Natural-Gas

By Sea Turtle Restoration Project The first ever recorded hybrid hawksbill sea turtle found in Australia nested this season at James Price Point, site of the proposed natural gas refinery in the Kimberley of Western Australia. The rare sea turtle was discovered during an independent survey of marine turtles at James Price Point conducted to provide more accurate and comprehensive science than the oil-industry funded studies done to date. The findings from the recent sea turtle study were released today, casting further doubts over the scientific integrity of the W.A. Government’s environmental impact assessment for the James Price Point gas hub. ...

By Christine Shearer / TruthOut Although the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 3 issued a statement last week that its preliminary tests of water samples near drilling and fracking sites in the Pennsylvania town of Dimock showed no health concerns, the group Water Defense and “Gasland” director Josh Fox went to Dimock to look at the EPA summaries themselves, which they say do report high levels of explosive methane, heavy metals and hazardous chemicals. The issue is raising renewed controversy over the increasing growth of unconventional gas drilling and fracking and the uncertainty around health and safety regulations. ...

By University of Colorado, Denver In a new study, researchers from the Colorado School of Public Health have shown that air pollution caused by hydraulic fracturing or fracking may contribute to acute and chronic health problems for those living near natural gas drilling sites. “Our data show that it is important to include air pollution in the national dialogue on natural gas development that has focused largely on water exposures to hydraulic fracturing,” said Lisa McKenzie, Ph.D., MPH, lead author of the study and research associate at the Colorado School of Public Health. ...

By Walter Brasch / Dissident Voice A new Pennsylvania law endangers public health by forbidding health care professionals from sharing information they learn about certain chemicals and procedures used in high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing. The procedure is commonly known as fracking. Fracking is the controversial method of forcing water, gases, and chemicals at tremendouspressure of up to 15,000 pounds per square inch into a rock formation as much as 10,000 feet below the earth’s surface to open channels and force out natural gas and fossil fuels. ...

By the Natural Resources Defense Council The Obama administration’s decision today authorizing nearly 1,300 new natural gas wells in Utah Desolation Canyon wilderness and other remote areas will degrade the pristine region’s air quality and hurt the state’s tourism industry, according to a coalition of environmental groups. In approving the so-called Gasco development project, the Department of the Interior also rejected calls by the Environmental Protection Agency and tens of thousands of citizens from across the country to approve an alternative to Gasco’s proposal. This alternative would have allowed for significant development while protecting the department’s plan to designate Desolation Canyon as wilderness and reducing the overall footprint and impact of the project. ...

By Fiona Harvey / The Guardian The biggest meeting on the issue of fracking for shale gas to be held in the UK will take place in Manchester on Saturday in an attempt to set up a broad nationwide coalition to stop the controversial practice. Protest groups have been set up in areas currently affected by shale gas exploration activities or likely to be the sites of fracking in future. ...

By Krishna Ramanujan A new report has found dozens of cases of illness, death and reproductive issues in cows, horses, goats, llamas, chickens, dogs, cats, fish and other wildlife, and humans. It says these conditions could be the result of exposure to gas drilling operations. Hydraulic fracturing, popularly called hydrofracking, is a process for extracting natural gas from shale using chemicals and water. The paper’s authors, Robert Oswald, a professor of molecular medicine at Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine, and veterinarian Michelle Bamberger, DVM ‘85, interviewed animal owners in six states – Colorado, Louisiana, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas – and cited 24 cases where animals were potentially affected by gas drilling. ...

By Dave Cooper / Huffington Post While combating dirty fossil-fuel energy sources like coal and shale gas, activists can sometimes find themselves so intensely focused on one issue that they lose track of important developments in other related fossil fuel campaigns. Mountain Justice Spring Break (MJSB), March 21-28 in northern West Virginia, seeks to build bridges between the long-established anti-mountaintop removal (MTR) campaign in Appalachia and the fast-growing anti-fracking campaign. ...

By Kevin Begos, Associated Press A western Pennsylvania woman says state environmental officials refused to do follow-up tests after their lab reported her drinking water contained chemicals that could be from nearby gas drilling. At least 10 households in the rural Woodlands community, about 30 miles north of Pittsburgh, have complained that recent drilling impacted their water in different ways. The Department of Environmental Protection first suggested that Janet McIntyre’s well water contained low levels of only one chemical, toluene. But a review of the DEP tests by The Associated Press found four other volatile organic compounds in her water that can be associated with gas drilling. ...

By BBC A gas-fuelled fire, with flames as high as 5m, may burn for months in waters off the Niger Delta in south-east Nigeria, Chevron has told the BBC. Two workers died after January’s explosion at the KS Endeavour exploration rig, owned by the US firm. Friends of the Earth says this is the world’s worst such accident in recent years. Chevron spokesman Lloyd Avram says, despite the fire, the situation is now under control and no oil is leaking. ...