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Water in the Woodlands
Tagged with: fracking, pennsylvania department of environmental protection, water contamination
Pepsi Cans on Wheels: Stopping Explosive Oil Trains
Some communities do not even know that mile long 100-car unit trains hauling explosive crude oil pass through their neighborhoods until they hear the rumbling of the tracks. Last summer, one of these trains derailed in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, killing 47 people. Additional tragedies, including one in downtown Lynchburg, Virginia last April, spotlight the enormous danger posed by what some now call “Bomb Trains”. Driven by the expansion of fracking for oil, especially in North Dakota, these rolling hazardous dangers carrying their climate-warming fossil fuels spilt more flammable crude oil last year than in the previous forty years according to Federal Railroad Administration records.
Tagged with: bakken, oil trains, crude by rail, federal railroad administration, phmsa
No matter the country, with money comes power - from soccer to resource extraction
Unconventional oil and gas extraction – colloquially referred to as fracking – is set expand and take over Argentina, which has some of the largest reserves of shale oil and gas in the world. The Argentinian government is providing incentives to attract international fossil fuel companies to drill there. Given that the country recently defaulted on some of its restructured debt, a push for development will likely only intensify in the coming months. Under-regulated and under-monitored fracking, however, has already led to a series of environmental and health issues in the U.S. and beyond.
Tagged with: fracking, argentina
Another Orange River, Another Toxic Spill
Just a week after the Mount Polley disaster, another mine waste spill has occurred, this time from a copper mine in Mexico. About 10 million gallons of toxic mine waste spilled from the Buenavista mine into nearby rivers. Water restrictions have been imposed on thousands of people.
Tagged with: tailings, pollution, latin america, spill, mine waste, mexico, sonora
On Colorado: Waiting and Seeing
You can’t say that the politics of oil and gas in Colorado have been dull lately.
Last week, on the day that signatures for four statewide oil and gas ballot initiatives were due, Governor Hickenlooper announced with Representative Polis that the four initiatives would be withdrawn as part of a political deal.
Tagged with: fracking, colorado, vote, ballot intiative
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