The environmental effects of hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” as a method for natural gas drilling investigated recently by ProPublica and displayed in the documentary film Gasland, have led to a nationwide backlash against this dangerous fossil fuel touted as a “clean burning alternative to oil.”
Environmental Issues
WilderUtopia sees environmental issues as publicizing harmful effects of human activity on the biophysical environment, and seeking methods to solve problems, transcend boundaries and build a better and more sustainable future. Environmentalism, a social and environmental movement that spans race, ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status, addresses environmental issues through advocacy, education and activism.
World’s Dirtiest Oil – Alberta Tar Sands
The world’s dirtiest oil is produced by strip mining the Athabascan Tar Sands of Alberta, Canada, destroying an area of Northern Boreal forest and wetlands the size of Florida, with toxic settling ponds that pollute rivers fished by First Nations people, requiring pipelines to the Gulf Coast and hauling routes through the Northern Rocky Mountains.
ProPublica: EPA to Study Pollution from Natural Gas Fracking
The EPA wants to study impacts on drinking water of each stage involved in hydraulic fracturing, where drillers mix water with chemicals and sand and inject the fluid into wells to release oil or natural gas.
Coming Disaster: Peak Oil and Climate Change
Peak Oil is the point at which petroleum production reaches its greatest rate just before going into perpetual decline. In “Peak Oil and a Changing Climate,” a new video series from The Nation and On The Earth productions, radio host Thom Hartmann explains that the world will reach peak oil within the next year if it hasn’t already. As a nation, the United States reached peak oil in 1974, after which it became a net oil importer.
Bison Wild Recolonization Stopped With Slaughter – By George Wuerthner
The bison slaughter is proposed to appease the intractable and unreasonable demands of Montana’s livestock industry to zero tolerance for native bison on Montana soil. All of this is justified in the name of controlling brucellosis, a disease that can cause domestic livestock to abort their first calf.
Nuclear Regulatory Smackdown at San Onofre
Precedent for closing San Onofre Nuke Plant: It’s age and human fallibility managing an outdated plant fast approaching its 2013 expiration date.
Arctic Currents Warmest in 2000 Years
A North Atlantic current flowing into the Arctic Ocean is warmer than for at least 2,000 years in a sign that global warming is likely to bring ice-free seas around the North Pole in summers, a study showed.
