The Cassia County Planning and Zoning Commission approved permits Thursday for three 7,500-animal unit confined animal feeding operations to be built and operated near Malta.

Applications for the permits were submitted by East Valley Cattle, LLC, which last year obtained a permit to operate a 26,000-animal unit CAFO next to the area where the new CAFOs will be built. Three separate permits were required for the new CAFOs because a county ordinance limits the number of animal units per CAFO to 7,500.

When all four CAFOs are up and running, the total number of animal units they house will come to 46,500, or about 31,000 head of cattle.

Matt Thompson, who represented East Valley during the application process, estimated the operation's total footprint at 700-800 acres. He said it is in the best interest of the county as well as East Valley to concentrate animal units in one area so as to minimize CAFOs' impact on neighbors.

"If we have to go out and look for another site, we're going to get closer to our neighbors, not farther away. This is the best site," he said.

Thompson's presentation at Thursday's hearing met with skepticism from some commissioners. Most questions centered on the manner East Valley intends to dispose of animal waste. While standard practice requires CAFO operators to distribute manure over farmed land - one acre for every two animal units - they are allowed to bypass that rule if they present certified plans for alternative nutrient management systems.

Alternative nutrient management systems considered viable include gasification, aerobic digesters, anaerobic digesters and composting. Of these, composting is by far the most common, though anaerobic digesters have recently gained traction with CAFO operators due to their ability to convert manure into methane gas and a fibrous, nutrient-rich substance popular with gardeners.

East Valley's application featured a letter from Idaho State Department of Agriculture Nutrient Management Specialist Hilary Simpson, who certified that East Valley's composting plan would dispose of the waste produced by 20,000 animal units - or enough to take the place of 10,000 farmed acres.

In addition to its composting plan, Thompson said East Valley has secured a verbal commitment from a neighboring farmer to distribute the rest of the manure the three new CAFOs produce over 1,460 acres of his land. Commissioners questioned the validity of that commitment, saying they would prefer East Valley obtain signed contracts from land owners willing to accept the manure.

"I really feel that if we're going to allow something, we're going to need some definite commitment," said Bruce Beck, the sole commissioner to vote against approving the CAFOs. "Once you get something built, it's awfully tough to shut it down."

But Thompson said there was no doubt East Valley's neighbor would take the operation's manure.

"If we have a neighboring farmer that wants manure, then we're going to give it to him first," he said. "We want to keep that open for our neighbors."

Commissioners included as a condition to the permit a requirement that East Valley provide the county with annual records of manure distribution from the CAFO to its neighbor. Another point of contention was East Valley's proposed use of a staging area where it will temporarily store compost and manure before loading it on to trucks to transport it.

Commissioner Brandon Brackenbury told Thompson he wanted assurances the staging area would not become a permanent storage site for manure or compost. Stockpiled manure in recent years has fallen under intense scrutiny from environmental agencies, which warn if manure is not distributed properly, its nutrients are easily leached into surface and groundwater, leading to a variety of health risks for water users. Conversely, nutrients in compost are much more stable and less likely to wash out of the compost.

Still, Brackenbury balked at the idea of stockpiled compost, saying it is an eyesore and a nuisance to CAFOs' neighbors.

Before voting to approve the applications, commissioners added another condition limiting the amount of time manure or compost can be left in the staging area to eight months.