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Huge North Dakota oil spill went unreported by furloughed feds

by e0ebri1z Posted on October 11, 2013

Huge North Dakota oil spill went unreported by furloughed feds

By

SnoShuu

This is what a wheat field looks like when it isn’t covered with thousands of barrels of leaked oil.

A farmer discovered a huge oil spill — several times bigger than the recent Mayflower, Ark., spill – nearly two weeks ago in North Dakota. But because of federal government furloughs, we’re only just learning about it.

More than 20,000 barrels of fracked oil seeped from a ruptured pipeline over 7 acres of remote North Dakota wheat fields, oozing 10 feet into the clay soil and killing crops. Farmer Steven Jensen found the mess on his land on Sept. 29.

The National Response Center, which reports oil and chemical spills, posted an alert about the spill on its website this week. Reuters reports that the agency normally posts such reports within a day, but that its work has been stymied by the government shutdown.

But there’s really nothing to worry about, says Tesoro Logistics, the company responsible for the spill:

There have been no injuries or known impacts to water, wildlife or the surrounding environment as a result of this incident.

Jeez, it’s as if the pipeline spewed oxygen and candy.

Try telling that to Jensen, whose nose led him to a pool of oil while he was out harvesting on his 1,800-acre farm. “It was pretty ugly,” he told Reuters. The nearby crop had “disintegrated, you wouldn’t have known it was a wheat plant.” More from Reuters:

At an estimated 20,600 barrels, it ranks among the biggest U.S. spills in recent years. It is the biggest oil leak on U.S. land since March, when the rupture of an Exxon Mobil pipeline in Mayflower, Arkansas spilled 5,000 to 7,000 barrels of heavy Canadian crude. …

This is the biggest oil spill in North Dakota since 1 million barrels of salt water brine, a by-product of oil production, leaked from a well site in 2006, according to the state Department of Health.

Emergency crews initially lit fire to the oil spill, burning an estimated 750 barrels in an effort to reach the leaking pipeline – despite homes being located a half mile away.

Tesoro says the burst pipeline has been shut down and it’s conducting an internal investigation to try to determine the cause of the accident. A state official’s description of a hole in the pipeline made it sound as though the spill was caused by corrosion. About 1,200 barrels of oil had been recovered by Thursday, meaning at least another 18,000 barrels are still out there in Jensen’s fields.

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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Splitsville for Obama and his chief climate adviser

by Myrna Posted on October 8, 2013

Splitsville for Obama and his chief climate adviser

By

CSIS

Heather Zichal.

What two things do you say to Barack Obama’s climate and energy czar?

“Who are you?” and “Catch ya later.”

You might never have heard the name Heather Zichal (then again, being a Grist reader, you might very well have).

Zichal is the White House official who has done much of the president’s heavy lifting on climate policy. Which, despite promises made by Obama during the 2008 election campaign, had not been a particularly admirable amount. But then June 2013 rolled around, and Obama unveiled a far-reaching climate plan that had been crafted by Zichal — who by then had risen to become his senior climate and energy adviser. Zichal was also instrumental in developing new federal standards for the fuel efficiency of cars.

Sounds like preeminent, high-profile work, right? Wrong. Despite the headiness of the role, Zichal was never given the authority, profile, or resources that such important work deserves. Al Gore made a veiled reference to her post in June, complaining that Obama had just “one person” working on climate change “who hasn’t been given that much authority.”

And now, after five years, it’s splitsville for Zichal and the president. It’s not quite clear just yet what gig Zichal has lined up — but Reuters is reporting that it will be “non-government” work.

The Washington Post reports that the White House wanted Zichal to stay, but that it didn’t do enough to convince her to stick around:

In an effort to keep Zichal on board, White House officials raised the possibility of her chairing the Council on Environmental Quality in the event that its chair, Nancy Sutley, would leave, according to people familiar with the decision who demanded anonymity in order to discuss sensitive personnel issues.

Sutley’s departure has not been announced, but the people familiar with the situation said she would step down before the end the year.

In a statement, White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough praised Zichal’s work.

“Heather is one of the president’s most trusted policy advisers,” McDonough said.

Environmental Protection Agency administrator Gina McCarthy said Zichal was “tremendously influential,” but that her departure will not affect how the administration’s climate action plan moves forward.

Obama has become adept at losing top environmental officials. Zichal joins former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, and former Interior Secretary Ken Salazar in parting ways with Obama during his second term.


