Biblio
Powder River region of northern Wyoming.
See: SkyTruth: Upper Green River Valley - A View From Above
Every day millions of gallons of clean ground water in the American West are being contaminated, all in the rush to drill for gas.
BILL WEST: It took thousands of years to recharge these aquifers.
They're pumping it out and in maybe ten years it will be gone...
Using the latest in satellite imagery, aerial photography, and Google Earth technology, this ten minute SkyTruth video explores the environmental impacts of gas and oil drilling in the Upper Green River Valley, an ecologically sensitve area of western Wyoming.
See the view of the Upper Green Valley in Wyoming from the air and the effect of hundreds of gas drilling well pads. According to SkyTruth, 10,000 well pads have been proposed.
Student Disrupts Government Auction of 150,000 Acres Of Wilderness For Oil & Gas Drilling.
Democracy Now reports on student action by Tim DeChristopher.
In a national broadcast exclusive, University of Utah student Tim DeChristopher explains how he bought 22,000 acres of land in an attempt to save the property from drilling. The sale had been strongly opposed by many environmental groups. Stephen Bloch of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance said: "This is the fire sale, the Bush administrations last great gift to the oil and gas industry. This is the first 10 minutes of the interview. For the rest go to DemocracyNow!
For full interview click here.
See: Judge says drilling lease lawsuit too late
See: Tim DeChristopher's blog and update on his legal battle.
See: As climate crime continues, who are we sending to jail? Tim DeChristopher?
Congressman Scalise serves on the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment. Monday, December 7, 2009.
"Regulation of green house gases will put millions of American jobs in danger."
Washington, DC -- Congressman Steve Scalise (R-LA) today made the following statement after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that they have declared carbon dioxide (CO2) along with five other gases as dangerous pollutants.
“The EPA's decision today is another example of this Administration’s liberal agenda that is killing jobs. What makes the EPA’s decision even more reckless is the fact that it is based on corrupt science that has recently been exposed by the ‘Climate gate scandal,’” Scalise said.
“At a time when the American people are asking ‘where are the jobs,’ the Obama administration continues to promote policies that run jobs out of our country while adding unprecedented debt onto the backs of our children and grandchildren.”
The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) is the main federal law that ensures the quality of Americans' drinking water. Under SDWA, EPA sets standards for drinking water quality and oversees the states, localities, and water suppliers who implement those standards.
SDWA was originally passed by Congress in 1974 to protect public health by regulating the nation's public drinking water supply.
The law was amended in 1986 and 1996 and requires many actions to protect drinking water and its sources: rivers, lakes, reservoirs, springs, and ground water wells. (SDWA does not regulate private wells which serve fewer than 25 individuals.)
Web Article contains links to legal, scientific, and contact information.
See: Safe Drinking Water Act 101 | Online Training | Drinking Water Academy
Sanjel is one of the companies the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce is investigating on the potential environmental impacts from hydraulic fracturing.
"Sanjel Corporation is a privately owned, Canadian-based, international oilfield service company with over two and a half decades of industry experience. As a major competitor in the global oil and gas market and the largest privately owned oilfield service company in Canada, Sanjel offers five specialized service lines including Acidizing, Cementing, Coiled Tubing, Fracturing and Nitrogen."
Congressman Scalise serves on the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment. Cap-and-Trade Hinders Job Growth, By Rep. Steve Scalise, Published in Roll Call February 8, 2010.
"...our state has seen success onshore by using safe, responsible and environmentally sound energy production technologies such as hydraulic fracturing.
Recently, this new technology was used to produce oil and gas from shale rock in Haynesville, La. This project helped create 32,742 new jobs within the state and added $3.2 billion to our economy through lease and royalty payments."
Schlumberger is one of the large companies being investigated by the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee to see if the gas extraction method known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a hazard to groundwater drinking supplies.
Schlumberger employs over 77,000 people of more than 140 nationalities working in approximately 80 countries.
Reuters reported on May 19, 2010 that personnel from oilfield giant Schlumberger left BP’s Deepwater Horizon only hours before it exploded. Read the article here.
