Biblio
Terry Mutchler, executive director of the state’s Office of Open Records.
Jennifer Learn-Andes
Luzerne County Reporter
The public should have access to the inner workings of Luzerne County home rule subcommittees, say three experts on the state’s open meeting law.
Unwarranted closed-door meetings “fracture public trust,” said Terry Mutchler, executive director of the state’s Office of Open Records.
...“If they’ve opened the committee meetings to the public, it’s a natural follow that the subcommittee meetings be open as well,” Mutchler said, noting that her office has no legal jurisdiction over alleged violations of the Sunshine Act governing open meetings.
Melissa Melewsky, media law counsel with the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association, said the Sunshine Act applies to committees of an agency that render advice, which would include the subcommittees.
“I think the language of the law is pretty clear. I think members of the public who are seeking public access are very legitimate in doing so. I think they have a strong argument,” she said.
Between now and October 1st, the state legislature will debate a new tax on natural gas extraction. But because of a loophole in the state's campaign finance laws, legislators will likely cast their votes before disclosing recent donations. That means the gas industry and environmental groups can flood Harrisburg with contributions without anyone knowing where the money is going.
That's why "It's Our Money” and Common Cause have teamed up to create a place where lawmakers can report contributions in real time: Marcellus Shale Money Watch.
Pennsylvania's environmental destruction is not limited to gas drilling. See: Coalfield Justice Blog, "What Could Be Worse?
Here is what could be worse: all the concern about shale gas has made the public unaware of other continuing problems. Big coal continues to destroy houses and streams. No one is demanding that the long overdue Act 54-required study of longwall mining be released. Big coal is continuing to do as it will with coal ash. With budget cuts in DEP, longwall enforcement, which has never been adequate, will be even worse.
Exxon Confronts Nuns, Calpers Over Global Warming Plans, Boskin
Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest oil company, faces growing criticism from investors who say it's lagging behind competitors in addressing global warming.
The Sisters of Saint Dominic, a Roman Catholic order in New Jersey, want shareholders at today's annual meeting to approve a proposal for setting targets on greenhouse-gas reductions. The California Public Employees' Retirement System, the biggest U.S. public pension fund, seeks to oust Michael Boskin, the Exxon director who runs the board committee responsible for environmental issues.
...``Exxon's the industry laggard when it comes to climate change,'' said Laura Shaffer, manager of shareholder activities at the New York-based Nathan Cummings Foundation, which oversees $535 million.
``Given their market capitalization and their earnings, they shouldn't be lagging anybody on this issue.''
The foundation is part of an investor group that backs a proposal to force Exxon to boost spending on ethanol and other non-petroleum fuels.
Shareholders who attend the meeting at the Symphony Center in Dallas will also vote on a measure that seeks to rein in share buybacks, which have tripled in the past three years, in favor of a one-time dividend. Another would limit compensation for the company's top five executives, including Tillerson, to $500,000 a year.
ExxonMobil. The Lamp. No. 4, 2009. p. 7-8.
Andrew Swiger, Exxon Senior V.P. has said,
"A key question about shale and other unconventional plays will be whether a company has the technology to turn them into profitable opportunities.
Swiger notes that technology advances ExxonMobil has perfected in producing unconventional natural gas from tight-sands formations in Colorado’s Piceance Basin should prove advantageous.
ExxonMobil‐XTO Merger:
Read preliminary transcripts of Rex Tillerson, CEO, giving testimony to the House Energy Committee.
ExxonMobil‐XTO Merger: Impact on U.S. Energy Markets Preliminary Transcript of Testimony, House of Representatives, Subcommittee on Energy and Environment, Committee on Energy and Commerce. Wednesday, January 20, 2010. 122 pages.
This merger heralds a fundamental long‐term shift in U.S. energy markets and one that deserves our close attention. Over the last decade, a small group of companies that most Americans have never heard of has been developing huge deposits of natural gas in deep shale formations across America."
-Edward J. Markey (D-MA), Chair of Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment.Tillerson testimony on p. 52.
By Jim Polson. Bloomberg Business Week. January 21, 2010.
Exxon Mobil Corp., XTO Energy Inc. and other shale-gas producers probably won’t face U.S. rules that would add costs of $100,000 a well, given comments at a Congressional hearing yesterday and the loss of a Senate seat by majority Democrats, FBR Capital Markets Corp. analysts said.
Irving, Texas-based Exxon’s $30 billion acquisition of XTO isn’t in jeopardy, Benjamin Salisbury and other FBR analysts wrote in a report to clients today. U.S. laws making shale development “illegal or commercially impracticable” would let Exxon terminate the deal without penalty, under the buyout agreement.