Source
Obama’s climate adviser plans to step down, Washington Post
Obama climate adviser Zichal to step down: officials, Reuters

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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How to clean a lake with an unstoppable oil spill: Drain the lake

by rakil23 Posted on September 26, 2013

How to clean a lake with an unstoppable oil spill: Drain the lake

By

Photograph obtained by the

Toronto Star

Oil polluting the ground at Cold Lake in Alberta.

We told you in July that tar-sands oil had been leaking into the Canadian wilderness from a drilling site for well over a month — and that nobody knew how to stanch the flow.

It would be nice to update you on how that leak was finally fixed. No such luck: The oil is still leaking.

More than 12,000 barrels of leaked bitumen has been mopped up, but at least 100 animals have died at the Canadian Natural Resources’ Primrose oil extraction site. So much bitumen has flowed into a 131-acre lake that Alberta’s environment department has ordered the company to drain it and dredge it before the waterbody freezes over. From Reuters:

The leak, one of four on the sprawling project site, sprung up from an oil sands reserve produced by a process that melts bitumen with high-pressure steam so that it can be moved and processed. The leak has yet to be stopped, and has become the latest focus for environmentalists concerned about the impact oil sands production.

“The Alberta government should, at a minimum, put a hold on approving new underground tar sands operations until we understand how these leaks are happening and if other sites could run into similar problems,” Mike Hudema, a climate and energy campaigner at Greenpeace Canada, said in a statement.

The order says the company must pump the water from the area of the lake that is in the vicinity of leak into the third of the lake where it can be contained by a road that cuts across the water body. Then the cleanup of the spill site can be completed.

The drill-happy province says the massive spill has not affected water quality in the lake. That’s wonderful news, because it means that this is a lake visited by dragon-slaying unicorns that lap up tar and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, carrying them to another planet where they won’t do any harm. Also, magic is real.


Source
Canadian Natural told to drain Alberta lake due to oil sands leak, Reuters

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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How to clean a lake with an unstoppable oil spill: Drain the lake

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Thai tourist paradise wrecked by oil spill

by Steven Posted on July 30, 2013

Thai tourist paradise wrecked by oil spill

By John Upton

LisaRoxy

Coconut Bay before the oil spill.

What could be lovelier than a vacation at Thailand’s Coconut Bay?

Right now, just about anything.

Thousands of gallons of crude gushed from a ruptured pipeline into the Gulf of Thailand over the weekend, blackening shorelines that had recently been bustling with tourists. Some beaches have been closed; others have simply been deserted.

Chemical dispersants have been dumped from airplanes over the slick, which should be helping to break up the oil but also potentially sickening workers, visitors, fish, and other wildlife.

The paradise-like island of Koh Samet, a tourist hub that’s four hours by bus and boat from Bangkok, has been hit hard. An official told reporters that tourism there had been impacted in “an extreme way.” Officials fear that the slick could reach central Thailand. From Reuters:

Worst hit was the beach at Ao Prao, or Coconut Bay, but tourists elsewhere on the island were getting out.

“We’re staying on another beach but we’re not taking any chances. We are checking out,” Daria Volkov, a tourist from Moscow, told Reuters.

Koh Samet, known for its beaches and clear, warm sea, is thronged by domestic and foreign tourists, thanks to its proximity to Bangkok.

“Tourists are leaving, some have cancelled their bookings,” said Chairat Trirattanajarasporn, chairman of the provincial tourist association.

Pipeline owner PTT Global Chemical Pcl, which is part of state-controlled PTT Pcl, Thailand’s biggest energy firm, has apologized for the spill and says the cleanup could take several more days. That prediction seems as ludicrous as its claim that just 13,000 gallons of oil spilled from the pipe. If the cleanup is stopped after just several days, there will be a lot of oil left behind on sandy shorelines.

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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Energy Secretary Moniz says Obama is not waging war on coal

by qdyedut Posted on July 2, 2013

Energy Secretary Moniz says Obama is not waging war on coal

By John Upton

Shutterstock

Coal lovers can breathe easy (as long as they’re not downwind of a coal-fired power plant, that is). President Obama’s new energy secretary, Ernest Moniz, has dismissed conservative claims that his boss is waging a war on coal, assuring Americans that the dirtiest fossil fuel will remain a vital part of America’s energy mix in the years to come.

From Reuters:

Obama “expects fossil fuels, and coal specifically, to remain a significant contributor for some time,” Moniz told Reuters in Vienna, where he was to attend a nuclear security conference.

The way the U.S. administration is “looking at it is: what does it take for us to do to make coal part of a low carbon future,” he said, adding this would include higher efficiency plants and new ways of utilizing coal.

