Raul Grijalva.  January 19, 2006. The Nation. "Coming Clean and Green."

"Much of the progress made over the past four decades in protecting the environment has been reversed by the Bush Administration. Its priorities are clear: The interests of corporate contributors always trump the public's well-being."

This article appeared in the February 6, 2006 edition of The Nation. Raul Grijalva, Chair of the House Democratic Environmental Task Force, has represented Arizona's 7th District since 2003.

Keeping Our Eyes on the Ball

May I remind you what this [2006] election is about? Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, unprecedented presidential powers, unmatched incompetence, unparalleled corruption, unwarranted eavesdropping, Katrina, Enron, Halliburton, global warming, Cheney’s secret energy task force, record oil company profits, $3 gasoline, FEMA, the Supreme Court, Diebold, Florida in 2000, Ohio in 2004, Terri Schiavo, stem cell research, golden parachutes, shrunken pensions, unavailable and expensive healthcare, habeas corpus, no weapons of mass destruction, sacrificed soldiers and Iraqi civilians, wasted billions, Taliban resurgence, expiration of the assault weapons ban, North Korea, Iran, intelligent design, Swift boat hit squads, and on and on.

This election is about that, but much more—it’s about honor, dignity and comity in this country. It’s about the Constitution, which gives us this great nation. Bush ran on a pledge of “restoring honor and integrity” to the White House. Instead, he brought us Tom DeLay, Roy Blunt, Katherine Harris, John Doolittle, Jerry Lewis, Richard Pombo, Mark Foley, Dennis Hastert, David Safavian, Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed, Karl Rove and an illegal and immoral war in Iraq. People, it’s up to you.

You saw it on 'Earth To America!', now see it here. The Blue Man Group really gets the message across loud and clear with this great video. Can you hear? From: stopglobalwarming.org

Earth to America!

Larry David standup: "Rich Pricks and Poor Schmucks." Live at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, November 17, 2005.

"It is estimated that more than 5 million gallons of water per day are used in fracturing operations." ( p. 26 of 34. )

This 2006 Powerpoint may represent the only scholarly study found to date that indicates an accurate estimate of the amount of water used per day in hydrofracking. Further research into this estimated amount is required.

Presented at “The Future of Desalination in Texas,” Global Petroleum Research Institute, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas, Aug. 6-8, 2006.

Start with the Introduction to the Feature Articles on NASA's Earth Observatory web site to see how scientists explain rapid climate change. The beauty of Earth's cities at night affirm our need for energy.

Global Warming and rapid climate change? There is room for denial, ask anyone who has been given a terminal AIDS or cancer diagnosis. But we are one big family with too many secrets. The U.S. and other nations cannot continue to exempt the military from environmental standards.

Perhaps our accepted ideas about the origin of oil will change as we discover life at the Earth's core and get more data from new missions beyond the Earth. What if we discover that the extraction methods and new technology that have given us hydraulic fracturing are destined to be obsolete? New research following in the footsteps of Thomas Gold's out-of-the-box thinking may lead us down a very different energy path.

The oceans and atmosphere are partners in creating Earth's climate. There is still much that remains to be discovered about the relationship between the geology underlying the oceans and Earth's climate.

See: Ocean and Climate Change Institute : Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

See: Public Supports Consumer and Environmental Protections, Polls Show

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 (P.L. 109-58), signed by President Bush on August 8, 2005, was the first omnibus energy legislation enacted in more than a decade. Spurred by rising energy prices and growing dependence on foreign oil, the new energy law was shaped by competing concerns about energy security, environmental quality, and economic growth.

The Energy Policy Act encourages production on federal lands through royalty reductions for marginal oil and gas wells on public lands and the outer continental shelf. Provisions are also included to increase access to federal lands by energy projects — such as drilling activities, electric transmission lines, and gas pipelines.

In addition, the law prevents the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from regulating hydraulic fracturing to protect drinking water sources.

(For additional information, see CRS Report RL32873, Key Environmental Issues in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, coordinated by Brent D. Yacobucci, and CRS Report RL32262, Selected Legal and Policy Issues Related to Coalbed Methane Development, by Aaron M. Flynn.)

