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Archive for September 7th, 2015
‘Rivers of acid’ in Zambian villages
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 7th, 2015
BBC: Zambian villagers are taking a multinational copper mining firm to court in the UK, accusing it of poisoning their water. The BBC's Nomsa Maseko visited the area which has allegedly been polluted. Dressed in colourful sarongs and t-shirts, the women of Hippo Pool village collect their water on the banks of the Kafue River on Zambia's copper belt. As the sun sets and the weather starts to cool down, they carry the water in large buckets which they balance gracefully on their heads as they walk back...
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Questions and answers about damaging oilfield wastewater
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 7th, 2015
Sacramento Bee: As U.S. oil and gas production increased this past decade, so, too, did spills of salty oilfield wastewater that can foul the land, kill wildlife and threaten freshwater supplies. An Associated Press analysis of 11 states found more than 180 million gallons of wastewater spilled from 2009 to 2014. Questions and answers about this damaging byproduct of energy production:
WHAT IS IT?
Oilfield wastewater is the fluid that comes to the surface when oil and gas are pumped out of the earth. Some...
United Kingdom: Influential shale gas body ‘is packed with pro-fracking supporters’
Posted by Independent: David Connett on September 7th, 2015
Independent: The European Ombudsman is to investigate allegations that an influential group examining shale gas development is packed with pro-fracking supporters.
The investigation into the European Commission’s Unconventional Carbon Extraction (UCE) group has been launched after it was claimed it is dominated by people with links to the oil and gas industry. According to the EC the group’s efforts are to be the “main source of independent knowledge about fracking and other unconventional oil and gas exploration”....
Greenland fines Greenpeace for drilling rig stunts
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 7th, 2015
Reuters: A Greenland court on Monday fined Greenpeace over $26,000 for disrupting oil drilling off the island's coast, the latest chapter in the environmental group's fight to stop industrial development in the Arctic. Greenpeace activists boarded or tried to board an exploration rig belonging to Cairn Energy three times in 2011. The Edinburgh-based company drilled five prospective wells that year but none found commercial quantities of hydrocarbons. Greenpeace's campaigns in the Arctic have run into trouble...
Role of fresh water lakes, reservoirs in the global carbon cycle
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on September 7th, 2015
ScienceDaily: Lakes make up less than 3 percent of the landscape, but they bury more carbon than all the world's oceans combined. In the global carbon cycle, fresh water lakes and reservoirs are hot spots of carbon cycling and important players in the global carbon cycle. Understanding that role, as well as the impacts of climate change on fresh water lakes and reservoirs, is central to the work of Kevin Rose, who recently joined the faculty at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). With a focus on aquatic ecology...
How Climate Change is Behind the Surge of Migrants to Europe
Posted by Time: Aryn Baker on September 7th, 2015
Time: More than 10,000 migrants and refugees traveled to Western Europe via Hungary over the weekend, fleeing conflict-ravaged and impoverished homelands in the hope of finding a more secure life abroad. Even as Europe wrestles over how to absorb the new arrivals, human rights activists and migration experts warn that the movement is not likely to slow anytime soon. Intractable wars, terror and poverty in the Middle East and beyond will continue to drive the surge. One additional factor, say scientists,...