Farmers and ranchers on Navajo land in northwestern New Mexico are preparing to take heavy losses this season as a plume of wastewater laced with toxic chemicals flows south from an abandoned mine in Colorado. Last week, the Environmental Protection Agency spilled around 3 million gallons of contaminated water into the Animas River. According to the EPA, the incident occurred when a crew hired to pump and treat wastewater inside the abandoned Gold King Mine outside of Durango, Colorado, accidently released a brew of arsenic, cadmium, lead and other heavy metals from a mine tunnel. As a precautionary measure, the Navajo Nation has asked citizens to keep livestock away from the San Juan River and stop diverting water from the river for crops. That means farmers like Lorenzo Bates are beginning to plan for the worst. “What is in the water? To what extent are those heavy metals?” said Bates, speaker of the Navajo Nation Council and farmer from Upper Fruitland, New Mexico.
By Bruce Finley in The Denver Post. Silverton, CO — Three days after EPA workers triggered a huge blowout at a festering mine in southwestern Colorado, a mustard-colored plume — still fed by 548 gallons leaking per minute — stretched more than 100 miles, spreading contaminants including cadmium, arsenic, copper, lead and zinc. Environmental Protection Agency regional chief Shaun McGrath on Saturday conceded that federal officials know the levels of the heavy metals in Cement Creek and the Animas River but would not reveal early testing results. “Those data sheets have not been finalized by the scientists,” McGrath said. “As soon as we are able to release them, we will.”
By Christopher Judges in Ventura Country Reporter – California farmers are desperate for water. Every year, Chevron sells back billions of gallons of recycled oil extraction wastewater to them. This water contains acetone, oil and methylene chloride, a known carcinogen, in nearly four times the amount found in a contaminated Arkansas River after the 2013 ExxonMobil tar sands pipeline failure. Our farmers assume the water is passing health standards, but the government authorities and local water boards charged with overseeing this practice are relying on decades-old monitoring, which does not test for carcinogens or the chemicals used in modern-day oil production. Big oil companies like Chevron, Shell, BP and the Koch Bothers, etc., are aware of their environmental destruction, their disgusting pollution and their “en masse” spreading of cancer-causing agents worldwide.
By Alex Freeman in The Fifth Column News – The new Order maintains that native tribes in Maine retain their sovereignty, but holds that they now have a “relationship between equals with its own set of responsibilities,” yet declares that tribal lands, forms of tribal governance and natural resources controlled by the native tribes are subject to the laws and jurisdiction of the State of Maine. The takeover of lands was prompted by an EPA letter to the State, and claims that lack of Tribal participation in “the State’s interests” required the usurpation of Tribal sovereignty. The Letter, in fact, actually supports the Tribal position, as the Tribal standards of environmental protection are much stricter than those of the EPA or the State of Maine. Those close to the Penobscot Tribe tell The Fifth Column that LePage threatened to sue the EPA over the proposed new regulations, leading the Agency to back down.
For all of you who are sick of heart over the destruction of the earth through pollution and militarization, we call on you to get involved in an action that speaks to your heart and mind, from the EPA to the Pentagon on April 22, Earth Day. [Details below.] In Climate Change Challenges by Kathy Kelly: “. . . it seems the greatest danger – the greatest violence – that any of us face is contained in our attacks on our environment. Today’s children and generations to follow them face nightmares of scarcity, disease, mass displacement, social chaos, and war, due to our patterns of consumption and pollution.” She adds this: “What’s more, the U.S. military, with its more than 7,000 bases, installations, and other facilities, worldwide, is one of the most egregious polluters on the planet and is the world’s largest single consumer of fossil fuels. If you are concerned by the challenges facing Mother Earth and want to end the killer drone program, get involved with the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance on April 22, Earth Day.
“This is about using the best possible science to do what the American people expect the EPA to do – ensure that the health of their communities and families are protected,” Paul Anastas, Assistant Administrator for the agency’s Office of Research and Development, said in 2011. But the EPA’s study has been largely shaped and re-shaped by the very industry it is supposed to investigate, as energy company officials were allowed to edit planning documents, insisted on vetting agency contractors, and demanded to review federal scientist’s field notes, photographs and laboratory results prior to publication, according to a review by DeSmog of over 3,000 pages of previously undisclosed emails, confidential draft study plans and otherinternal documents obtained through open records requests.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been sued over toxic chemicals released into the air, water and land by the oil and gas industry, a coalition of nine environmental and open government groups announced today. The extraction of oil and gas releases more toxic pollution than any other industry except for power plants, according to the EPA’s own estimates, the coalition, which filed the lawsuit this morning in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, noted. But the industry has thus far escaped federal rules that, for over the past two decades, have required other major polluters to disclose the type and amount of toxic chemicals they release or dispose. The Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) is a federal pollution database, established under the Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act, and can be used by first-responders in the event of a crisis as well as members of the general public.