See: CRS Report RL33302.

Summary. In the month leading up to a baby's birth, the umbilical cord pulses with the equivalent of at least 300 quarts of blood each day, pumped back and forth from the nutrient- and oxygen-rich placenta to the rapidly growing child cradled in a sac of amniotic fluid. This cord is a lifeline between mother and baby, bearing nutrients that sustain life and propel growth.

Not long ago scientists thought that the placenta shielded cord blood — and the developing baby — from most chemicals and pollutants in the environment. But now we know that at this critical time when organs, vessels, membranes and systems are knit together from single cells to finished form in a span of weeks, the umbilical cord carries not only the building blocks of life, but also a steady stream of industrial chemicals, pollutants and pesticides that cross the placenta as readily as residues from cigarettes and alcohol. This is the human "body burden" — the pollution in people that permeates everyone in the world, including babies in the womb.

In a study spearheaded by the Environmental Working Group (EWG)S in collaboration with Commonweal, researchers at two major laboratories found an average of 200 industrial chemicals and pollutants in umbilical cord blood from 10 babies born in August and September of 2004 in U.S. hospitals. Tests revealed a total of 287 chemicals in the group. The umbilical cord blood of these 10 children, collected by Red Cross after the cord was cut, harbored pesticides, consumer product ingredients, and wastes from burning coal, gasoline, and garbage.

This study represents the first reported cord blood tests for 261 of the targeted chemicals and the first reported detections in cord blood for 209 compounds. Among them are eight perfluorochemicals used as stain and oil repellants in fast food packaging, clothes and textiles — including the Teflon chemical PFOA, recently characterized as a likely human carcinogen by the EPA's Science Advisory Board — dozens of widely used brominated flame retardants and their toxic by-products; and numerous pesticides.

Of the 287 chemicals we detected in umbilical cord blood, we know that 180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth defects or abnormal development in animal tests. The dangers of pre- or post-natal exposure to this complex mixture of carcinogens, developmental toxins and neurotoxins have never been studied.

Chemicals and pollutants detected in human umbilical cord blood

	Mercury (Hg) - tested for 1, found 1 Pollutant from coal-fired power plants, mercury-containing products, and certain industrial processes. Accumulates in seafood. Harms brain development and function.
	Polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) - tested for 18, found 9 Pollutants from burning gasoline and garbage. Linked to cancer. Accumulates in food chain.
	Polybrominated dibenzodioxins and furans (PBDD/F) - tested for 12, found 7 Contaminants in brominated flame retardants. Pollutants and byproducts from plastic production and incineration. Accumulate in food chain. Toxic to developing endocrine (hormone) system
	Perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) - tested for 12, found 9 Active ingredients or breakdown products of Teflon, Scotchgard, fabric and carpet protectors, food wrap coatings. Global contaminants. Accumulate in the environment and the food chain. Linked to cancer, birth defects, and more.
	Polychlorinated dibenzodioxins and furans (PCDD/F) - tested for 17, found 11 Pollutants, by-products of PVC production, industrial bleaching, and incineration. Cause cancer in humans. Persist for decades in the environment. Very toxic to developing endocrine (hormone) system.
	Organochlorine pesticides (OCs) - tested for 28, found 21 DDT, chlordane and other pesticides. Largely banned in the U.S. Persist for decades in the environment. Accumulate up the food chain, to man. Cause cancer and numerous reproductive effects.
	Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) - tested for 46, found 32 Flame retardant in furniture foam, computers, and televisions. Accumulates in the food chain and human tissues. Adversely affects brain development and the thyroid.
	Polychlorinated Naphthalenes (PCNs) - tested for 70, found 50 Wood preservatives, varnishes, machine lubricating oils, waste incineration. Common PCB contaminant. Contaminate the food chain. Cause liver and kidney damage.
	Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) - tested for 209, found 147 Industrial insulators and lubricants. Banned in the U.S. in 1976. Persist for decades in the environment. Accumulate up the food chain, to man. Cause cancer and nervous system problems.

