Newt Gingrich accuses Obama and liberals of wanting higher gas prices. What a fool he is. Nobody wants higher gas prices but it is inevitable no-matter what we do. We can continue to increase military spending to sequester as much as we can from other countries or we can change our minds and pollute our own land to get it here, which is something we havn't done not because the technology didn't exist, but because it is a filthy dirty dangeroues business and we would rather do it on some other countries land.
The Tar Sands technology that Gingrich, Romney, Santorum, Obama, Boehner and other politicians want is dirtier, filthier, and more dangerous than any other that has ever before existed. So why do they all of the sudden want to take all these risks for fossil fuels on american soil, the answer is simple, they all stand to profit personally from these ventures.
Let us not forget that the Haliburton Company most well known for being an american contractor wherever we send troops, and as one of the corporations responsible for the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster is also a major Natural Gas Fracking Contractor. Let us not forget that Haliburton rose to power under the Bush Administration under Vice President Dick Cheney, and let us not forget that Newt Gingrich was part of this illustrious administration and he himself was forced out after 84 ethics violations while working alongside of Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld.
Let us not forget that speaker Of the House John Boehner stands to profit immensely from the Keystone Pipeline project if approved and has been doing everything possible as a politician (supposedly elected to serve the people) to see his oil and gas investmenst return a powerful dictorial profit for himself.
Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum are both part of this incestuous relationship between politicians and fossil fuel corporations past and present. They both admitting to "voting with the team" but not despite being against the teams goals as they claim, but because they are elitists and don't ever really consider that you and I are a part of the team, in their greedy sociopathic minds, we are not even really valued as fans of the time, oh sure they all claim that they love their fans in public because they need us, but the truth is that they don't really give a shit about us, in thier minds we are thought of less than a negroe shoe-shiner in the subway of their pathetic miniscule 1950's minds.
Obama is only half right about energy policy, he is still a corporate whore and has done just as much to sell us out and vainly hold on to his fleeting power as all the rest have done. Obama also says drill baby drill, and then almost as an afterthought, "and also develop alternative energy."
Yes I am a liberal, and a proud, patriotic one, and no I havn't had a bath today because I have been up all night writing to you about what is really important during our time in this world today. Very few generations in the history of the world have found it necessary to rise up in defense of freedom and democracy and now is that time.
A Global Green Energy Economy is KEY to the changes we need in this world in all fronts: The economy, global politics, the environment, and technology. We need a massive change in the way the world works on all fronts for the good of the all, for the future of all, and we need it now. The rhetoric of those in power serves only to prolong our journey down what has become a wreckless path.
We need a Green Energy Evolution. This is four revolutions in one. It is a social revolution. It is a political revolution. it is an economic revoltution, and it is a brand new industrial revolution.
It is not the fanning out and spreading of more and more complicated, polluting and dangerous fossil fuel exploration, it is not the building of more and more coal powered electricity generation plants, it is not the use of the Deepwater Horizon technology in america's heartland, main agricultural area and largest fresh water aquafir, It is not the polluting of America, Chile, Argentina, the Amazon, China and the Middle East. It is not emiting pollution that is so far reaching that the fallout from it lands in each and everyone of our National Parks and on both of earths poles, it is not sending more and more troops to other countries under the guise of ensuring democracy so that we can really force contracts with them and U.S. corporations to aquire their natural resources through duress and at gun point.
A Global Green Energy Economy IS true energy independence for every community. It is more jobs than you could ever imagine. It is an interstae highway system as part of a superconducting electricity grid constructed of tens of thousands of miles of wind turbines and solar panels, corner to corner and coast to coast of every nation. It is highrise buildings that are all retrofitted with both solar and wind power. It is using massive gyro's for both electricity storage and load leveling, it is a technology of mining superconducting metals and lithium, all of which is 80% recyclable once extracted. It is a world where coal and fracking no longer have any value due to the damage it causes. It is a world where oil in not used as a fuel, but is reserved only as a manufacturing ingredient. It is a world with clean air, clean water, clean soil, and clean food.
A new prosperity, with new values, where the fossil fuels of last centuries industrial age are relegated to the history books with the dinosaurs from which they came, and we the people of america and we the people of our beloved and only mother earth write a new chapter in evolution, create a new industry, build a reinvigorated democracy, embrace new values, and become stewards of the earth, as one people, united.
~ cleanelectric
Stopping the Coal Rush
Welcome, Coal Activists!
