Oklahoma Court Rules Homeowners Can Sue Oil Companies Over Quakes

From: NY Times

Gary and Sandra Ladra filed suit against two oil companies over earthquake damage to their house in Prague, Okla., and injuries she suffered in 2011.

 

Nick Oxford for The New York Times

By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.

June 30, 2015

The Oklahoma Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that homeowners who have sustained injuries or property damage from rampant earthquakes they say are caused by oil and gas operations can sue for damages in state trial courts, rejecting efforts by the industry to block such lawsuits from being decided by juries and judges.

The case has been closely watched both by the energy industry and by fracking opponents across the United States, and the 7-to-0 ruling opens the door for homeowners in a state racked by earthquakes to pursue oil and gas companies for temblor-related damage.

It is the first time the court has specifically addressed whether plaintiffs could sue for damage that experts believe is typically caused by massive amounts of wastewater generated by oil and gas drilling — often involving hydraulic fracturing, or fracking — that are ultimately injected into underground disposal reservoirs near fault zones.  MORE

Map: Public Lands Threatened by Fracking

From:  Food & Water Watch

COMMENT - The National Parks were planned so extractive industries could trade lands with those controlling lands in National Trusts, both Forests and Parks,  and increase their profits.  Arthur C. Pillsbury was burned out of Yosemite because he was becoming a danger to the powers that be on this issue and because he was determined that the Parks, if they existed, be used to educate people on the need for preservation.  He was forced out in 1927 when Mather realized he could blow the whistle on them. 


America's public lands are our national treasures, but that hasn't stopped the oil and gas industry from fracking in national forests and around national parks.

The map below shows oil and gas formations where fracking could occur (or is already occurring), and where they overlap with our public lands. To protect these precious places from fracking, we need to permanently ban fracking on federal lands.

This is a map you have to see.  Go to the site. 

About 20 percent of all potential U.S. oil and gas lies beneath public lands, and corporations are eager to extract it for profit. Already, fracking companies have leased over 34 million acres of public land (an area seven times the size of New Jersey), but that is just the beginning — over 200 million more acres that overlay oil and gas deposits could be fracked in the future.  MORE

The hazardous truth

From:  The VC Reporter 

One year later, a deeper look at what happened at the Santa Paula waste water site

By Kit Stolz 11/19/2015 

Aerial shot of Santa Clara Waste Water the day after the explosion, November 19th.

On Nov. 18, 2014, an explosion, fire and mile-long plume of toxic gas badly injured three firefighters and 12 employees at the Santa Clara Waste Water site near Santa Paula. Over 50 people, including a motorcyclist passing on Highway 126, were sent to the hospital for treatment after breathing in a cloud of black toxicity that included chlorine dioxide, a poisonous gas.

The three Santa Paula firefighters who were enveloped in the cloud have not recovered a year later and remain on medical leave. The fire truck they drove to the site at 3:45 in the morning was badly damaged in the explosion and subsequently had to be written off, after repeated attempts to decontaminate it, and despite its $500,000 cost.

In the immediate aftermath of the explosion, which led to a daylong evacuation and the declaration of a local emergency by Sheriff Geoff Dean, the closure of Hwy 126, and a “shelter in place” order at the county jail on Todd Road; the Ventura County District Attorney seized documents, computers and cell phones from the top executives at the company.  MORE

Did Exxon Just Admit It’s Still Funding Climate Deniers?

From:  EcoWatch 

COMMENT - And they are admitting this?  Wow.

Elliott Negin, Union of Concerned Scientists


Viewers were treated to a rare moment of candor at the end of a recent PBS NewHour interview with Kenneth Cohen, ExxonMobil‘s vice president of public and government affairs.

NewsHour host Judy Woodruff pressed Cohen about an accusation New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman made during a taped interview that aired just before Cohen’s segment. Schneiderman—who had announced the week before that he was investigating ExxonMobil over whether it had misled the public and shareholders about climate change risks—had charged that ExxonMobil funds climate change denier organizations to malign mainstream climate science.
 
“Has Exxon been funding these organizations?” she asked.

“Well, the answer is yes,” Cohen replied. “And I will let those organizations respond for themselves.”  MORE

Another Historic Day in the Battle to Stop the Tar Sands

From:  EcoWatch

Mike Hudema, Greenpeace International 

November 23, 2015 10:41 am

 

Today people slowed the beast again but this time we did it at the source.

After a string of pipeline victories and over a decade of campaigning on at least three different continents, the Alberta government has finally put a limit to the tar sands. Today they announced they will cap its expansion and limit the tar sands monster to 100 megatons a year (equivalent to what projects already operating and those currently under construction would produce).

Aerial view of seismic lines and a tar sands mine in the Boreal Forest north of Fort McMurray, northern Alberta. Photo credit: Greenpeace

As momentous an occasion as it is when an oil jurisdiction actually puts limits on growth, 100 million tons of carbon a year at a time when science is demanding bold reductions is still far too much. While historic, the government’s cap needs to be viewed as a ceiling rather then a floor and a ceiling that we will need to work like crazy to ratchet down until it meets the science. MORE

US air strike 'hits 238 IS oil trucks' in Syria

From:  BBC

Getty Images - IS receives a large portion of its funding from seized oil facilities

A US air strike has destroyed more than 238 fuel trucks controlled by Islamic State (IS) militants in north-east Syria, the US military has said.

It is thought the pilots found the trucks parked up together, waiting to be loaded at an oil production point near Hassakeh and Deir al-Zour.

Warning shots were reportedly fired to scare away the civilian drivers, before the destruction of the trucks began.

IS makes large amounts of money from oil it produces from seized facilities.

 MORE

Baker Hughes rig count rises for the first time in 29 weeks

From:  Business Insider 

Akin Oyedele

Jul. 2, 2015, 1:04 PM

The number of US oil rigs in use just rose for the first time in six months.

On Thursday, we learned that US oil rigs in use rose by 12 to 640, the first increase since December 5, 2014.

Last week, the total count of oil and gas rigs climbed for the first time in several weeks, by two to 859. The oil rig count fell for a 29th straight week, by three to 628, the lowest since August 6, 2010.

This week's combined oil and gas rig count was up 3 as 9 natural gas rigs were shut down.  MORE