Source: Chemical analyses of 10 umbilical cord blood samples were conducted by AXYS Analytical Services (Sydney, BC) and Flett Research Ltd. (Winnipeg, MB).

Chemical exposures in the womb or during infancy can be dramatically more harmful than exposures later in life. Substantial scientific evidence demonstrates that children face amplified risks from their body burden of pollution; the findings are particularly strong for many of the chemicals found in this study, including mercury, PCBs and dioxins. Children's vulnerability derives from both rapid development and incomplete defense systems:

• A developing child's chemical exposures are greater pound-for-pound than those of adults.
• An immature, porous blood-brain barrier allows greater chemical exposures to the developing brain.
• Children have lower levels of some chemical-binding proteins, allowing more of a chemical to reach "target organs."
• A baby's organs and systems are rapidly developing, and thus are often more vulnerable to damage from chemical exposure.
• Systems that detoxify and excrete industrial chemicals are not fully developed.
• The longer future life span of a child compared to an adult allows more time for adverse effects to arise.

The 10 children in this study were chosen randomly, from among 2004's summer season of live births from mothers in Red Cross' volunteer, national cord blood collection program. They were not chosen because their parents work in the chemical industry or because they were known to bear problems from chemical exposures in the womb. Nevertheless, each baby was born polluted with a broad array of contaminants.

U.S. industries manufacture and import approximately 75,000 chemicals, 3,000 of them at over a million pounds per year. Health officials do not know how many of these chemicals pollute fetal blood and what the health consequences of in utero exposures may be.

Had we tested for a broader array of chemicals, we would almost certainly have detected far more than 287. But testing umbilical cord blood for industrial chemicals is technically challenging. Chemical manufacturers are not required to divulge to the public or government health officials methods to detect their chemicals in humans. Few labs are equipped with the machines and expertise to run the tests or the funding to develop the methods. Laboratories have yet to develop methods to test human tissues for the vast majority of chemicals on the market, and the few tests that labs are able to conduct are expensive. Laboratory costs for the cord blood analyses reported here were $10,000 per sample.

A developing baby depends on adults for protection, nutrition, and, ultimately, survival. As a society we have a responsibility to ensure that babies do not enter this world pre-polluted, with 200 industrial chemicals in their blood. Decades-old bans on a handful of chemicals like PCBs, lead gas additives, DDT and other pesticides have led to significant declines in people's blood levels of these pollutants. But good news like this is hard to find for other chemicals.

The Toxic Substances Control Act, the 1976 federal law meant to ensure the safety of commercial chemicals, essentially deemed 63,000 existing chemicals "safe as used" the day the law was passed, through mandated, en masse approval for use with no safety scrutiny. It forces the government to approve new chemicals within 90 days of a company's application at an average pace of seven per day. It has not been improved for nearly 30 years — longer than any other major environmental or public health statute — and does nothing to reduce or ensure the safety of exposure to pollution in the womb.

Because the Toxic Substances Control Act fails to mandate safety studies, the government has initiated a number of voluntary programs to gather more information about chemicals, most notably the high production volume (HPV) chemical screening program. But these efforts have been largely ineffective at reducing human exposures to chemicals. They are no substitute for a clear statutory requirement to protect children from the toxic effects of chemical exposure.

In light of the findings in this study and a substantial body of supporting science on the toxicity of early life exposures to industrial chemicals, we strongly urge that federal laws and policies be reformed to ensure that children are protected from chemicals, and that to the maximum extent possible, exposures to industrial chemicals before birth be eliminated. The sooner society takes action, the sooner we can reduce or end pollution in the womb.

See: World-Renowned Scientist Dr. Theo Colborn on the Health Effects of Water Contamination from Fracking

See: Our Stolen Future: Are We Threatening Our Fertility, Intelligence, and Survival?--A Scientific Detective Story

See: Fracking: Implications for Human and Environmental Health

Weston Wilson. Letter written to Senators Allard and Campbell and Representative DeGette. Denver, Colorado. October 8th, 2004. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was criticized by Wilson and others for this Fracking Study which led to the "Halliburton Loophole" of 2005. See New York Times Editorial on Halliburton Loophole.  See also the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

Eyal Press.  The Nation.  September 23, 2004.