Although "Flaring" was used extensively in the Gulf of Mexico aftermath of the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion in April, 2010, Schlumberger published a 2002 report that recommends zero flaring in the Middle East.
The World Bank estimates that over 150 billion cubic metres of natural gas are flared or vented annually, an amount worth approximately 30.6 billion dollars, equivalent to 25 percent of the United States’ gas consumption or 30 percent of the European Union’s gas consumption per year. See World Bank, December 14, 2009. "World Bank, GGFR Partners Unlock Value of Wasted Gas".
See: Renee Schoof and Marisa Talylor. June 11, 2010. McClatchy. "Plan to burn excess oil from BP well raises health questions."
See: Energy & Commerce Committee Investigates Deepwater Horizon Rig Oil Spill
"Schlumberger Mississippi Canyon Block 252 Timeline". (PDF)
On April 18, 2010, a Schlumberger wireline cased hole crew arrives on Transocean Deepwater Horizon. Specifically, BP contracted with Schlumberger to be available to perform a cement bond log and set a bridge plug and/or cement retainer, should BP request those services.
At approximately 7:00 a.m., BP informs Schlumberger crew that no wireline cased hole services will be requested and BP sends Schlumberger crew home.
At approximately 11 :15 a .m., on April 20, 2010, the day of the BP well explosion, the Schlumberger crew departed Transocean Deepwater Horizon on regularly scheduled BP helicopter flight.
At 10:56 EDT, the fire on Deepwater Horizon started. It burned for more than a day and sank April 22, leading to 11 deaths and the largest oil spill in U.S. history.
Schlumberger failed to advise public officials on how BP's actions, declining a wireline cased hole service might have prevented this disaster.
How can government regulators require that private contractors in the oil and gas industry blow the whistle on potentially global disasters? (Neil Zusman, 2010-08-13.)
See: Publication: Middle East & Asia Reservoir Review
Volume: No. 3, 2002
Publication Date: 01/01/2002
An important issue in protecting the environment of the Gulf, which is no less fragile than elsewhere in the world, is the effect of hydrocarbon flaring from oil production operations. This causes many forms of pollution – noise, toxic gases, soot, acid rain and the production of carbon dioxide, the latter is one of the primary causes of global warming. In this article, Alp Tengirsek and Nashat Mohamed explain the progress of a project in Abu Dhabi that has already eliminated oil flaring during testing and production, with the ultimate aim of eliminating all hydrocarbon flaring within a year.
See: Stanley Reed. "The Stealth Oil Giant: Why Schlumberger, long a hired gun in oil-field services, is becoming a major force and scaring Big Oil". Business Week. 2008-01-03
Red tire marks line the roads leading up to the extinct Somlo volcano, home to Hungary’s smallest wine region and only a few miles from the worst environmental disaster in the country’s history.
It has been almost two weeks since a concrete dam holding back millions of gallons of toxic sludge burst, sweeping two villages along with it and killing nine people. The fields are still red, eerily outlined in chalky white — the gypsum that emergency crews used to try to neutralize the caustic grime...
...What exactly is this sludge stored in reservoirs across this part of Hungary by the hundreds of millions of cubic feet?
...The sinister sound of the sludge sloshing around the edge of the shovel blade lingers in the ear, and makes the initial lack of reliable information more painful.
Soon after the spill, the Hungarian Academy of Sciences declared that the red sludge was nontoxic. The chief executive of MAL went on camera to say it was a completely harmless substance, that it could simply be washed away with water.
They were quickly proved wrong. The first responders suffered severe burns; apparently no one warned them that the sludge had a pH of 13, as caustic as lye.
The gap between the official statements and the reality of people dying seemed to widen the crack in the wall. For many, it brought to mind the time, thought long past, when so much of life in Hungary was defined by rumors and lies, when everything was a game of pretend and make-believe.
By JOHN M. BRODER, New York Times, January 21, 2010. "In a direct challenge to the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority, Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, introduced a resolution on Thursday to prevent the agency from taking any action to regulate carbon dioxide and other climate-altering gases."
Senator Lisa Murkowski is challenging the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency.
Shale gas has plenty of detractors.