Democrats at the hearing praised the economic and environmental benefits of replacing fuels such as coal with cleaner-burning natural gas, indicating the party will emphasize jobs and the economy rather than restrictions on fracturing petroleum-bearing rock that might curb drilling by as much as 20 percent, the analysts wrote. Environmentalists said chemicals in fracturing fluid contaminate drinking water.
By Joel Kirkland of ClimateWire, New York Times.
The $31 billion Exxon-XTO all-stock deal still has to jump some regulatory hurdles. If the merger becomes real, Exxon will be the largest natural gas producer in the country, controlling large chunks of acreage in the most promising onshore gas fields in the United States.
Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Arkansas and the Appalachian regions of Pennsylvania and New York are the epicenter of shale gas, coalbed methane and tight-sand gas formations.
See: Marching Band, Quail Hunt Helped Exxon’s Tillerson to XTO Deal - Bloomberg.com
--Editors: Flynn McRoberts, Susan Warren
This article examines the lawsuit against Exxon filed by Texas rancher Elizabeth Burns.
See: Rancho Los Malulos | A satirical view from the McGill Brothers Lease
Oil’s ‘Ugly Side’
“This isn’t something the states are proud to advertise,” said Philip Dellinger, chief of the groundwater section in the Austin, Texas, office of the Environmental Protection Agency. “It’s the ugly side of the oil and gas business.”
The EPA says it has no authority to force companies to address contamination on active fields and must defer to Texas regulators, who let oil companies determine if sites need cleanup.
...Pollution from decades-old wells and waste pits isn’t isolated to their ranch or Exxon. There are more than 100,000 old wells in Texas that haven’t been capped and thousands of defunct gas-processing plants, compressor stations and related equipment that have never been dismantled, according to the Texas Land and Minerals Owners Association, which represents 1,200 ranchers, farmers and individuals who own stakes in oil and gas fields.
Contamination Migrates
The contamination may have migrated from a defunct oilfield on the north end of town, where sludge and other waste from wells was dumped in open dirt pits for decades, said J.T. Garcia, president of the Duval County Conservation and Reclamation District. He doesn’t know who operated the field, which stopped pumping crude in the 1970s.
The Burns’s ranch, which covers an area equal to the size of Brooklyn, is just one example of the lingering environmental damage across swaths of south, west and east Texas from what were once regarded as acceptable oilfield practices, said Patterson, the commissioner with the Texas General Land Office, which oversees oil leases that help fund the state’s schools and universities.
Mrs. Burns | Photo by Sharon Wilson
“They’d just dig a pit and put the oil in it and then they’d haul it off later, or maybe they wouldn’t haul it off later, depending on the price of oil at the time,” said Patterson. “That was the norm, and nobody said anything about it.”
...Although lighter-weight hydrocarbons can degrade naturally in 40 or 50 years, the heavier molecules “are more persistent and pretty toxic,” said Gregory Miller, project manager at Icon Environmental Services Inc., a Port Allen, Louisiana-based company that cleans up old oilfields. “You have no idea how bad some of these sites are.”
Daunting Task
Patterson said cleaning up a tract as large as the Encinitos Ranch is impossible. Instead, the best solution may be to fence it off and monitor the pollution to ensure it doesn’t migrate underground to other ranches...
...“Exxon’s walked away from a lot of this stuff they built here, but the evil lurks,” said Burns, who had planned to raise organic vegetables when she and her husband moved to the ranch with their sons five years ago. “You’d hope your kids can do something with this land, but now it’s worthless.”
The Continental Center and KBR Tower (foreground) in downtown Houston.
Photo by Blair McFarlain.
The London lawyer accused by American authorities of helping KBR and its partners bribe Nigerian officials lost his battle against extradition yesterday.
The British High Court affirmed a decision to send Jeffrey Tesler, 62, a U.K. citizen, to Houston to answer criminal charges in federal court. He faces up to 55 years in prison and forfeiture of more than $132 million.
Tesler was indicted in February 2009. He was charged with one count of conspiracy to violate and ten counts of violating the FCPA. The DOJ alleges he was part of a decade-long scheme to bribe Nigerian government officials in exchange for contracts worth $6 billion to build liquefied natural gas facilities on Bonny Island, Nigeria.
His co-defendant, Wojciech Chodan, KBR's former commercial vice president at a U.K. subsidiary, was extradited from Britain in December last year. He pleaded guilty in Houston federal court to conspiring to violate the FCPA.
Chodan's sentencing is scheduled for February 22, 2011. He faces up to five years in prison on the conspiracy charge. As part of his plea agreement, Chodan, 72, who's also a U.K. citizen, agreed to forfeit $726,885.