It is “all about having, in fact, coal as part of that future,” Moniz said. “I don’t believe it is a ‘war on coal’.”

Well, that’s a relie … cough hack cough … f.

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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Pesticide makers want you to save the bees

by AshleaMelina844 Posted on March 29, 2013

Pesticide makers want you to save the bees

By John Upton

BayerBee killer.

Not only do manufacturers of bee-killing pesticides still insist that their products should be sold — now they are saying that everybody else needs to be doing more to help save the bees.

Syngenta and Bayer say that their poisonous products do not kill bees, despite a bevy of evidence suggesting otherwise. (The complex problem of colony collapse disorder, in which the pesticides are heavily implicated, is getting worse, by the way — not better.) Their neonicotinoid-based pesticides may soon be outlawed soon by the European Commission, and beekeepers and activists are suing the EPA as they push for a similar ban here.

But the chemical companies want us to know that they care deeply about these pollinators. And they have kind-heartedly published a plan they think could help the rest of us boost bee populations.

After all, if neonicotinoids are banned, they say, then we may never truly understand how they affect bees. Imagine living without that kind of knowledge.

From Reuters:

Syngenta and Bayer, which say harmful effects of the pesticides on bees are unproven and that a ban would deal a blow to the EU economy, proposed a plan that includes the creation of more flowering field margins to provide habitats for bees.

They also proposed a field monitoring program to detect the neonicotinoids pesticides blamed for the decline of honeybees, measures to limit the exposure of bees to the products and more research into the impact of parasites and viruses.

“This comprehensive plan will bring valuable insights into the area of bee health, whereas a ban on neonicotinoids would simply close the door to understanding the problem,” Syngenta Chief Operating Officer John Atkin said in a statement.

All you organic gardeners and pollinator lovers, consider yourselves called out: Pesticide-producing corporations say you need to do more to help save the bees that they are killing. Consider volunteering for a bee monitoring program or something.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

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Melting ice is a boon for archaeology

by Gwenda Bischof Posted on March 26, 2013

Melting ice is a boon for archaeology

By John Upton

Shutterstock

As glaciers melt, they are revealing old tunics and bodies and stuff.

As glaciers melt and recede, they are revealing archaeological treasures from the civilizations that came before ours.

A humble tunic found at a site normally covered over with ice in south Norway is among the discoveries that wouldn’t have been possible without the assistance of global warming.

From Reuters:

“It’s worrying that glaciers are melting but it’s exciting for us archaeologists,” Lars Piloe, a Danish archaeologist who works on Norway’s glaciers, said at the first public showing of the tunic, which has been studied since it was found in 2011. …

The 1991 discovery of Otzi, a prehistoric man who roamed the Alps 5,300 years ago between Austria and Italy, is the best known glacier find. In recent years, other finds have been made from Alaska to the Andes, many because glaciers are receding.

The shrinkage is blamed on climate change, stoked by man-made emissions of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels.

The archaeologists said the tunic showed that Norway’s Lendbreen glacier, where it was found, had not been so small since 300 AD. When exposed to air, untreated ancient fabrics can disintegrate in weeks because of insect and bacteria attacks.

Well, old tunics are cool. Nobody is saying they’re not. But it’s too bad we can’t dig up some of the wisdom of past societies that treasured nature and valued lives lived in harmony with it. Alongside the smelly old clothes, of course.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

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The budget turmoil may mean no meat inspectors — and no meat

by nension Posted on February 11, 2013

The budget turmoil may mean no meat inspectors — and no meat

By Philip Bump

In every respect, the sequester is dumb. If you’re only vaguely familiar with the term as it’s being used this month: God bless you. But a little background is in order. The recently ended 112th Congress wasn’t mature enough to come up with a plan to reduce the deficit (even though it had declared that the deficit was a big priority), so it decided to build a time bomb. “If you don’t come up with a budget plan in the spring,” it said, “this thing’s gonna blow, slicing over a trillion dollars from the budget over the next decade.” The 112th Congress then laughed maniacally and did nothing for the rest of the year. Now the 113th Congress is standing around holding this big bomb, sweating nervously, mad at the previous Congress (which was almost entirely the same people).

Oh, you don’t care? Good, slash government, you say? Cool attitude. But also: Say goodbye to all of the meat you eat. From Reuters:

The Obama administration warned on Friday that across-the-board spending cuts set to take effect in March may result in furloughing every U.S. meat and poultry inspector for two weeks, causing the meat industry to shut down.

