Least Cost Solutions for Removing Poultry Litter from Eucha-spavinaw Watershed Under Phosphorous Restrictions

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to minimize the cost of removing specified amounts of poultry litter from a watershed by processing it, by transporting it from the watershed to phosphorous-deficit areas, or both. The study was conducted in three different scenarios. Scenario I analyzed the reduction of Oklahoma poultry litter with an assumption that no processing plant is established. A linear programming model was used to find the optimum solution. Scenario II examined the combined alternatives of establishing processing plants and transporting some amount of Oklahoma litter outside the watershed. Mixed integer programming was used to find the optimum solution. Scenario III was like Scenario II, but included litter from western Arkansas. The results of the study indicate that processing is an effective way of removing litter from the watershed. Transporting litter out of the region is more costly. Even if processing is 50% less profitable than projections indicate, it is still less costly than transporting the litter out of the region. There is a tradeoff between reducing cost (increasing profitability) of removing litter, and amount of litter removed from Oklahoma. Profitability is increased by allowing Arkansas litter to be processed (because of economies of size in processing), but this reduces the amount of litter removed from Oklahoma.