Today’s Essential Reads
FRACKING:
1000 Contaminated Wells: Ban Fracking In California
Clean water is life. Sign the following petition from the Center for Biological Diversity to keep California waters healthy.
Fracking: Whitewood, Va., Man Blames CNX for Methane Leak
Curtis White’s parents moved into a lush valley in the hills of Southwest Virginia in 1956. Nearly 60 years later, that scenic vista is a distant memory in sharp contrast to today’s landscape, which features a coal-bed methane well just 500 feet from the family home.
Bicyclists Protest ‘Fracking’ On Trip Through Somerset County
Twelve participants in the Tour de FRACK, or Freedom Ride for Awareness & Community Knowledge, rode their bicycles through Rockwood this week to bring attention to the side effects of hydraulic fracturing.
French Government ‘Totally Opposed’ to Fracking, Batho Says
The French government is “totally opposed” to hydraulic fracturing, a drilling process to produce natural gas and oil from shale, French Environment and Energy Minister Delphine Batho said.
BP OIL SPILL:
Firm Blamed In The Costliest Onshore Oil Spill Ever
Two years ago this month, an oil pipeline burst in Michigan, contaminating 38 miles of the Kalamazoo River. It didn’t get much national notice because everyone was focused on the massive BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Board: BP Missed the Important Safety Issues
A government safety panel says BP focused too much on the little details of personal worker safety instead of big systemic hazards that led to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
BP Oil Spill Fines Could Boost Everglades Restoration
Everglades restoration backers are aiming to get a big piece of the billions of dollars of fines that oil giant BP is expected to pay for polluting the Gulf of Mexico and disrupting Florida’s delicate ecology during the Deepwater Horizon spill of 2010.
Largest Oil-Spill Health Study Needs Volunteers
Scientists studying long-term effects of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill are looking for 15,000 more people who helped with the cleanup, even for one day.
RADIATION:
Use Lessons of Fukushima to Improve N-plant Safety
Based on lessons learned from the results of investigations into the unprecedented nuclear power plant crisis, the government and electric power companies must work on measures to prevent future nuclear accidents.