Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
REBECCA LEBER, - The Raw Story/Clean Technica
Stephan: If there has been a more ironical story in the last year, I don't know what it is. This is so blatantly... well, just read it.
As ExxonMobil’s CEO, it’s Rex Tillerson’s job to promote the hydraulic fracturing enabling the recent oil and gas boom, and fight regulatory oversight. The oil company is the biggest natural gas producer in the U.S., relying on the controversial drilling technology to extract it.
The exception is when Tillerson’s $5 million property value might be harmed. Tillerson has joined a lawsuit that cites fracking’s consequences in order to block the construction of a 160-foot water tower next to his and his wife’s Texas home.
The Wall Street Journal reports the tower would supply water to a nearby fracking site, and the plaintiffs argue the project would cause too much noise and traffic from hauling the water from the tower to the drilling site. The water tower, owned by Cross Timbers Water Supply Corporation, ‘will sell water to oil and gas explorers for fracing [sic] shale formations leading to traffic with heavy trucks on FM 407, creating a noise nuisance and traffic hazards,” the suit says.
Though Tillerson’s name is on the lawsuit, a lawyer representing him said his concern is about the devaluation of his property, not fracking specifically.
When he is acting as Exxon CEO, not a homeowner, Tillerson has lashed out at […]
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Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
LAURA ZUCKERMAN, - Scientific American
Stephan: The old 19th and 20th century energy forms of the carbon era produce crisis after crisis. Consider North Carolinia, or North Dakota, just for starters. Yet so great is the influence of these extraction industries over the American government that we continue to pour billions of tax dollars into the continuation of these technologies.
Testing of surface air near an underground nuclear waste site in New Mexico’s desert showed elevated levels of radiation but did not pose a threat to humans or the environment, a U.S. Department of Energy official said on Thursday.
Trace amounts of man-made radioactive elements such as plutonium were found at an air-monitoring site half a mile from the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant and are tied to a radiation leak in the underground salt formation where waste from defense research and nuclear weapons production is stored, said Joe Franco, manager of an Energy Department field office that oversees the plant.
Energy officials said over the weekend that there was no apparent surface air contamination from the accidental release of radiation that caused an air-monitoring alarm below ground to go off about 11:30 p.m. local time on Friday. That was the first such mishap since the facility opened in 1999.
The plant, located in southeastern New Mexico near Carlsbad, is a repository for so-called transuranic waste shipped from other federal nuclear laboratories and weapons sites. The waste includes discarded machinery, clothing and other materials contaminated with plutonium or other radioisotopes heavier than uranium.
No workers were underground when high levels of radioactive particles were detected […]
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Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
STEVEN MUFSON, - The Washington Post
Stephan: Here is what I mean about the corruption of Washington and the control over government exercised by the nuclear industry, an industry that should have ceased to exist by now. Instead we have no money for children to have breakfast, but we have plenty available for nuclear reactors. President Obama should be ashamed of himself and his administration.
If nuclear power is such a good idea, why does it need financial help from U.S. taxpayers?
This week, Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz announced that the Obama administration would extend a $6.5 billion federal loan guarantee to cover part of the cost of building two new reactors at Southern Co.’s Alvin W. Vogtle site. Thursday he went to Waynesboro, Ga. to finalize the deal. Another $1.8 billion in guarantees could come soon.
The impact: Southern’s Georgia Power subsidiary, which owns 46 percent of the project, will save $225 million to $250 million because the loan guarantee will reduce interest costs. Instead of borrowing from a commercial bank, Southern can now borrow at rock bottom rates from the government’s Federal Financing Bank. And you, gentle reader, the taxpayer, take on all the risk if the project goes bust. Does the name Solyndra ring a bell?
If that’s not enough, Southern is also getting help from the federal production tax credit and other federal incentives that will ultimately save the company an additional $2 billion or so, Southern’s chief executive Tom Fanning said on a Jan. 29 conference call about earnings.
‘This is a deeply subsidized project that will cost the taxpayers a lot,” said Ken […]
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Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
MARY ANNE HITT, Director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign - Grist
Stephan: Here, I hope, is some good news coming from the recent carbon energy disasters. Maybe people are finally waking up.
West Virginians hold the coal industry responsible for air and water contamination in the state, and they are tired of the stranglehold they believe the industry’s lobbyists have on state politics.
That’s just one of many powerful findings of a new poll out today about the aftermath of the January coal chemical spill in Charleston, West Virginia.
The Sierra Club and Hart Research Associates polled West Virginia voters, and look at the results:
1) West Virginians do not view the January coal chemical spill as an isolated incident – 69 percent think the spill was a result of companies acting irresponsibly (only 21 percent saw the spill as an accident) and believe future spills will happen again unless something changes.
2) West Virginians strongly support increased regulations and enforcement to protect air and water. And they don’t just want ‘better enforcement” in the abstract – they solidly endorse specific changes in policy and more EPA involvement in the state.
3) Two out of every three West Virginians support political candidates who are independent of the coal industry.
This is major news – even in a state long dominated by the coal industry, my fellow […]
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Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
RYAN BROUSSARD, - The Advocate (Baton Rouge)
Stephan: Yet another carbon energy disaster. They seem to be coming one a week now affecting the lives of millions of people in negative ways.
The U.S. Coast Guard says a 65-mile stretch of the Mississippi River is closed between Baton Rouge and New Orleans until further notice while crews clean up oil from a barge that struck a towboat.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Bill Colclough said on Monday there’s still no estimate for how long the river will remain closed.
‘It will remain closed until further notice to allow for safe cleanup and recovery operations,” he said just before 10 a.m. on Monday. ‘Cleanup and recovery operations continue. The cause of the spill remains under investigation.”
The collision happened Saturday afternoon near Vacherie.
In St. Charles Parish, officials say public drinking water intakes on the river are closed as a precaution. ‘The water supply in St. Charles Parish remains safe,” parish officials said in a news release Sunday afternoon.
In St. James Parish, officials said the Vacherie, Lutcher and Gramercy intake valves were protected by a boom within hours after the incident. Water plant operators were monitoring the intakes valves and did not close the intakes, officials said.
Colclough said officials don’t know how much oil spilled, but only a sheen of oil is reported on the river.
Shortly after the spill, the National Response Center reported that oil was spilling […]
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