If the 100-plus coal-fired power plants currently proposed are built, the global warming pollution pumped into our air will make all our other efforts to reverse climate change irrelevant. Coal plants are the dirtiest, most regressive source of energy- poisoning our communities and environment. The Environmental Law Program is working with activists around the country to champion clean energy in the face of this unprecedented rush to build new coal plants.We have created a number of tools to provide coal activists with key information and resources:
- Check out our Google map of proposed coal-fired plants across the United States.
- Visit our Coal Plant Tracker, which lists detailed information about each proposed plant.
- Read about our recent victories and the latest news!
- The top questions activists should ask about proposed coal plants.
- Keywords for permits and other legal documents.
- Information about the most stringent coal plant permits.
- General coal documents and resources, such as recent reports and fact sheets.
Coal by the numbers:
Coal mines use an astonishing 260 million gallons of water every day and produce 90,000,000 gallons of liquid waste every year.
21,000,000 million people live within 5 miles of a coal fired electricity plant.
More than 2,000 rivers and streams have been buried and destroyed due to "mountain top removal" mining.
47 states have fish consumption warnings due to mercury pollution from burning coal to generate electricity.
Burning coal generates 130,000,000 million tons of solid waste every year.
245 more NEW coal plants have been proposed accross the country (and even more new plants are propsed in China.)
Pollution from these facilities reaches everywhere, the arctic and the antarctic.
These legal and technical resources are password-protected; for access, email environmental.law@sierraclub.org
Other Sierra Club Coal Work
Final Report on Probe into Upper Big Branch Mine Disaster Released
SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images(CHARLESTON, W.Va.) -- The state of West Virginia Thursday released what is expected to be the final report on the investigation into the Upper Big Branch mine explosion that killed 29 people in April 2010.
The report, like three others, says a methane explosion at the mine was exacerbated by coal dust. Massey Energy -- owner of the Upper Big Branch mine -- favored production over safety and failed to properly rock dust the mine, according to the report.
The state issued 253 citations against the coal company. Those violations were for improper ventilation, equipment problems, and personnel issues pertaining to the foreman or fireboss, among other areas.
Presumably "personnel issues" refers to the fact that employees on the ground do exactly what the CEO's tell them to do, or else lose your job.
The explosion at Upper Big Branch has been called the worst U.S. mining disaster in nearly 40 years.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio
The explosion at Upper Big Branch has been called the worst U.S. mining disaster in nearly 40 years.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio
Read On ABC News Radio: http://abcnewsradioonline.com/national-news/final-report-on-probe-into-upper-big-branch-mine-disaster-re.html#ixzz1nJHqTl5F
Oklahoma Impact Team: Is Fracking Really Putting Oklahomans At Risk?
Posted: Feb 20, 2012 5:18 AM PSTUpdated: Feb 23, 2012 8:49 AM PST
Natural gas well drilling operation in western Oklahoma
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is the process of creating small cracks in rock formations thousands of feet below the surface to release trapped oil and gas.
In rural Oklahoma, renewed oil and gas activity is as prevalent as farming.
Mike Paque is the director of the national Groundwater Protection Council, based out of Oklahoma City.
Natural gas well drilling operation in western Oklahoma
TULSA, Oklahoma -
Related Story: Oklahoma Earthquake Swarm
But fracking is nothing new. Companies like Haliburton have been fracking oil and gas wells for decades. What is new? Horizontal drilling. Combine that with fracking and the continued demand for natural gas and it creates the current boom.
The Boom
In rural Oklahoma, renewed oil and gas activity is as prevalent as farming. Drilling rigs crowd the Oklahoma horizon and shiny new wellheads dot the plains. But with increased production comes increased pollution-related complaints, now hovering around 2 thousand per year.
Walter Grabow lives and farms in Kingfisher County. He's filed several complaints with the state over the last four years and still doesn't know what's killing his crops. He says he's watched a small patch of dead wheat grow to cover several of his acres and cross the road into his neighbor's field. There are eleven gas wells surrounding his property and he fears they are the source of his problems.
The Oklahoma Corporation Commission has investigated Grabow's problem several times and still can't say what is killing his crops. They suspect it is something other than oil and gas activity, but on one trip to Grabow's land, inspectors found a small amount of gas beneath the surface. Corporation Commission field inspectors say the case is still open.