A simmering water war is about to come to a boil over the fate of historic, well-loved public reservoirs in Portland, Oregon. At the heart of the controversy is a breakdown in public trust that reflects the dangers of corporate-led water privatization schemesin the United States and around the world. In an emotionally charged public meeting on November 18, 2014, Portland residents bombarded two of their city commissioners with questions about what they believe is a cronyism-driven plan to kill the elegant, gravity-fed, open water reservoir system that has reliably served their city safe, clean drinking water for more than 100 years.
Side-stepping a shifty exemption for fracking pollution known as the “Halliburton loophole,” the Environmental Protection Agency is fining the world’s largest natural gas company for dirtying West Virginia’s waterways. The EPA, the Justice Department, and the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) on Monday charged XTO Energy, a subsidiary of Exxon Mobil, $2.3 million for violating the Clean Water Act for fracking-related activities in West Virginia. The company will also have to pay an additional $3 million to restore eight sites damaged by the unauthorized discharge of fill material into streams and wetlands.
A new study says the world’s ocean is awash in 5 trillion pieces of plastic — from tiny beads and toys to shopping bags and bottles — weighing more than 250,000 tons. One of the researchers said it’s the equivalent of two-liter plastic bottles stacked end-to-end in a column that stretches to the moon and back twice. The study, published in PLOS One, is one of the largest attempts to date to quantify plastic litter in the world’s oceans. Much of the plastic ends up in giant swirling gyres like the Pacific Garbage Patch that spreads across some 276,000 square miles — an area larger than the state of Texas.
Attorneys general in at least a dozen states are working with energy companies and other corporate interests, which in turn are providing them with record amounts of money for their political campaigns, including at least $16 million this year. They share a common philosophy about the reach of the federal government, but the companies also have billions of dollars at stake. And the collaboration is likely to grow: For the first time in modern American history, Republicans in January will control a majority — 27 — of attorneys general’s offices. The Times reported previously how individual attorneys general have shut down investigations, changed policies or agreed to more corporate-friendly settlement terms after intervention by lobbyists and lawyers, many of whom are also campaign benefactors.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has arrested Gary Southern, former president of the company responsible for contaminating the drinking water of 300,000 West Virginians earlier this year, on criminal fraud charges. According to a complaint unsealed on Monday, Southern was charged with bankruptcy fraud, wire fraud and lying under oath in hearings following the spill. This January, up to 300,000 people were left without tap water after 10,000 gallons of a coal-cleaning chemical began leaking into the Elk River in Charleston, West Virginia, just upstream of the largest water treatment plant in the state. The leak sprung at a storage tank run by Southern’s former company, Freedom Industries, which manufactures chemicals for coal and steel production.
In the past few months, Detroit got flooded by unusually heavy rains. Washington State wrapped up one of its most destructive fires seasons on record. And California remains in the grip of extreme drought, with major reservoirs holding just 43 percent of normal levels. Joe Muzzi, a California farmer, said, “If it doesn’t rain this winter we are out of business.” Already 17,100 jobs have been lost due to the drought. Climate change is hurting American communities right now. It will take an even greater toll on future generations if we don’t confront it. Fortunately, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is taking action.
San Francisco, CA – A coalition of farmers and environmental groups filed a lawsuit to sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today on behalf of six Midwest states where a toxic herbicide cocktail called Dow’s Enlist Duo, a blend of glyphosate and 2,4-D, was approved on October 15 for use on genetically engineered (GE) crops. Approved for use on GE corn and soybeans that were engineered to withstand repeated applications of the herbicide, the creation of 2,4-D-resistant crops and EPA’s approval of Enlist Duo is the result of an overuse of glyphosate, an ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup. The misuse resulted in an infestation of glyphosate-resistant super weeds which can now be legally combatted with the more potent 2,4-D.
MOORINGSPORT, La. (KTBS) – Raw oil is coating around a four mile section of Tete Bayou in Caddo Parish after a major spill Monday, around 8 AM. It happened just southwest of Mooringsport. Three families have been displaced because of the environmental disaster. The burst oil pipe belongs to Sunoco Logistics, which says the exact cause of the spill is still under investigation. Sunoco faces a long cleanup. The company estimates for now that around 4,000 thousand barrels worth of oil poured from the pipe, which carries oil from Texas to Ohio. At a press conference Saturday, it was announced around 1,900 barrels have already been cleaned up so far. Louisiana State Police say the three families were not forced out but asked to leave because of the oil’s fumes.
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