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Fracking boom is fueling a plastics boom
Posted by Grist: John Upton on November 22nd, 2013
Grist: Plastic crap that Americans are accustomed to importing from Asia is increasingly being manufactured right here in the U.S. -- all thanks to the country’s crappy fracking boom.
Chemical and plastics companies use natural gas as a raw material, and now they can get it cheaply in the U.S. As Living on Earth reports, "The fracking boom has led to renaissance for the chemical industry, particularly for plastics makers in Louisiana, where the plants are major employers."
Other states are seeing...
Anti-fracking activists celebrate victory in a fourth Colorado city
Posted by Grist: John Upton on November 15th, 2013
Grist: It turns out that it was a clean sweep for opponents of fracking during last week`s elections in Colorado.
Voters in the city of Broomfield narrowly approved a five-year moratorium on hydraulic fracturing. The initial vote tally indicated that the ballot measure had failed by 13 votes, but by the end of an exhaustive recount on Thursday it was revealed it had actually succeeded by 17 votes. The result is expected to be legally certified today, but because the vote was so close there may still...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Anti-fracking activists celebrate victory in a fourth Colorado cityMarcellus Shale fracking wells use 5 million gallons of water apiece
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 31st, 2013
Grist: Forget about residents. Forget about fish. The streams and rivers of Pennsylvania and West Virginia are being heavily tapped to quench the growing thirst of the fracking industry.
According to a new report, each of the thousands of fracking wells drilled to draw gas and oil out of the Marcellus Shale formation in those two states uses an average of 4.1 to 5.6 million gallons of fresh water. That`s more than the amount of water used by fracking wells in three other big shale formations around the...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Marcellus Shale fracking wells use 5 million gallons of water apieceThe future of a big coal-export project will be decided by this small Washington community
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 31st, 2013
Grist: Less than a week remains before what could be the most momentous council election in the Washington county`s hitherto humble electoral history.
About 125,000 registered voters will have a say Tuesday on whether a $700 million shipping terminal will be built near Bellingham in the northwest corner of Washington state. The Gateway Pacific Terminal at Cherry Point would load 48 million tons of coal dug up in Montana and Wyoming every year onto ships bound for Asia. The county council will decide...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on The future of a big coal-export project will be decided by this small Washington communityNitrogen pollution from farming lingers for decades
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 23rd, 2013
Grist: When a farmworker sprays fertilizer over a field, there`s a good chance he or she will be outlived by nitrogen pollution from that fertilizer.
A 30-year study published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals that nitrogen could linger in soil for nearly a century after fertilizer is applied.
Nitrogen from fertilizer helps crops grow, but it can be poisonous for humans and animals. When nitrates leach from farmed soil into groundwater, they can make it undrinkable....
The Northeast is producing more natural gas than Saudi Arabia
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 23rd, 2013
Grist: More natural gas is being fracked out of the Marcellus Shale formation in the Northeastern U.S. than is being produced by most foreign countries.
A report published Tuesday by the U.S. Energy Information Administration revealed that Marcellus gas production is growing much faster than had been predicted. (So, too, are the damages that fracking is inflicting on the region`s environment - and the world`s climate.)
The Associated Press reports that daily gas production from the Marcellus Shale...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on The Northeast is producing more natural gas than Saudi ArabiaOil and gas train runs off tracks, explodes in Canada — again
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 21st, 2013
Grist: Firefighters did not bother battling the flames at the accident near Edmonton in Alberta. Instead, they allowed the propane that was leaking from ruptured rail cars to burn itself out. Nobody was hurt, but a nearby town was evacuated. From a weekend Globe and Mail report:
The train belongs to Canadian National Railway Co. It derailed in Gainford, a village about 90 kilometres west of Alberta’s capital, at around 1 a.m. MT Saturday. The train was en route to Vancouver from Edmonton.
Thirteen...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Oil and gas train runs off tracks, explodes in Canada — againLagoons filled with toxic water coming to Ohio’s fracklands
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 14th, 2013
Grist: Where frackers go, lagoons filled with toxic wastewater follow. Fracking wastewater impoundment lots as big as football fields already dot heavily fracked landscapes in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. The lagoons are built to help the industry manage and reuse the vast volumes of wastewater that it produces. Ohio lawmakers looked admiringly to their neighboring Marcellus Shale states and decided to draw up their own rules for wastewater lagoons. From The Columbus Dispatch: “We are putting in a...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Lagoons filled with toxic water coming to Ohio’s fracklandsWisconsin’s sand-mining boom could fuel fracking abroad
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 14th, 2013
Grist: When most people think about Wisconsin, cheese, breweries, and cornfields spring to mind. But the fracking industry is interested in something else the Badger State has to offer: sand. A sand-mining boom has gotten rolling in Wisconsin over the last three years. The state’s quartz-based sand is strong and spherical, nicely suited for injecting underground with water and chemicals to prop open cracks in fractured shale, allowing natural gas and oil to be fracked. The spoils of Wisconsin’s $1 billion...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Wisconsin’s sand-mining boom could fuel fracking abroadAmerican company sues Canada over fracking moratorium
Posted by Grist: John Upton on October 3rd, 2013
Grist: Quebec isn`t entirely sure about this whole fracking thing. Amid reports from across the continent of groundwater pollution, air pollution, deforestation, and other environmental side effects of hydraulic fracturing, the Canadian province has placed a moratorium on the practice beneath the St. Lawrence River.
That doesn`t sit well with Lone Pine Resources, a Delaware-based company that has long eyed the gas and oil that`s locked up in the Utica shale beneath the grand waterway. The company claims...