According to a recent report by The Guardian, the spread of dangerous phosphorus algal blooms in Lake Erie has left hundreds of thousands of Ohio residents without safe drinking water.
The article explains that unsafe levels of phosphorus in the Great Lakes used to be caused by industrial waste, but after a ban on phosphorus in laundry detergent went into effect in 1988, agricultural pollution from factory farms became the main source of the contamination.
This most recent threat to surrounding communities is due to “an overload of phosphorus, which washes into lakes from commercial fertilizer used by farming operations.”
Not surprisingly, factory farming practices are responsible for widespread contamination of our drinking water. In fact, animal excrement and other agricultural runoff from large-scale farms has polluted nearly one third of rivers in the U.S.
Want to withdraw your support of factory farms and protect our precious natural resources? Check out ChooseVeg.com for meal ideas, recipes, and more.
