Tag Archives: industry

A Recharging Industry Rises

by Myrna Posted on November 12, 2013

High-voltage, superfast public devices for recharging electric cars are appearing more frequently, though some are more expensive for drivers than home chargers, or even gasoline. View this article – A Recharging Industry Rises Related Articles Electric Cars Give Rise to a Recharging Industry U.S. Offers Reward in Wildlife-Trade Fight Dot Earth Blog: The Poverty and Population Factors Behind Vast Typhoon Losses

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A Recharging Industry Rises

Posted in alo, Anker, Citadel, eco-friendly, FF, G & F, GE, growing marijuana, horticulture, LAI, Monterey, ONA, organic, organic gardening, Pines, PUR, solar, solar power, Uncategorized | Tagged appearing-more, art, citadel, codex, g & f, games, industry, poverty | Comments Off

Colorado voters tell fracking industry to frack off

by 1LymSlagter473 Posted on November 6, 2013

Colorado voters tell fracking industry to frack off

By John Upton

Helen Cassidy

Maybe it’s the polluted groundwater, river water, and air. Perhaps it’s the toxic stew that gushed over Colorado when it flooded. Or it could be the abject lies.

Whatever the fracking industry has done to earn the hostility of voters in at least three Colorado cities, it couldn’t be undone by spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a pro-fracking ad blitz in recent weeks.

On Tuesday, voters in Boulder, Fort Collins, and Lafayette all approved measures that either banned or placed a moratorium on the practice of hydraulic fracturing. Boulder was the most decisive: Three-quarters of votes cast were in opposition to fracking. A similar initiative in Broomfield was failing by a mere 13 votes at the end of unofficial counting.

This despite the Colorado Oil and Gas Association spending more than $870,000 by Halloween on an effort to defeat the four ballot measures. Supporters of the initiatives raised just over $26,000, The Denver Post reports.

Kelly Giddens, manager of the Fort Collins campaign, told KUNC that volunteers “were really excited, passionate and willing to go out there and knock doors and make phone calls and talk to their friends and family.”

The fracking industry, however, won’t take no for an answer. “A ban is not a responsible way to engage in this discussion, and we are going to continue our efforts across the state,” Tisha Schuller, CEO of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, told The Coloradoan. That means lawsuits.

And the lawsuits won’t just come from the fracking industry; they’ll also come from Gov. John Hickenlooper’s administration. The industry and state are already suing Longmont, which passed a fracking ban last year, arguing that voters there are illegally “taking” minerals that rightfully belong to somebody else.

Tuesday’s vote didn’t just tell frackers where to go — it highlighted how out of touch the Democratic governor is on this issue.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

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Colorado voters tell fracking industry to frack off

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Frackers might soon be allowed to float their wastewater down rivers

by CarriNDQ Posted on November 5, 2013

Frackers might soon be allowed to float their wastewater down rivers

By John Upton

Shutterstock

We told you the other day that frackers are drawing millions of gallons of water from rivers and streams to pump into their wells. Now the U.S. Coast Guard wants that water returned to the rivers — floating on barges and laced with radioactive contamination.

Wastewater is a huge problem for the fracking industry. It’s produced when the water that frackers pump into the ground returns to the surface — contaminated with fracking chemicals and also with toxic substances that naturally linger deep beneath the soil. Some of the wastewater is pumped back into the ground, but that can trigger earthquakes. Some of the wastewater is treated like sewage and then poured back into rivers and streams, but that pollutes waterways with the hitherto-subterranean radiation.

The industry wants to be allowed to ship its wastewater away from frack sites to be dumped, stored, or recycled in far-off locations, even in other states. And the Coast Guard is giving the public a month to comment on its proposal to allow this precarious practice to begin. From PublicSource, a news outlet in the heavily fracked state of Pennsylvania:

The Coast Guard began studying the issue nearly two years ago at the request of its Pittsburgh office, which had inquiries from companies transporting Marcellus Shale wastewater.