In the meantime Grabow says he has seen gas wells create problems for his neighbors, including an incident where gas was bubbling in a nearby creek. He fears the increase in natural gas drilling and fracking is disturbing the groundwater around his acreage too.
"So if it's getting in the water and running around in the water table, then coming up some place, we got a problem," said Grabow. "Water's going to be worth more than the oil someday."
The Experts
Mike Paque is the director of the national Groundwater Protection Council, based out of Oklahoma City. He says there will always be pollution problems associated with the oil and gas industry, but he says the Oklahoma Corporation Commission does a good job regulating it, keeping those pollution issues to a minimum. But, when it comes to fracking, he says the chemicals involved are the most important issue and the public has good reason to be concerned.
"They should very much be concerned about the chemicals in the ground. That's really the bottom line," said Paque.
That's why the Groundwater Protection Council created the website FracFocus.org. Soon all oil and gas companies fracking in Oklahoma could be required to post the chemicals they used there. Right now, some are posting voluntarily.
We looked up a well in Dewey County to see what kinds of chemicals were used to frack it. Some chemicals were relatively harmless while others like glutaraldehyde are listed in chemical databases as "poison" and "toxic," chemicals that cause damage to organs if inhaled, ingested, or absorbed through the skin.
The Industry
Gas producers say the chemicals make up less than one percent of fracking fluid.
"Point five percent is chemicals," said Jim Heinze of Devon Energy, who took us on a tour of a frack job. "And a majority of that chemical that we're running is a friction-reducer that allows us to be able to pump down the hole at lower pressures than we would be able to do without that friction-reducer. And then also a biocide. And the biocide is to kill any bacteria that's in the water."
Heinze walked us through the entire fracking process, showing us all of the safeguards put in place to protect the groundwater near the site. (See "What is Fracking?" tab above) The safeguards include four different types of casings which are metal pipes that encase the well bore surrounded by three inches of cement.
Still, at that frack site alone, 0.5 percent amounts to about 20 thousand gallons of chemicals.
Possible Groundwater Contamination
Mike Paque with the Groundwater Protection Council says it's good to have access to the specific kinds of chemicals that were used in specific frack jobs. He says if a water well owner ever finds those chemicals in their well, they could use that information in a lawsuit against the energy company involved. He says FrackFocus.org is also a good resource for energy companies that may come under fire for contaminating water wells with fracking chemicals.
However, Paque says it's highly unlikely anyone will ever connect a groundwater problem to the actual process of fracking.
"It's important for the public to understand that hydraulic fracturing is a very short event in the life of a well. It occurs literally miles below the ground and there's just no drinking water down there," Paque says.
In Oklahoma, regulators say they have never linked groundwater pollution to the actual process of fracking.
We looked through thousands of pollution-related complaints reported to the Oklahoma Corporation Commission and the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality and discovered it's the post-fracking operations that pose the biggest pollution risks.
Injection Wells
When a well is fracked, it produces millions of gallons of wastewater. In Oklahoma that wastewater, which sometimes still contains toxic chemicals, has to go into another type of well called an injection or disposal well. There it is pushed back into the ground, trapping it in rock formations beneath the water table.
There are just under 11 thousand injection and disposal wells across Oklahoma. Companies have pushed 8.8 billion gallons of oil and gas wastewater into those wells (the ones that are tracked by the Corporation Commission) in just the last two years.
But, is it possible for injection wells to fail and leak the very fluids they're supposed to keep away from our water? We found a landowner in Creek County who says it happened to him.
"We had a glass. He took a drink of it. He literally fell down and spit it out and said 'Oh my God!"
We'll have his story and our discovery of an Environmental Protection Agency report detailing serious concerns with Oklahoma regulators Tuesday night at 10 o'clock.
Energy experts say fracking is the key to American energy sustainability. Some environmentalists say it's the worst human innovation ever. Either way, it's happening at a record pace in Oklahoma.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is the process of creating small cracks in rock formations thousands of feet below the surface to release trapped oil and gas. To create those cracks, producers push huge amounts of water, sand and chemicals into the rock formations.Related Story: Oklahoma Earthquake Swarm
But fracking is nothing new. Companies like Haliburton have been fracking oil and gas wells for decades. What is new? Horizontal drilling. Combine that with fracking and the continued demand for natural gas and it creates the current boom.
The Boom
In rural Oklahoma, renewed oil and gas activity is as prevalent as farming. Drilling rigs crowd the Oklahoma horizon and shiny new wellheads dot the plains. But with increased production comes increased pollution-related complaints, now hovering around 2 thousand per year.