See: Barry Meier and Clifford Krauss. "Inquiry Puts Halliburton in a Familiar Hot Seat". NYT Business Day. October 28, 2010.
Last year, for example, Halliburton and KBR agreed to pay $579 million to settle charges brought by the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission in connection with bribes that KBR had paid to top Nigerian officials over a decade. The companies still face criminal liability in Nigeria over the episode, which involved contracts to build a liquefied natural gas complex.
See: Snamprogetti, ENI In $365 Million Settlement
See: Fracking Resource Guide | Halliburton (updated)
Richard L. Cassin lived in the Middle East and Asia for 25 years. Before founding Cassin Law LLC, he was a senior partner in a major international law firm and managing partner of its Asia practice in Singapore, Hong Kong and Beijing.
He helps clients comply with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and other U.S. laws, and regularly assists companies facing compliance issues.
Sourcewatch page provides overview including links to directors, funders, and board members.
See FAS page on Earth Systems:
"Over the next century the earth’s resilience and adaptive capabilities will be stressed by the demands of global climate change, environmental degradation, a population increase of two billion people, and the accompanying increased resource and energy demand.
These stresses will place an additional burden upon the earth’s natural systems and the processes and resources that drive these systems. Future system scarcities and imbalances represent a security concern with the potential to destabilize and weaken existing political, social, and economic structures. And as these natural systems are inherently highly interdependent, it is necessary for them to be analyzed and considered systemically.
The Earth Systems Program seeks to address these issues by developing and promoting sustainable, scientifically sound, and inclusive solutions, policies, and technological developments."
"The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) was founded in 1945 by scientists who had worked on the Manhattan Project to develop the first atomic bombs. These scientists recognized that science had become central to many key public policy questions. They believed that scientists had a unique responsibility to both warn the public and policy leaders of potential dangers from scientific and technical advances and to show how good policy could increase the benefits of new scientific knowledge."
FAS works to challenge excessive government secrecy and promote public oversight with their FAS Project on Government Secrecy. Part of the project includes the distribution of the free electronic newsletter Secrecy News, which provides informal coverage of new developments in secrecy, security and intelligence policies.
Includes video interview with Hans Bethe on Atomic weapons.
Please note that information taken from Wikis should be verified using other, more reliable sources. It is a good place to start research, but because anyone can edit a Wiki, we do not recommend using it in research papers or to obtain highly reliable information.
Get Involved
If you think you might be affected by a proposed natural gas or hydroelectric project regulated by the Commission, you have certain rights. These rights range from being able to look at project correspondence to becoming an intervener and being able to appeal any FERC decisions in federal court.
The Commission's Citizen's Guides are a good place to start.
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Should I Get Involved? Only you can ultimately answer this but we can help you think things through. Read More. |
How to Get Involved Take advantage of a suite of electronic services to easily get involved. Still prefer paper? That's fine too. Read more. |
The Process Natural gas and hydropower projects have distinct processes. This overview will help you to participate. Read More |
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, is an independent agency that regulates the interstate transmission of electricity, natural gas, and oil.
Contains sections on how to file a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, Enforcement, Legal Resources, Dispute Resoulution Service (DRS), etc.
The West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, Friends of Blackwater, and former West Virginia State Park Chief Cordie Hudkins have taken the fight over the proposed drilling for natural gas in Chief Logan State Park to the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals. There they have been joined by the West Virginia chapter of the Sierra Club as well as the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources and the West Virginia Department of Energy who also oppose the drilling.
The controversy is over a proposal by Cabot Oil and Gas to drill several gas wells inside Chief Logan State Park. The Department of Environmental Protection had originally denied the permit to drill based upon a statute which it believed prohibited drilling for gas in a state park. Cabot Oil and Gas (the driller) appealed to the Circuit Court of Logan County which reversed the Department of Environmental Protection and ordered that the permit be issued.
The case also has the potential to interfere with an important source of funding for West Virginia’s parks and recreation. West Virginia receives extensive funding for its parks from the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund. A condition of that funding is that the land dedicated for park use remain so and not be converted for non-recreational use. If West Virginia allows part of Chief Logan to be converted from recreational use to minerals extraction, this would interfere with funding under this program.
During last year's presidential campaign, Richard B. Cheney acknowledged that the oil-field supply corporation he headed, Halliburton Co., did business with Libya and Iran through foreign subsidiaries. But he insisted that he had imposed a "firm policy" against trading with Iraq.
"Iraq's different," he said...
Cheney has offered contradictory accounts of how much he knew about Halliburton's dealings with Iraq. In a July 30, 2000, interview on ABC-TV's "This Week," he denied that Halliburton or its subsidiaries traded with Baghdad.
