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Archive for August, 2013
Fracking Companies Issue Gag Orders and Buy Victims’ Silence
Posted by EcoWatch: Joshua De Leon on August 5th, 2013
EcoWatch: In further attempts to stifle public awareness of the dangers of fracking, energy companies have been issuing gag orders on families who contract with them. The gag orders cover everyone in the family, including children. Drilling company Range Resources offered $750,000 to a Pennsylvania family to move from their home with one catch: the family, and their kids, were not to say a word.
There have been numerous reports of dangerous pollutants contaminating the land and water supply of families...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Fracking Companies Issue Gag Orders and Buy Victims’ SilenceBianca Jagger: Stop this fracking nightmare in Balcombe
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 5th, 2013
Guardian: I am very upset by reports that the fracking company Cuadrilla began operations in Lower Stumble, a mile south of the lovely village of Balcombe, West Sussex, last Friday, 2 August.
On Saturday I made my second trip to the campsite in Lower Stumble – my first journey was on 28 July. I felt compelled to lend my support after I received Twitter requests from concerned residents asking me to help them in their struggle against Cuadrilla. I decided it was important to visit Balcombe because I believe...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Bianca Jagger: Stop this fracking nightmare in BalcombeRepublicans’ war on the environment: Time to counterattack
Posted by Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Joel Connelly on August 5th, 2013
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: The Republican leaders in Congress look so grim and dour on TV, always denouncing this and that, and voting -- for the 40th time in the House on Friday -- to repeal the health care reform law known as Obamacare.
Appearances are deceiving. If you read their tweets, you'll quickly identify one thing close to the hearts of House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell: These guys love coal.
They're out front going backwards. They want to strip the EPA of authority to...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Republicans’ war on the environment: Time to counterattackKeystone pipeline decision pivotal for Obama
Posted by Star Tribune: James P. Lenfestey on August 5th, 2013
Star Tribune: In his speech on climate in June, President Obama laid out his criteria for approval of the Keystone XL pipeline: "Allowing the Keystone pipeline to be built requires a finding that doing so would be in our nation's interest. And our national interest will be served only if this project does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution. The net effects of the pipeline's impact on our climate will be absolutely critical to determining whether this project is allowed to go forward.'...
Nebraska trial could delay Keystone XL pipeline
Posted by Washington Post: Lenny Bernstein on August 5th, 2013
Washington Post: While environmentalists, energy executives and elected officials across North America await the State Department’s critical decision on the Keystone XL pipeline, a little-noticed trial scheduled for next month in Nebraska could spell problems for the $5.3 billion project.
Despite two attempts by Nebraska’s attorney general to have the case thrown out, Lancaster County District Court Judge Stephanie Stacy has set a Sept. 27 trial date for arguments in a lawsuit that contends the state legislature...
With Tar Sands Development, Growing Concern on Water Use
Posted by Yale Environment 360: Ed Struzik on August 5th, 2013
Yale Environment 360: Opposition to the mining of Alberta’s tar sands — and the Keystone and Gateway pipelines that would carry their oil to the Gulf of Mexico and Pacific Ocean — has largely been focused on the project’s greenhouse gas emissions and threats to pristine environments along the pipeline rights-of-way. But another serious issue is coming to the fore — the massive amounts of freshwater being used by the industry. In 2011, companies mining the tar sands siphoned approximately 370 million cubic meters of water...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on With Tar Sands Development, Growing Concern on Water UsePressure mounts on UK’s polluting water companies
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 5th, 2013
Guardian: On Sunday, I revealed in the Observer that the most persistent and frequent polluters of England's rivers and beaches are the nation's biggest 10 biggest water companies. I wrote: The companies, who are responsible for treating waste water and delivering clean supplies, have been punished for over 1000 incidents in the last nine years but fined a total of only £3.5m. The revelations have prompted deep concern that the financial penalties being levied are far too low to change the behaviour of an...
The rise and rise of American carbon
Posted by Guardian: Duncan Clark on August 5th, 2013
Guardian: You've probably heard that US carbon emissions have been falling. According to President Obama and energy commentators the world over, fracked shale gas has displaced dirty coal, in much the same way that fossil fuels undercut whale oil a century earlier. Out with environmentally unfriendly old technologies and in with cleaner and more efficient new ones. Everyone wins – including the climate, thanks to the fact that gas produces only around half as much CO2 as coal does for each unit of power or...
Can Farming Provide a Solution to Climate Change?
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 5th, 2013
Scientific American: When the heavy rains came to Iowa this spring, corn farmer Dave Miller tilled the rolling portions of his 255-hectare plot. Cutting into the soil slows runoff and, particularly, prevents water from gouging big gullies in the fertile but softly held land. A few years back such tilling would have cost him money, thanks to an attempt to pair farmers improving the carbon management of their soils and companies looking to reduce pollution. "We know that raising soil organic matter is good for soil, good...
Neonicotinoids are the new DDT killing the natural world
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 5th, 2013
Guardian: It's the new DDT: a class of poisons licensed for widespread use before they had been properly tested, which are now ripping the natural world apart. And it's another demonstration of the old truth that those who do not learn from history are destined to repeat it. It is only now, when neonicotinoids are already the world's most widely deployed insecticides, that we are beginning to understand how extensive their impacts are. Just as the manufacturers did for DDT, the corporations which make these...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Neonicotinoids are the new DDT killing the natural world