Walter Grabow lives and farms in Kingfisher County. He's filed several complaints with the state over the last four years and still doesn't know what's killing his crops. He says he's watched a small patch of dead wheat grow to cover several of his acres and cross the road into his neighbor's field. There are eleven gas wells surrounding his property and he fears they are the source of his problems.
The Oklahoma Corporation Commission has investigated Grabow's problem several times and still can't say what is killing his crops. They suspect it is something other than oil and gas activity, but on one trip to Grabow's land, inspectors found a small amount of gas beneath the surface. Corporation Commission field inspectors say the case is still open.
In the meantime Grabow says he has seen gas wells create problems for his neighbors, including an incident where gas was bubbling in a nearby creek. He fears the increase in natural gas drilling and fracking is disturbing the groundwater around his acreage too.
"So if it's getting in the water and running around in the water table, then coming up some place, we got a problem," said Grabow. "Water's going to be worth more than the oil someday."
The Experts
Mike Paque is the director of the national Groundwater Protection Council, based out of Oklahoma City. He says there will always be pollution problems associated with the oil and gas industry, but he says the Oklahoma Corporation Commission does a good job regulating it, keeping those pollution issues to a minimum. But, when it comes to fracking, he says the chemicals involved are the most important issue and the public has good reason to be concerned.
"They should very much be concerned about the chemicals in the ground. That's really the bottom line," said Paque.
That's why the Groundwater Protection Council created the website FracFocus.org. Soon all oil and gas companies fracking in Oklahoma could be required to post the chemicals they used there. Right now, some are posting voluntarily.
We looked up a well in Dewey County to see what kinds of chemicals were used to frack it. Some chemicals were relatively harmless while others like glutaraldehyde are listed in chemical databases as "poison" and "toxic," chemicals that cause damage to organs if inhaled, ingested, or absorbed through the skin.
The Industry
Gas producers say the chemicals make up less than one percent of fracking fluid.
"Point five percent is chemicals," said Jim Heinze of Devon Energy, who took us on a tour of a frack job. "And a majority of that chemical that we're running is a friction-reducer that allows us to be able to pump down the hole at lower pressures than we would be able to do without that friction-reducer. And then also a biocide. And the biocide is to kill any bacteria that's in the water."
Heinze walked us through the entire fracking process, showing us all of the safeguards put in place to protect the groundwater near the site. (See "What is Fracking?" tab above) The safeguards include four different types of casings which are metal pipes that encase the well bore surrounded by three inches of cement.
Still, at that frack site alone, 0.5 percent amounts to about 20 thousand gallons of chemicals.
Possible Groundwater Contamination
Mike Paque with the Groundwater Protection Council says it's good to have access to the specific kinds of chemicals that were used in specific frack jobs. He says if a water well owner ever finds those chemicals in their well, they could use that information in a lawsuit against the energy company involved. He says FrackFocus.org is also a good resource for energy companies that may come under fire for contaminating water wells with fracking chemicals.
However, Paque says it's highly unlikely anyone will ever connect a groundwater problem to the actual process of fracking.
"It's important for the public to understand that hydraulic fracturing is a very short event in the life of a well. It occurs literally miles below the ground and there's just no drinking water down there," Paque says.
In Oklahoma, regulators say they have never linked groundwater pollution to the actual process of fracking.
We looked through thousands of pollution-related complaints reported to the Oklahoma Corporation Commission and the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality and discovered it's the post-fracking operations that pose the biggest pollution risks.
Injection Wells
When a well is fracked, it produces millions of gallons of wastewater. In Oklahoma that wastewater, which sometimes still contains toxic chemicals, has to go into another type of well called an injection or disposal well. There it is pushed back into the ground, trapping it in rock formations beneath the water table.
There are just under 11 thousand injection and disposal wells across Oklahoma. Companies have pushed 8.8 billion gallons of oil and gas wastewater into those wells (the ones that are tracked by the Corporation Commission) in just the last two years.
But, is it possible for injection wells to fail and leak the very fluids they're supposed to keep away from our water? We found a landowner in Creek County who says it happened to him.
"We had a glass. He took a drink of it. He literally fell down and spit it out and said 'Oh my God!"
We'll have his story and our discovery of an Environmental Protection Agency report detailing serious concerns with Oklahoma regulators Tuesday night at 10 o'clock.