If the policy is approved, companies can ship the wastewater in bulk on barges on the nation’s 12,000 miles of waterways, a much cheaper mode than trucks or rail. …

Under the policy, companies would first have to test the wastewater at a state-certified laboratory and provide the data to the Coast Guard for review. The tests would determine levels of radioactivity, pH, bromides and other hazardous materials. …

However, “the identity of proprietary chemicals may be withheld from public release,” the policy states.

The proposed regulations [PDF], which were published last week, would cap each load’s level of radioactivity:

The Coast Guard is concerned that, over time, sediment and deposits with radioisotopes may accumulate on the inside of the barge tank surface and may pose a health risk to personnel entering the tank. The Coast Guard’s concern with respect to radioisotopes is to ensure that radiation exposure duration and levels are both kept as low as reasonably achievable, within the meaning of Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulations.

Environmentalists and scientists worry about the potential impacts if a barge sinks, runs aground, or tips over while laden with a stew of pollution. “If and when there’s a spill, that can’t be cleaned up,” said Benjamin Stout, a biology professor at Wheeling Jesuit University. “That means it’s going to be in the drinking-water supply of millions of people.”

Source
Proposed policy letter: Carriage of conditionally permitted shale gas extraction waste water in bulk, U.S. Coast Guard
U.S. Coast Guard publishes proposed policy on moving frack wastewater by barge, PublicSource

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Frackers might soon be allowed to float their wastewater down rivers

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Lagoons filled with toxic water coming to Ohio’s fracklands

by berrywood1 Posted on October 14, 2013

Lagoons filled with toxic water coming to Ohio’s fracklands

By John Upton

National Energy Technology Laboratory

via NRDC

A fracking wastewater impoundment lot.

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 process to outline their standards of construction and their length of use,” said Mark Bruce, spokesman for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

A provision in the most-recent state budget requires Natural Resources officials to create rules and permits for them. …

Tom Stewart, vice president of the Ohio Oil and Gas Association, said the lagoons would be built with plastic liners to prevent leaks. He said treatment operations would strip out harmful pollutants.

“They want to clean it up and use it again,” Stewart said. “That means getting the water back to as fresh a state as possible.”

But environmentalists worry the wastewater pits will pose threats to streams and groundwater. Trent Dougherty, a lawyer with the Ohio Environmental Council, also warned that they could be used as long-term storage for tainted water: “There is a point in time when temporary storage can become long-term storage,” he said.

Source
Big lagoons could hold Ohio fracking waste, The Columbus Dispatch

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Lagoons filled with toxic water coming to Ohio’s fracklands

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Up to 100,000 cattle dead in South Dakota blizzard

by Guadalupe Scharff Posted on October 14, 2013

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Inside of a Dog – Alexandra Horowitz

The bestselling book that asks what dogs know and how they think, now in paperback. The answers will surprise and delight you as Alexandra Horowitz, a cognitive scientist, explains how dogs perceive their daily worlds, each other, and that other quirky animal, the human. Horowitz introduces the reader to dogs’ perceptual and cognitive abilities and then draw […]

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Codex: Adepta Sororitas – Games Workshop

The Adepta Sororitas, also known as the Sisters of Battle, are an elite sisterhood of warriors raised from infancy to adore the Emperor of Mankind. Their fanatical devotion and unwavering purity is a bulwark against corruption, heresy and alien attack, and once battle has been joined they will stop at nothing until their enemies are utterly crushed In this b […]

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Index Chaotica: Garden of Nurgle – Games Workshop

The Plague Father’s realm within the Warp includes the nauseating putrescent of the Garden of Nurgle. A tangled forest of noxious plants and rotting souls the garden is crisscrossed with winding paths and stinking bogs, each one leading to another terrible part of Nurgle’s personal domain. About This Series: Though the Chaos Space Marines were once heroic de […]

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Paracord Fusion Ties – Volume 2 – J.D. Lenzen