Environmentalists say fracking, a process in which drillers blast water into a well to shatter rock and unleash the gas, threatens pristine watersheds. Dish, a hamlet of 180 residents north of Fort Worth, Texas, has almost as many wells, compressors and pipelines as people.
‘Children, Old People’
Last year, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality found benzene, which it classifies as a carcinogen, at 10,700 times the safe long-term exposure limit next to a well 6 miles (10 kilometers) west of town on which a valve had been left open.
“We have children, old people, pregnant women,” Mayor Calvin Tillman says. “They’re not supposed to be subjected to toxins.”
Switzer, who moved to Dimock Township, Pennsylvania, to build a $350,000 dream home with her husband, Jimmy, in 2004, had no idea how shale gas would consume her village of 1,400.
She says she found so much methane in her well that her water bubbled like Alka-Seltzer. Neighbor Norma Fiorentino says methane in her well blew an 8-inch-thick (20-centimeter-thick) concrete slab off the top. The $180 bonus Cabot paid to drill on Switzer’s 7.2 acres (2.9 hectares) and the $900 in royalties she gets each month don’t compensate, she says.
‘Beads and Baubles’
“I feel like one of the Indians who sold Manhattan for beads and baubles,” she says.
The economics of shale don’t look great right now for big companies either. Natural gas prices plunged to $2.41 per MMBtu in September 2009 from $13.69 in July 2008 as the recession cut demand while drilling accelerated. On May 24, gas traded at $4.04.
Includes related videos: John Hanger, secretary of Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection, talked with Bloomberg's John Lippert in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on May 13 about regulation of shale-gas drilling operations in the commonwealth.
Shale gas in the United States is rapidly increasing as a source of natural gas. Led by new applications of hydraulic fracturing technology and horizontal drilling, development of new sources of shale gas has offset declines in production from conventional gas reservoirs, and has led to major increases in reserves of US natural gas.
Please note that information taken from Wikipedia should be verified using other, more reliable sources. It is a good place to start research, but because anyone can edit Wikipedia, we do not recommend using it in research papers or to obtain highly reliable information.
EnergyBulletin.net is a clearinghouse for information regarding the peak in global energy supply. It is published by Post Carbon Institute whose goal is to provide a roadmap for a transition to a resilient, equitable, and sustainable world by arming individuals, communities, businesses, and governments with the information and resources they need to understand and take action.
Shale Gas Shenanigans
...These shale gas producers are an asset play. And this outcome obviously benefits the Wall Street banks who lend them money. Indeed, this is their exit strategy from the unprofitable drilling treadmill they are currently on. If shale gas production can be said to be in a bubble, this is where that bubble lies. And the strategy is working! Rigzone reports on the acquisition frenzy...
Energy Bulletin is maintained by three editors, Simone Osborn, Kristin Sponsler, and Bart Anderson, based respectively in Bristol, UK, and California USA. Adam Grubb (writing as Adam Fenderson) and Liam Cranley of Melbourne, Australia, founded Energy Bulletin in 2004.
On January 14, 2009, Energy Bulletin was adopted as a core program by the Post Carbon Institute. Except for PCI, Energy Bulletin is unaffiliated with any private, government, or institutional body.
"With the rapid development of the shale plays across the U.S., there was a massive influx of lease purchases which drove companies with cash into a bidding frenzy," said Ryan. (Neal Ryan, managing partner at Ryan Oil & Gas Partners LLC.)
"Now many of those companies are being forced to continue drilling plans formulated for a much higher market price in order to protect those lease investments," he said.
That's "a dangerous spot to be in because the domestic market doesn't need this gas right now, but companies are stuck having to protect their capital investment," he said.
Shaleshock Action Alliance is a movement that works toward protecting our communities and environment from exploitative gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale region.
Shaleshock is an alliance of Working Groups which include people who have signed leases, not signed leases, who have been compulsorily integrated, and people who don't own land.
See: A collection of websites and listservs edited by Shaleshock.
See: Updated Calendar of Events For New York and Pennsylvania.
See: Driling 101 - background information on hydraulic fracturing.