Special Report: The Truth About Fracking
If you live in Pennsylvania you have heard of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, but how much do you know about it?
There have been claims that a series of earthquakes to hit Northeastern Ohio, including one that had a magnitude of 4, that may have been caused by wells related to fracking.
Just as the drill bits for fracking go down through many layers of rock, there are many layers to this story. It seems so simple, you reach down you flip the switch and the gas is there for you, but the more we investigated this issue, the more questions we had and quickly realized just what an amazingly complex issue fracking is for our state.
Recently signed into law, House Bill 1950 regulates gas drilling. It is 174 pages long, but nowhere in the bill could I find a mention of earthquakes and how to keep them out of Pennsylvania.
The genesis for this story came back on New Year's Eve. Near Youngstown, in northeastern Ohio, an earthquake registered magnitude four on the Richter Scale. This quake did damage to homes near the epicenter, some suffering large cracks in their floors and foundation.
The epicenter of the quake was less than a 1/4 of a mile from a waste water injection well and almost immediately the suspicions began. Political support for getting to the trillions of cubic feet of gas locked in the Marcellus Shale comes from the top down.
But as there is more and more fracking, should we expect more and more earthquakes? The fracking itself is like a mini-earthquake. The intense pressure breaks apart the rock and frees up the gas. But the size of the cracks are tiny, so small that a very fine sand is used.
PA DCNR Geologist Helen Delano:
“It moves into the the little fractures with the water, then as the water recedes," explained Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Geologist Helen Delano. "The sand grains stay behind and that props the cracks open.”
While they may may not look like much, seismographs are the key to earthquake detection here in Pennsylvania and throughout the world.
“There are underground injection wells for the disposal of fracking waste water in Pennsylvania, but not as many as in Ohio, so a lot so a lot of Pennsylvania's fracking waste water is being shipped to Ohio,” stated President of Penn Future Jan Jarrett.
Would it be possible for a fracking well in Pennsylvania to cause an earthquake similar to one that happened in Ohio? “It's much less likely, but there are no absolutes here,” stated PA Sierra Club Director Jeff Schmidt.
Closing the disposal well in Youngstown has made a huge difference. The well stopped injecting waste and the earthquakes have seem to have gone away, in December the seismographs were seeing more than three tiny earthquakes a day.
Should you be worried if a gas fracking well is near your property?
The chances of any one well causing earthquakes is small, so if you are collecting royalties you might well make a calculation, I'll take the risk and I'll take the royalties.
Here is the bottom line when it comes to earthquakes and fracking: “There are a lot of environmental issues, but earthquakes is not one that would worry me,“ commented Delano.
At least not for us in Pennsylvania. But we did talk to the legal department for the City of Youngstown in Ohio and most of the city officials there have earthquake insurance, including the Mayor.
The Youngstown well was just one of 177 wells in Ohio, so other wells in Ohio have capacity, but now seismologists are starting to see the same kind of small quakes near Marietta in Southeast Ohio that they saw in the months leading up to quake in Youngstown.
There have been claims that a series of earthquakes to hit Northeastern Ohio, including one that had a magnitude of 4, that may have been caused by wells related to fracking.
Just as the drill bits for fracking go down through many layers of rock, there are many layers to this story. It seems so simple, you reach down you flip the switch and the gas is there for you, but the more we investigated this issue, the more questions we had and quickly realized just what an amazingly complex issue fracking is for our state.
Recently signed into law, House Bill 1950 regulates gas drilling. It is 174 pages long, but nowhere in the bill could I find a mention of earthquakes and how to keep them out of Pennsylvania.
The genesis for this story came back on New Year's Eve. Near Youngstown, in northeastern Ohio, an earthquake registered magnitude four on the Richter Scale. This quake did damage to homes near the epicenter, some suffering large cracks in their floors and foundation.
The epicenter of the quake was less than a 1/4 of a mile from a waste water injection well and almost immediately the suspicions began. Political support for getting to the trillions of cubic feet of gas locked in the Marcellus Shale comes from the top down.
“We have a supply of natural gas that can last America nearly 100 years,”
stated President Obama.
But as there is more and more fracking, should we expect more and more earthquakes? The fracking itself is like a mini-earthquake. The intense pressure breaks apart the rock and frees up the gas. But the size of the cracks are tiny, so small that a very fine sand is used.