This article appeared in the October 11, 2004 edition of The Nation.

"...Beginning under the Clinton Administration, the federal government pushed to expand production of this comparatively clean-burning fossil fuel, although Clinton also protected millions of acres of public land from drilling.

The Bush Administration, by contrast, has called for removing all "restrictions and impediments" on domestic development, code language for opening dozens of pristine natural habitats to unfettered leasing..."

A report on how the Federal Safe Drinking Water was amended by the U.S. Congress in 2005 to exempt hydraulic fracturing from its regulations.

WASHINGTON — Over the last four years, the Bush administration and Vice President Dick Cheney's office have backed a series of measures favoring a drilling technique developed by Halliburton Co., Cheney's former employer.

The technology, known as hydraulic fracturing, boosts gas and oil production and generates $1.5 billion a year for the company, about one-fifth of its energy-related revenue. In recent years, Halliburton and other oil and gas firms have been fighting efforts to regulate the procedure under a statute that protects drinking water supplies.

The 2001 national energy policy report, written under the direction of the vice president's office, cited the value of hydraulic fracturing but didn't mention concerns raised by staff members at the Environmental Protection Agency.

Since then, the administration has taken steps to keep the practice from being regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act, which Halliburton has said would hurt its business and add needless costs and bureaucratic delays.

An EPA study concluded in June that there was no evidence that hydraulic fracturing posed a threat to drinking water. However, some EPA employees complained about the study internally before its completion, and others have strongly criticized it publicly since its release.

According to the website, Endangered Environmental Laws, "...over time, courts have transformed [the Eleventh Amendment] into a sweeping doctrine of state “sovereign immunity,” unmoored from the Constitution’s text, and in recent years, a conservative bloc of the Supreme Court has further expanded states’ immunity from private lawsuits.

In the environmental context, this has led to near-total immunity of state agencies from citizen suits under the federal coal-mining statute; to similar challenges (so far unsuccessful) to citizen litigation under the Clean Air Act and the Endangered Species Act; and to dismissal of state employees’ whistleblower complaints under the Solid Waste Disposal Act and other laws."

"The states are permitted to act unjustly only because the highest court in the land has, by its own will, moved the middle ground and narrowed the nation's power.

With rare exception, many people, including Indian tribes, federal employees, patent holders, the elderly, and the disabled, find themselves unable to vindicate rights granted by federal laws in any court when the defendant is a state or a state agency."

Babcock, H. “Effect of the United States Supreme Court's Eleventh Amendment Jurisprudence on Clean Water Act Citizen Suits: Muddied Waters, The.” Oregon Law Review 83 (2004): 47.

See: Rulings Restrict Clean Water Act, Foiling E.P.A.

See: Activists Block Entrance to DEP Headquarters, Condemn Failed Enforcement

See: Lenape Resources, Inc.

In this powerful and far-reaching indictment of George W. Bush's White House, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the country's most prominent environmental attorney, charges that this administration has taken corporate cronyism to such unprecedented heights that it now threatens our health, our national security, and democracy as we know it... --from the book jacket.

Robert Kennedy Jr. says we the people have the right to protect our commons.

See: Sarah van Gelder. Yes Magazine. May 27, 2010. "Protecting our Water Commons: Interview with Robert Kennedy Jr."

van Gelder: How important is the public trust doctrine in enforcing the idea that the waters are a commons and that ordinary people have a right to it?

Kennedy: There are two ancient laws that underlie all modern environmental laws: One is the nuisance doctrine that essentially says you can use your property any way you want, but if you pollute and it escapes your property and goes onto somebody else’s property, you’re violating the law.

The other is the public trust doctrine, which says you can’t do anything that is going to diminish the commons, which includes any property that is not susceptible to private property ownership, like air, water, the fisheries, wetlands, wildlife, the wandering animals, rivers, streams, shorelines, aquifers, underground rivers, etc. Everybody has the right to use the commons, but nobody can use them in a way that diminishes their use and enjoyment by others.

