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Canada: Did Alberta Just Break Fracking Earthquake World Record?
Posted by Tyee: Andrew Nikiforuk on January 29th, 2015
Tyee: Hydraulic fracturing, a technology used to crack open difficult oil and gas formations, appears to have set off a swarm of earthquakes near Fox Creek, Alberta, including a record-breaking tremor with a felt magnitude of 4.4 last week.
That would likely make it the largest felt earthquake ever caused by fracking, a development that experts swore couldn't happen a few years ago.
Fracking operations in British Columbia's Montney shale generated similar seismic activity of that magnitude last year,...
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Abandoned oil wells spouting significant levels of methane, study finds
Posted by Tyee: Andrew Nikiforuk on June 14th, 2014
Tyee: A Princeton University study has found that leaks from abandoned oil and gas wellbores pose not only a risk to groundwater, but represent a growing threat to the climate.
Between 200,000 and 970,000 abandoned wells in the state of Pennsylvania likely account for four to seven per cent of estimated man-made methane emissions in that jurisdiction, a source previously not accounted for, the study says.
Pennsylvania, much like Alberta in Canada, is the oldest oil and gas producer in the United...
Alberta Regulator Quietly Halts Steam Bitumen Mining Due to Safety Concerns
Posted by Tyee: Andrew Nikiforuk on March 6th, 2014
Tyee: The Alberta energy regulator has suspended the fastest-growing source of bitumen production around Fort McMurray due to concerns about fracturing the region’s cap rock.
Last January, the regulator quietly issued a bulletin announcing the freeze on development in the Wabiskaw-McMurray deposit of the Athabasca Oil Sands Area while it completes “a thorough technical review of the factors that affect reservoir containment of steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) projects.”
The suspension affects...
More and more, the boreal will burn
Posted by Tyee: Andrew Nikiforuk on May 20th, 2011
Tyee: Local officials say they need more staff, money and legal assurances to do the job.
Wildfires ripping through Alberta's boreal forest or what government officials call "freakish" firestorms are really a snapshot of how warming global temperatures and intensified insect infestations will change the nation's boreal forest, say scientists.
In the last week nearly 100 wildfires, battled by 1,000 forest fighters, have shut in billions of dollars worth of oil and gas facilities and forced the evacuation...