PA DCNR Geologist Helen Delano:
“It moves into the the little fractures with the water, then as the water recedes," explained Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Geologist Helen Delano. "The sand grains stay behind and that props the cracks open.”
While they may may not look like much, seismographs are the key to earthquake detection here in Pennsylvania and throughout the world.
“There are underground injection wells for the disposal of fracking waste water in Pennsylvania, but not as many as in Ohio, so a lot so a lot of Pennsylvania's fracking waste water is being shipped to Ohio,” stated President of Penn Future Jan Jarrett.
Would it be possible for a fracking well in Pennsylvania to cause an earthquake similar to one that happened in Ohio? “It's much less likely, but there are no absolutes here,” stated PA Sierra Club Director Jeff Schmidt.
Closing the disposal well in Youngstown has made a huge difference. The well stopped injecting waste and the earthquakes have seem to have gone away, in December the seismographs were seeing more than three tiny earthquakes a day.
Should you be worried if a gas fracking well is near your property?
The chances of any one well causing earthquakes is small, so if you are collecting royalties you might well make a calculation, I'll take the risk and I'll take the royalties.
Here is the bottom line when it comes to earthquakes and fracking: “There are a lot of environmental issues, but earthquakes is not one that would worry me,“ commented Delano.
At least not for us in Pennsylvania. But we did talk to the legal department for the City of Youngstown in Ohio and most of the city officials there have earthquake insurance, including the Mayor.
The Youngstown well was just one of 177 wells in Ohio, so other wells in Ohio have capacity, but now seismologists are starting to see the same kind of small quakes near Marietta in Southeast Ohio that they saw in the months leading up to quake in Youngstown.
Copyright 2012 Newport Television LLC All rights reserved
What is the Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline?
The U.S. already imports 800,000 barrels per day of tar sands oil, and the stage is being set for a drastic increase. Several pipelines already transport tar sands oil from Canada to the U.S. and two new ones have been built in the last few years.But the next one could be a game-changer.
TransCanada, a Canadian pipeline company, has proposed a pipeline called Keystone XL, which would carry up to 900,000 barrels per day of tar sands oil from operations in Alberta, Canada, more than 2,000 miles to refineries on the Gulf Coast. The pipeline would cut through six American heartland states, including Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.
Keystone XL would lock the U.S. into a dependence on this dirty fuel and drive a massive expansion of the tar sands operations in Alberta, Canada. Because Keystone XL would deliver tar sands oil to the Gulf Coast, America's largest oil refining and transport hub, it would effectively open the entire U.S. market and international markets to dirty fuel.
The added capacity of Keystone XL and the other two pipelines that have been built recently could more than triple U.S. consumption of tar sands oil. If expansion of tar sands goes unchecked, it will be impossible to reach our goals to reduce global warming pollution, and will have serious impacts for both people and wildlife.
Learn more about the proposed Keystone XL pipeline (PDF) >>
How Could the Keystone XL Impact People and Wildlife?
If approved, the Keystone XL pipeline will cross through America's agricultural heartland, the Missouri and Niobrara Rivers, the Ogallala aquifer, sage grouse habitat, sandhill crane habitat, walleye fisheries and more. Our public water supplies, crop lands, wildlife habitats and recreational opportunities will all be at risk of dangerous tar sands oil leaks, like the Enbridge Oil Spill in Michigan.Learn more about the threat the Keystone XL pipeline poses >>
Speak Up to Stop the Keystone XL
Thousands of people around the country are taking a stand against the import of dirty tar sands oil, from farmers in Nebraska who don't want a tar sands pipeline plowed through their property to activists in Seattle who want to move towards a clean energy future.
Will Tar Sands Pipeline Threaten Groundwater?
National Geographic News Article
Proposed Keystone XL pipeline would carry diluted bitumen, or “dilbit.”
More than a million gallons of dilbit leaked into Michigan's Kalamazoo River in July 2010.
Photograph courtesy Michigan Department of Environmental Quality
Published September 19, 2011
This story is part of a special National Geographic News series on global water issues.
For two weeks in late August and early September, environmental activists staged sit-ins in front of the White House to protest a pipeline that would carry a slurry of tar sands from Alberta, Canada, to Texas.
Their objection? Because the gooey mixture of oil and sand that comprises tar sand must be broken down to form normal crude, extracting it is a messy business that produces far more carbon emissions than does extracting regular crude.
(Related: "Is Canadian Oil Bound for China Via Texas Pipeline?")
