Fracking

The Downwinders

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More than 70 years ago, a chemical attack was launched against Washington State and Nevada. It poisoned people, animals, everything that grew, breathed air, and drank water. The Marshall Islands were also struck. This formerly pristine Pacific atoll was branded “the most contaminated place in the world.” As their cancers developed, the victims of atomic testing and nuclear weapons development got a name: downwinders. What marked their tragedy was the darkness in which they were kept about what was being done to them. Proof of harm fell to them, not to the U.S. government agencies responsible.

Faster Drilling, Diminishing Returns in Shale Plays Nationwide?

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Today’s shale gas boom has brought a surge of drilling across the US, driving natural gas prices to historic lows over the past couple of years. But, according to David Hughes, geoscientist and fellow at the Post Carbon Institute, in the future, we can expect at least the same frenzied rate of drilling – but less and less oil and gas from each well on average.

Oil crunch and Eurozone crisis

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We are three and a half years into the Eurozone crisis that kicked off in October 2009 when Greek minister of finance George Papaconstantinou made it apparent to the outside world that his country’s budget was essentially a gaping hole. The recent bailout (or bail-in where depositors and creditors have to pay their share) of the Cyprus banks is just the latest chapter in this ongoing story of recession, austerity measures, high unemployment, strikes, protests, credit rating cuts, financial reforms and leadership resignations. But what if, on top of all of this, the price of oil was to spike at over US$200 a barrel? Would that mark the end of the Eurozone?

Stopping LNG Exports Key to Preventing the Spread of Fracking

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For people concerned about the harmful effects of fracking in the U.S., they should do whatever they can to prevent natural gas companies from exporting liquefied natural gas (LNG). Deborah Rogers—a shale gas industry expert, former investment banker and founder of Energy Policy Forum—underscores the importance of anti-export campaigns. She contends that stopping LNG exports is the most important step citizens can take to prevent shale gas companies from creating even larger industrial fracking zones in their communities.

Externalities of shale: Road damage

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The past few years have brought endless glowing reports about the benefits and promise of shales, both oil and gas. We have been assured of a prolific supply that will continue to be cheap and abundant for decades to come. Unfortunately industry rhetoric has proven overtly optimistic. Reserves and economic benefit are short-lived but perhaps most importantly are the negative externalities which are becoming more and more obvious. Once such externalities are factored in shales look even less attractive.

UK rewards polluters and locks up people who want to save the planet

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What if, instead of giving Marie Curie and Alexander Fleming Nobel prizes for their life-saving work on radiation and penicillin, they’d been thrown in jail? Or, instead of being awarded the Grand Croix of the Légion d’honneur for his work on the germ theory of disease, Louis Pasteur was imprisoned like Napoleon on Elba? It would be perverse to return the favour of great, public works by depriving people of their freedom. Yet that is just what we’re doing in Britain right now. The contributions of the people above were remarkable, but how much greater is the challenge of preserving a readily habitable climate, and how thankful should we be to those prepared to throw their life’s energy and creativity at the task?