to
$251 million. 49 Water supplied by the project was allocated among these
areas based on a needs assessment. An estimated 10 million gallons per
day can be handled by the Mni Wiconi intake at Pierre, South Dakota.
RESPEC noted that the Tribe's allotment from the Mni Wiconi Rural
Water System, which was intended to supply drinking water for the Tribe
as well as water for some economic development purposes, would be
completed by 2003 and could be used to "supply adequate water for the
project." 50 However, this claim has been questioned by some who suggest
that the amount of Mni Wiconi water allotted for all of the RST's
economic purposes by the needs assessment could supply water to only
one to two of the planned hog sites. 51
In a letter of September 22, 1998, the Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA), which found both the environmental assessment and the BIA's
FONSI to be "significantly flawed," disputed the 1.686 million gallon per
day water use estimate for the project. 52 The EPA also disputed that the
waste handling system would operate as described in the EA and that it
would be a "no discharge" facility. (Waste discharges from large confined
animal feeding operations must be permitted under the National Pollution
Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) program by the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency. However, if it is expected that the
facilities will not discharge (as in the case of the evaporation systems of
the Rosebud Pork Production Facility), these are called "no discharge
facilities" and do not need to be permitted under the NPDES program.)
The proposed venture divided the community. 53,54 While most tribal
members were unaware of the plans, a few tribal members and the
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