But while emissions worries have seized much of the attention directed at the nearly 2,000-mile (3,218-kilometer) Keystone XL pipeline, experts are also concerned about another environmental problem: the threat to water quality all along the conduit’s route.
The pipeline, which would transport the tar sands material to refineries near Houston, would cross one of America’s largest underground water reserves, the Ogallala Aquifer, which stretches across 174,000 square miles (450,000 square kilometers) and underlies eight Great Plains states.
Last month, the U.S. State Department said in an environmental review that the project would have “no significant impacts to most resources” during “normal operation.” But what many opponents of the project worry about is what happens if those normal operations fail.
TransCanada, the company seeking to build the pipeline, already runs one pipeline from the tar sands region that crosses the eastern edge of the aquifer. The Natural Resources Defense Council and other environmental groups have argued that such pipelines are dangerous because they carry a watered-down version of the sticky tar sands deposits known as diluted bitumen, or “dilbit.”
Dilbit carries hazardous chemicals such as cancer-causing benzene and toxic heavy metals such as arsenic. Because it also contains particles of sand, the environmental groups say, dilbit is much more corrosive than oil alone, thus more likely to cause leaks.
Susan Casey-Lefkowitz, a co-author of a recent report by the Defense Council, said that piping dilbit is “like sandblasting the inside of the pipe,” making pipes 16 times more likely to leak than when they are carrying regular crude oil.
Keystone XL would pass over the heart of the aquifer, cutting through the Sand Hills of Nebraska, a region of grass-covered dunes that contains one of the largest wetlands ecosystems in the United States. The region's porous ground acts as a thick sponge, environmentalists say, allowing oil to soak into the aquifer more easily than it would if the soil were more solid.
(Related: "The Keystone XL Pipeline: A Tar Sands Folly?" and "Yellowstone Spill Shadows Efforts on the Keystone XL")
Along much of its length, the pipeline would be buried in a trench, a design that would protect it from harsh weather but one that would also make it harder to spot leaks.
“I could imagine a worst-case scenario where a potential dilbit spill might reach the water table in a matter of hours or days,” said Jason Gurdak, a hydrologist at San Francisco State University. A spill would likely immediately migrate downward, he said, possibly reaching the aquifer and creating a plume. Because much of dilbit is denser than water, he said, it could sink deep, making any contamination worse than that caused by more common pollutants.
TransCanada argues that piping is the safest way to transport petroleum over long distances and that the impact of any spill on the aquifer “would be limited to a very small area.”
Dilbit spills have already occurred in other areas. One, in July 2010, dumped about a million gallons of the substance into Michigan’s Kalamazoo River, closing the waterway to fishing and swimming for more than six months.
Meanwhile, near the mining sites in Western Canada’s Athabasca River basin, fishermen have pulled up fish with crooked spines and strange sores, and even one with two mouths.
Both the oil industry and the provincial government of Alberta have denied any link between fish deformities and the mining. But in two studies, researchers at the University of Alberta reported that near and downstream from the mines, they found higher-than-normal levels of toxic compounds that can cause cancer or developmental problems, including heavy metals such as mercury and thallium, as well as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs).
“We saw the same thing for every toxin we looked at: mercury, arsenic, lead, you name it,” David Schindler, professor of ecology at the University of Alberta, told the Canadian parliament last year.
Research funded by the oil industry has suggested that the pollution around tar sands sites occurs naturally, from the deposits being exposed and washed away. But an independent panel of experts said the research failed to meet basic scientific criteria, used too few monitoring stations, and had no real baseline.
(Related: "A Quest To Clean Up Canada's Oil Sands Carbon")
Panel member Monique Dubé, an aquatic toxicologist at the University of Saskatchewan, said, “There’s no question there’s contamination in the air, water, and land from the oil sands.”
To move forward, the pipeline needs the approval of the U.S. State Department. But even with that, it is still likely to confront local opposition. “I am not opposed to pipelines in Nebraska,” U.S. Sen. Mike Johanns, a Republican, said in a statement. But he faults the environmental review and wants the U.S. government to explore other options. “We have only one Ogallala Aquifer,” he said, “and we must take seriously our obligation to protect it.”
Speaker of the House John Boehner incested his personal portfolio into the Keystone Pipeline Project and has spent all of his time as one of our alledged leaders trying to get the pipleine approved by congress and the president so that he can profit from his "insider investment."
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