Paracord Fusion Ties – Volume 2 (PFT-V2) is the second installment in the paracord fusion ties book series and another stunning achievement by author J.D. Lenzen. Like Paracord Fusion Ties – Volume 1, PFT-V2 reveals innovative and stylish ways of storing paracord for later use. So once again you’ll find crisp, clear, full-color photographs (over 1,000 i […]

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Warlords of the Dark Millennium: Ahriman – Games Workshop

Once a favoured sorcerer of the Thousand Sons Legion, Ahriman was responsible for the Rubric, an powerful spell that turned almost every Space Marine in his Legion to dust, trapped forever in their animated suit of power armour. Now, Ahriman seeks knowledge above all else, and has spent his lifetime seeking out the entrance to the mysterious Black Library. A […]

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Warhammer 40,000: The Rules – Games Workshop

There is no time for peace. No respite. No forgiveness. There is only WAR. In the nightmare future of the 41st Millennium, Mankind teeters upon the brink of destruction. The galaxy-spanning Imperium of Man is beset on all sides by ravening aliens and threatened from within by Warp-spawned entities and heretical plots. Only the strength of the immortal […]

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Codex: Adepta Sororitas (eBook Edition) – Games Workshop

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Codex: Space Marines (Enhanced Edition) – Games Workshop

The Space Marines are the chosen warriors of the Emperor, and the greatest fighting force of the Imperium. Each Space Marine is a genetically enhanced super soldier, easily a match for a dozen lesser men, armed with some of the deadliest weapons in the galaxy and encased in formidable power armour. This codex explores the formations and Chapters of the Space […]

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Munitorum: Rail Rifles – Games Workshop

The Tau are masters of advanced technologies and weapons system, like their fearsome rail technology that can accelerate rounds to supersonic speeds. Against attacks from a rail weapon even the heaviest armours are little protection, the shots punching through plasteel and ferrocrete with equal ease. About this Series: Weapons are the tools of war and with t […]

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How to Raise the Perfect Dog – Cesar Millan & Melissa Jo Peltier

From the bestselling author and star of National Geographic Channel’s Dog Whisperer , the only resource you’ll need for raising a happy, healthy dog. For the millions of people every year who consider bringing a puppy into their lives–as well as those who have already brought a dog home–Cesar Millan, the preeminent dog behavior expert, says, “Yes, […]

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Up to 100,000 cattle dead in South Dakota blizzard

Posted in alo, Citadel, eco-friendly, FF, G & F, GE, LAI, Monterey, ONA, PUR, solar, solar power, Uncategorized | Tagged adepta-sororitas, chemicals, citadel, drought, Emperor, grazing, greenhouse, industry, livestock, q&a, space, story | Comments Off

Fracking industry says fracking made you $1,200 richer last year

by bibw6a Posted on September 6, 2013

Fracking industry says fracking made you $1,200 richer last year

By John Upton

Shutterstock

Want to get rich? Just take from the environment.

If you keep a close eye on energy news, you probably know by now that fracking for oil and natural gas is injecting $1,200 a year into the bank accounts of American households.

Fricking awesome, right? Go on out right now and buy that 65-inch plasma TV on credit — you’re good for it. Because of fracking.

Or maybe not.

A new report [PDF] from consulting firm IHS CERA claims that fracking increased household disposable income in the U.S. by more than $1,200 last year, and that the industry supports 2.1 million jobs. Reuters, CNBC, Forbes.com, and the Los Angeles Times reported the study’s key findings.

But as Media Matters for America notes, “These figures are much larger than the findings of many previous economic studies.” Media Matters also points out that the aforementioned media outlets didn’t bother reporting who paid for the study. It’s all there at the bottom of the report’s third page:

This research was supported by the American Chemistry Council, America’s Natural Gas Alliance, the American Petroleum Institute, the Fertilizer Institute, the US Chamber of Commerce – Institute for 21st Century Energy, the National Association of Manufacturers, the Natural Gas Supply Association, Rio Tinto, and the Society of the Plastics Industry.

Well, golly, if the industries that frack and use much of the fracked gas and oil say fracking is great, then who are we to argue?

