News Round-Up: August 24, 2011

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Today’s Essential Reads

FRACKING:

Mwaa Ha Ha! Fracking Fluid Is So Safe, Halliburton CEO Made a Peon Drink It

Halliburton CEO Dave Lesar is so confident in the company’s new eco-friendlier fracking fluid that he had one of his minions sip the mixture during his keynote speech at a recent industry conference. What better way to quell public fear over the effects of hydraulic fracturing — the natural-gas drilling technique dubbed “fracking” — on water sources than to have someone play the guinea pig?

Fracking Tax Could Aid Wildlife

Not only will expanded drilling have a lasting impact on our municipalities, it also will drastically alter the landscape of New York’s Southern Tier, forever impacting the birds and other wildlife species that depend on the region’s forests, wetlands and grasslands.

Did Fracking Cause the Virginia Earthquake?

Earthquakes in the nation’s capitol are as rare as hen’s teeth. The epicenter of Tuesday’s quake was in Mineral, Virginia, which is located on three very quiet fault lines. The occurrence of yet another freak earthquake in an unusual location is leading many anti-fracking activists (including me — they have just started fracking in Stratford, which is 40 minutes from New Plymouth) to wonder whether “fracking” in nearby West Virginia may be responsible.

BP OIL SPILL:

St. Bernard Officials Call for Investigation into Dead Crabs in Lake Borgne (VIDEO)

It’s been a costly few days on the water for Bruce Guerra. “Yesterday, [I lost] in between $800 and $1000,” he said. The Yscloskey crabber said he is losing money because of dead crabs, being pulled from his crab traps in Lake Borgne.

Oil-Slicked Pelicans Found Near TC Port

Two oil-slicked pelicans are recovering at a wildlife rehabilitation center in Seabrook after being found Monday near where 50 barrels of bunker oil spilled into the Texas City ship channel during the weekend, officials confirmed.

BP’s Not Out Of The Water Yet: Thousands Of Fish Float Dead In Louisiana Bayou

Officials with Louisiana’s Plaquemines Parish are investigating why hundreds of thousands of dead fish were found in the Bayou Chaland area of the state, which is west of the Mississippi River. Workers with the Plaquemines Parish Inland Waterways Strike Force discovered the massive fish kill Sept. 10, 2010, and reported it to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries.

Was Shell as Transparent as it Should Have Been With Recent North Sea Spill?

You would think that after the BP Deepwater Horizon Spill last year, oil companies would have learned to deal with similar catastrophes better. An oil spill is something that may be unavoidable but dealing with it in a prompt manner that encourages stakeholder awareness is more than clever PR.

RADIATION:

Japan Triples Airborne Radiation Checks as ‘Hot Spots’ Spread

Japan will more than triple the number of regions it checks for airborne radiation as more contaminated “hot spots” are discovered far from Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s crippled Fukushima nuclear power station.

China Finds 100,000 SQ Miles of Radiation In Pacific Ocean Up 300 Times Higher Than Normal

China says the radioactive contamination in the Pacific Ocean from the Fukushima nuclear power plant is far wider than the areas released by the Japanese government.

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Stuart H. Smith is an attorney based in New Orleans fighting major oil companies and other polluters.
Cooper Law Firm

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