Tenn. Code Ann. § 44-18-101 (2026)

As used in this chapter, unless the context otherwise requires:

• (1) "Dairy farm" means any place or premises where one (1) or more cows are kept and from which a part or all of the milk or milk products is provided, sold or offered for sale to a milk plant, transfer station or receiving station;

• (2) "Department" means the department of environment and conservation, and includes any officer, agency or designee of that department;

• (3) "Established date of operation" means the date on which a feedlot, dairy farm or poultry production house commenced operating. If the physical facilities of the feedlot, dairy farm or poultry production house are subsequently expanded, the established date of operation for each expansion is deemed to be a separate and independent "established date of operation" established as of this date of commencement of the expanded operations, and the commencement of expanded operations shall not divest the feedlot, dairy farm or poultry production house of a previously established date of operation;

• (4) "Established date of ownership" means the date of the recording of an appropriate muniment of title establishing the ownership of realty;

• (5) "Feedlot" means a lot, yard, corral or other area in which livestock are confined, primarily for the purposes of feeding, growing, raising, or birthing prior to slaughter. "Feedlot" does not include areas that are used for the raising of crops or other vegetation upon which livestock are allowed to graze or feed;

• (6) "Livestock" means all equine as well as animals that are being raised primarily for use as food or fiber for human utilization or consumption including, but not limited to, cattle, sheep, swine, goats, and poultry;

• (7) "Materially affects" means prohibits or regulates with respect to the location, or the emission of noise, effluent, odors, sewage, waste or similar products resulting from the operation or the location or use of buildings, machinery, vehicles, equipment or other real or personal property used in the operation of a livestock feedlot, dairy farm or poultry production house;

• (8) "Nuisance" means and includes public or private nuisance as defined either by statute or by the common law;

• (9) "Nuisance action or proceeding" means and includes every action, claim or proceeding, whether brought at law, in equity or as an administrative proceeding, that is based on nuisance;

• (10) "Owner or operator" means any person who owns, leases, operates, controls or supervises a feedlot;

• (11) "Poultry production house" means any place or premises where chickens are kept for the production of eggs or broilers for resale to processors, wholesalers or retailers;

• (12) "Regulations" means a resolution by the county legislative body or an ordinance by the governing body of any municipality regulating or prohibiting the normal noises of animals or fowls, the noises in the operation of the equipment, the odors normally associated with any feedlot, dairy farm, or poultry production house, or the preclusion of any animals or fowls from within the city or from within a defined area of the county;

• (13) "Rule of the department" means a rule as defined in the Uniform Administrative Procedures Act, compiled in title 4, chapter 5, that materially affects the operation of a feedlot, dairy farm, or poultry production house and that has been adopted by the department. Nothing in this chapter shall be deemed to empower the department to make any rule; and

• (14) "Zoning requirement" means a regulation or ordinance that has been adopted by a city, county, township, school district, or any special-purpose district or authority, that materially affects the operation of a feedlot, dairy farm or poultry production house. Nothing in this chapter shall be deemed to empower any agency described in this definition to make any regulation or ordinance.

Acts 1979, ch. 138, § 1; T.C.A., § 53-6701; Acts 1992, ch. 693, § 1; 1996, ch. 792, §2; 2002, ch. 635, §§ 1, 2.