Bloomberg tries to inject a small dose of ecological reality into the conversation, noting that the report “didn’t account for the potential environmental impacts of fracking.”

Environmental impacts? Pffft, industry bodies that represent massive corporations don’t care about environmental impacts, so why should we? Free hypothetical money for everybody!

Source
What The Media Left Out: Pro-Fracking Report Was Funded By Gas Industry, Media Matters for America

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Fracking industry says fracking made you $1,200 richer last year

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The Texas Tribune: Fighting Pest, Farmers Find Strange Ally: A Drought

by Myrna Posted on August 31, 2013

Texas’ drought has left crops parched across the state, but the lack of water could have unintended benefits, in the killing-off of boll weevils, for South Texas farmers. Read this article: The Texas Tribune: Fighting Pest, Farmers Find Strange Ally: A Drought ; ;Related ArticlesMajor Surge Is Unlikely for Prices of U.S. GasCity Room: A Quiet Beauty Flying ByFacing Fire Over Challenge to Louisiana’s Oil Industry ;

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The Texas Tribune: Fighting Pest, Farmers Find Strange Ally: A Drought

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USA Today: Renewable fuels make a difference

by Posted on August 16, 2013

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USA Today: Renewable fuels make a difference

Posted 16 August 2013 in

National

From USA Today:

Congress shouldn’t weaken the Renewable Fuel Standard, which commits our country to using increasing quantities of clean-burning biofuels.

The RFS is one of the most successful energy policies ever. Since it was enacted in 2005, U.S. dependence on imported oil has decreased from 60% to 40% largely because of biofuels. American biofuels are good for our economic security, too. The American ethanol industry supports some 365,000 jobs in 29 states, especially in rural communities. In 2012, the industry contributed $43.4 billion to the gross domestic product, $30.2 billion to household incomes, and $8billion in federal, state and local taxes.

Because ethanol burns cleaner than gasoline, it reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 34% to 59%. Because ethanol costs less than gasoline, it saves motorists more than $1,200 per year.

When Congress crafted the RFS, it built in a great deal of administrative and market flexibility, allowing refiners and gasoline marketers to adjust to changing market dynamics that reduce the supply of biofuels. Last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) demonstrated the RFS’ flexibility once again by reducing the requirement for cellulosic (non-grain) ethanol.

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USA Today: Renewable fuels make a difference

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Fracking company wants to build new pipeline — for water

by marinavhunt Posted on August 15, 2013

Fracking company wants to build new pipeline — for water

By John Upton

Rob Ireton

Should frackers be allowed to suck millions of gallons a day from the Ohio River?

Antero Resources, a major Marcellus Shale driller, needs so much water for its fracking operations that it hauls truckloads from the Ohio River to its wells in West Virginia and Ohio. To cut down on transportation costs, the company now wants to build an 80-mile water pipeline.

The Wall Street Journal describes the project as a “costly wager that the hydraulic-fracturing industry’s thirst for reliable sources of water will grow” — and reports that enviros are worried about the swelling stresses that the industry is placing on the Ohio River, which is the Mississippi River’s largest tributary:

Tapping the Ohio would give the pipeline access to the region’s most dependable source of water. Many of the rivers and streams that Antero now uses run low in the summer, prompting state officials to stop gas-industry withdrawals. A drought in Ohio last year curtailed water to fracking operations.

In a permit filed with the Army Corps of Engineers, which regulates water withdrawals from the Ohio River, Antero said it plans to build an intake pipe capable of sucking up 3,360 gallons of river water a minute—or about 4.8 million gallons a day. …

Some environmental groups are concerned by the scope of the project. “There is a whole lot of water in the Ohio River, but not if we start withdrawing millions of gallons of water a day,” says Janet Keating, executive director of the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition.

A growing number of pipelines are supplying water to fracking wells—though few of them have been anywhere near as expensive.

At least this pipeline won’t explode in a burst of oil or flaming gas. But it highlights one more way that fracking messes with the environment.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Fracking company wants to build new pipeline — for water