"I had a firm policy that we wouldn't do anything in Iraq, even arrangements that were supposedly legal," he said. "We've not done any business in Iraq since U.N. sanctions were imposed on Iraq in 1990, and I had a standing policy that I wouldn't do that."
Cheney modified his response in an interview on the same program three weeks later, after he was informed that a Halliburton spokesman had acknowledged that Dresser Rand and Ingersoll Dresser Pump traded with Iraq. He said he was unaware that the subsidiaries were doing business with the Iraqi regime when Halliburton purchased Dresser Industries in September 1998.
See: Halliburton on Fracking Resource Guide.
Global Policy Forum is an independent policy watchdog that monitors the work of the United Nations and scrutinizes global policymaking. GPF works particularly on the UN Security Council, the food and hunger crisis, and the global economy. We promote accountability and citizen participation in decisions on peace and security, social justice and international law.
GPF gathers information and circulates it through a comprehensive and heavily-visited website, as well as through frequent media interviews. We play an active role in NGO networks and other advocacy arenas. We organize meetings and conferences and we publish original research and policy papers.
GPF analyzes deep and persistent structures of power and dissects rapidly-emerging issues and crises. GPF's work challenges mainstream thinking and questions conventional wisdom. We seek egalitarian, cooperative, peaceful and sustainable solutions to the world's great problems.
See: FCPA Blog | UK Court Won't Block Telser Extradition
See: Fracking Resource Guide | Halliburton (updated)
See: Halliburton's Interests Assisted by White House - Los Angeles Times
David Beers. "Tar Sands Expert Nikiforuk to Speak at UBC." The Tyee. 2010-09-09.
Tyee writer-in residence will reveal 'Who Regulates Canada's Oil Patch, and for Whom?'
“Sour gas is one of the most dangerous, toxic substances known to man,” he said. “Having a sour gas well 800 metres from your home is like having a child molester an in urban community. You never know when things are going to go wrong.”
Charlie Smith. "Andrew Nikiforuk: EnCana pipeline attacks are not ecoterrorism." Straight.com. 2008-10-17.
You can read another interview with Nikiforuk about his Tyee project here and find his work, so far, here.
See: The Globe and Mail. "Andrew Nikiforuk wins Rachel Carson medal." July 22, 2009.
See: Society of Environmental Journalists.SEJ's Rachel Carson Environment Book Award."
Irena Salina's award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st Century - The World Water Crisis.
Salina builds a case against the growing privatization of the world's dwindling fresh water supply with an unflinching focus on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel.
Interviews with scientists and activists intelligently reveal the rapidly building crisis, at both the global and human scale, and the film introduces many of the governmental and corporate culprits behind the water grab, while begging the question "Can anyone really own water?"
Beyond identifying the problem, Flow also gives viewers a look at the people and institutions providing practical solutions to the water crisis and those developing new technologies, which are fast becoming blueprints for a successful global and economic turnaround.
See: Jeannette Catsoulis. Sept. 12, 2008. The New York Times. "The War Between Public Health and Private Interests".
See: Cory Doctorow . Apr 7, 2008. BoingBoing.net. "For Love of Water: infuriating and incredible documentary about world's water-crisis".
See: World-Renowned Scientist Dr. Theo Colborn on the Health Effects of Water Contamination from Fracking
See: Clean Water Action
See: WATER: Rulings Restrict Clean Water Act, Foiling E.P.A.
and Supreme Court Restricts Clean Water Act
See: WATER | That Tap Water Is Legal but May Be Unhealthy
See: WATER | FRONTLINE: Poisoned Waters
See: Drinking Water: Understanding the Science and Policy behind a Critical Resource
See: Connie Watson, CBC Radio | Feb. 4, 2003. "Sell the rain: How the privatization of water caused riots in Cochabamba, Bolivia".
See: SERC (State Environmental Resource Center). 2004. "The Meaning of Privatization."
Implications of Privatization of Water Utilities
[Provides] examples where privatized water utilities have posed risks of rate hikes, negative economic impacts, inadequate customer service, and harm to natural resources...
Not So Fast, Natural Gas: Why Accelerating Risky Drilling Threatens America’s Water
Some energy analysts are predicting that natural gas will be the fuel of the future if advances in drilling technology allow drillers to tap into domestic shale rock formations on a large scale. But because of the impacts that the technology can have on water, natural gas could become our next energy disaster.
Food & Water Watch works to ensure the food, water and fish we consume is safe, accessible and sustainably produced.
Learn more: read about our victories.
See: Poisoned Profits
See: Blue Covenant
See: Tox Town