By law, meatpackers and processors are not allowed to ship beef, pork, lamb and poultry meat without the Agriculture Department’s inspection seal.

Remember before when you were like, “Who cares about budget cuts?” Now, you do. Ha ha.

Shutterstock

Can you even imagine going a day without delicacies like this?

Here is a spoiler: This is an obviously empty threat on which the president would never follow through. Obama is 51 years old. He’ll only be 54 when he leaves office. Do you think he wants to spend the rest of his life being known as the president who allowed the United States to go without meat for even an hour? When Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, he suggested that the move would lose the South for Democrats for a generation. If Obama let America run out of meat, he’d lose the entire United States for Democrats for about a century.

Reuters adds this bit of trivia:

Americans consume more than 200 pounds (91 kg) of meat apiece each year, an average of slightly more than one-half pound a day.

Gross.

But, it could be worse. We could be Europe.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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A fracking horror story: Do you know who owns what’s underneath your land?

by mirorita02 Posted on February 8, 2013

A fracking horror story: Do you know who owns what’s underneath your land?

By Philip Bump

For your weekend reading, a horror story from North Carolina, via Reuters:

Three years ago, Vince and Jeanne Rhea found the house of their dreams in Shirley, Arkansas. They couldn’t believe the deal: 40 acres complete with a separate workshop that Jeanne could use as an art studio and two nearby lakes. It was also thousands of dollars cheaper than a property of that quality should have been. They booked a plane ticket from Raleigh, North Carolina that day to fly down and buy it.

When they got to Arkansas, they found out why it was so cheap.

The owner of the house had recently sold the mineral rights under the property to a natural gas company for use in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a drilling technique that is opening new areas across the country for energy exploration. The front page of the local newspaper that day had a story about problems in the water supply and was advising residents not to bathe, Jeanne recalled. “There was no way we were making an offer after that,” she said.

Close call. Except that the Rheas then bought property in Lee County, a rural area of North Carolina — and found that it too was over a shale formation.

[B]ecause of two arcane laws known as split estates and forced pooling, they may not even have the right to say whether gas companies can drill on their property. …

“Whether we want to sell or not, the gas companies could take our property from us,” said Vince Rhea.

oldrebel

The courthouse in Lee County, N.C.

The article takes a deep-dive look at the legal rights surrounding property ownership, particularly the difference between owning property and owning the right to extract what’s underneath it. Tension between the two isn’t new, but it’s escalated as drilling companies explore previously untouched shale formations.

Turn down the lights, light a few candles, and prepare to be chilled to the bone. The story is twice as scary as Nightmare on Elm Street, and with far, far more sequels.

Source

In North Carolina, fracking rights rise to surface, Reuters

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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Have coal companies been ripping Americans off even more than we already knew?

by 7GrittonMaine146 Posted on February 8, 2013

Have coal companies been ripping Americans off even more than we already knew?

By Philip Bump

The coal industry, for as much as it whines and frets and fake-cries about how oppressive the government is, gets a pretty sweet deal. We’ve noted before than companies pay 25 cents a ton for coal from public lands and then can turn around and sell it for $35 a ton. (We’ve also mentioned that they often sell that coal to China, meaning we’re subsidizing the world’s largest consumer of coal, but that’s a whole other issue.)

This was reported as eight pounds of coal, probably.

What makes this so much more galling is that the weepy coal companies might not even be paying for all of the coal they’re extracting. From The Hill:

Interior is looking into whether mining firms lowball the value of coal excavated from federal lands to minimize the fees they pay the government. …

Reuters said mining companies are underreporting the price of coal at mine sites — where royalties are assessed — then selling it to marketers that they often times own. Reuters said those intermediaries then ship the coal abroad, where they fetch higher prices.

[Sen. Ron Wyden (R-Ore.)] and Energy Committee ranking member Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) had asked [Interior Secretary Ken] Salazar to examine those charges in a January letter. They said the government could ill afford to lose out on any revenues, noting coal royalties amounted to $898 million in 2011.

The National Mining Association suggests that the Reuters report was inaccurate. Of course, the NMA also went out of its way to propagate the “war on coal” nonsense, so it can be ignored.

As part of its investigation, Interior will review a decade of coal sales, largely from the Powder River Basin region in Wyoming and Montana that provides much of the coal exported to Asia. The department is also considering a new system that would assess a royalty on coal companies’ proceeds rather than tons of coal mined.

Or, to crib from bad parents from the 1950s: Coal companies, we’ll give you something to cry about.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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