The Association of Farm & Forestry Contractors in Ireland (FCI) has welcomed the clarification from the Environment Protection Agency (EPA) that Slurry contractors will not have to sign up to the EPA's water register.
Under new regulations, farmers drawing over 25,000l of water a day had to complete an online registration by 16 November.
The FCI pointed out that low emission spreading techniques require substantial volumes of water to dilute slurry.
“This dilution requirement is especially necessary when the farm contractor is spreading the slurry using low emission slurry spreading machinery, such as trailing shoe, injector or dribble bar systems,” said FCI National chair, Richard White.
“These machines are very prone to blockages from the high dry matter Irish animal slurries that typically contain significant amounts of silage or hay from bale silage feeding systems.
"These more expensive low emission slurry spreading machines, which many contractors have invested in, all require the slurry to be more dilute than with splash plate spreading systems, in order to prevent time consuming machine blockages in the field,” he added.
The EPA told the Irish Farmers Journal that they expected 1,171 farmers to sign up to the register. However, they had not yet concluded counting registrations at the time of going to print. Farmers who fail to sign up to the register face a €5,000 fine.
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