This is ancient law that goes back to Roman times when every citizen—rich or poor, humble or noble, African or European—had a right to cross the beach, throw in a net, and take out a share of the fish. And the emperor himself couldn’t stop them.

The first thing that happens in a tyranny is the privatization of the public trust by powerful entities...

See: Flow - The War Between Public Health and Private Interests

See: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Feb. 19, 2004. The Nation. "The Junk Science of George W. Bush".

See: Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Mobilizes on Mountaintop Removal

See: Mountaintop Removal Redux: Bobby vs. Blankenship II

See: New Starpower in the Fracking Fight

See: Mixplex | Halliburton.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA MOA). 2003. A Memorandum of Agreement Between The United States Environmental Protection Agency and BJ Services Company, Halliburton Energy Services, Inc., and Schlumberger Technology Corporation: Elimination of Diesel Fuel in Hydraulic Fracturing Fluids Injected into Underground Sources of Drinking Water During Hydraulic Fracturing of Coalbed Methane Wells, Dec. 12, 2003.

"While the Companies do not necessarily agree that hydraulic fracturing fluids using diesel fuel endanger USDWs when they are injected into CBM production wells, the Companies are prepared to enter into this agreement in response to EPA’s concerns and to reduce potential risks to the environment." See Drilling Around the Law for a follow-up on this voluntary agreement.  According to the Environmental Working Group's report, "This promise, however, applied to only coalbed methane wells -- a small portion of natural gas and oil wells drilled – and only to those drilled directly into underground sources of drinking water."

Increasingly, models are being called on to predict the effects of human actions on natural ecosystems.

Despite the widespread use of models, there exists intense debate within the field over a wide range of practical and philosophical issues pertaining to quantitative modeling.

This book, which grew out of a gathering of leading experts at the Cary Conference IX, explores those issues.

See Chapter: "The Role of Quantitative Models in Science" (Oreskes).

History of hydraulic fracturing | criticism of the 2004 EPA study.

I am writing on behalf of the Oil and Gas Accountability Project to provide an impartial analysis of the adequacy of the actions proposed in the subject report. I am a practicing hydrogeologist; I spent 32 years at the U.S. Geological Survey in both management and research positions. I left the USGS in 1995 to become a consultant. I have published more than 100 papers in the refereed scientific literature on various groundwater problems. My resume is attached to this comment.

Coal-bed methane is an energy source that in many places in the United States is associated with underground sources of drinking water (USDW). In some places the coal beds are the best aquifers in the area. In these places the development of CBM is incompatible with the continued use of the coal beds as an aquifer.

There is a direct conflict between national/state energy policy and the preservation of USDW. For example, in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming and Montana the Bureau of Land Management predicts, in their Final Environmental Impact Statement for CBM, that the development will lower the water levels in the coal measures by 600 to 800 feet over much of the basin.

This will make unusable several thousand private water wells that are completed in the coal beds. The law favors the development of the methane over the continued use of the coal beds as aquifers—in this case the best aquifers in the area.

...EPA discounted problems associated with hydraulic fractures based upon a limited sample of identified problems. They relied upon citizen reports almost exclusively. There were no independent surveys, no independent field investigation or other well sampling. The EPA exercise is incomplete at best.

...EPA seems caught up in the conflict between the National Energy Policy of the Bush Administration and the EPA mandate to protect USDW.

Letter written by Hydrology expert, John D, Bredehoeft, to Joan Harrigan-Farrelly: Chief Underground Injection Control, Prevention Program Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water Environmental Protection Agency.

RE: EPA draft study report:Evaluation of Impacts to Underground Sources of Drinking Water by Hydraulic Fracturing of Coalbed Methane Reservoirs: Subject: Federal Register August 28, 2002, Volume 67, Number 10, Pages55249-55251 (water Docket Id no. w-01-09-11).

See also: Bredehoeft, J. (2003). " From Models to Performance Assessment: The Conceptualization Problem." Ground Water, Vol. 41, No.5 pp 571-577.