Search Results for: Amy Mall

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Switchboard, from NRDC :: Amy Mall’s Blog :: Tags: hydraulicfracturing

$Switchboard, from NRDC :: Amy Mall’s Blog :: Tags: hydraulicfracturing$

On NRDC’s Switchboard, Amy Mall tracked the fast-moving terrain of shale development — regulatory shifts, industry claims, emerging science. From Washington rulemaking to on-the-ground drilling impacts, the blog translated policy fights into plain stakes. As the gas boom expanded, so did the need for real-time scrutiny. Switchboard became a running ledger of what regulators proposed — and what communities stood to lose or gain.

Source: Switchboard, from NRDC :: Amy Mall's Blog (2010) Read More

Love Canal 2020

“Love Canal 2020” evoked the infamous New York toxic waste disaster as a warning: environmental crises often unfold slowly before erupting into national scandal. The comparison suggested a future headline no one wants — contamination recognized only after years of denial. History, the piece implied, does not repeat itself quietly.

Source: Love Canal 2020 (2010) Read More

BARDs “Big Mule” Drummond Coal Sued–Part II

On Martin Luther King Day (MLK Day Jan. 17, 2011), America deserves to be reminded that hard on the trail of King’s Civil Rights legacy in Alabama is the way Alabama’s poor have been victimized by negligent environmental law. The daily posts of Max Shelby and his group, blogging in Alabama about the environment, politics, big business and corruption, are some of the boldest independent voices writing in the U.S. on environmental justice today.

Source: Vincent Alabama Confidential (2010) Read More

The risks of oil and gas production acknowledged around the world

Government officials from around the world have recently declared that the risks of natural gas drilling are too great to allow it to proceed without additional analysis.

Source: Amy Mall's Blog | Switchboard, from NRDC (2011) Read More

Exxon Mobil Corporation

ExxonMobil, one of the world’s largest publicly traded energy companies, expanded its unconventional portfolio through major acquisitions and strategic positioning in shale basins. With global capital and political influence, Exxon’s moves reverberate beyond individual wells. When Exxon commits, markets, lawmakers, and competitors take notice.

Source: Exxon Mobil Corporation (2010) Read More

Exxon-Xto Deal Forces Congress to Reconsider Natural Gas

Rex Tillerson — a former tuba player in the University of Texas Longhorn Band who once supplied the band’s bottom register — would later rise to become ExxonMobil’s CEO. In global energy markets, he built a reputation as a disciplined negotiator, forging high-level relationships including with Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin. When Exxon moved to acquire XTO Energy, doubling down on U.S. shale, the scale of the bet drew renewed congressional attention to natural gas policy and market concentration. When a supermajor commits billions, energy independence narratives and oversight frameworks shift with it. Scale reshapes politics.

Source: The New York Times : Climatewire (2010) Read More

Tennessee Gas Pipeline

The Tennessee Gas Pipeline system connects production fields to distant markets, underscoring that extraction is only part of the equation. Pipelines determine where gas flows — and which communities host compressor stations and right-of-way corridors. Infrastructure redraws maps.

Source: Tennessee Gas Pipeline (2010) Read More

Watchdog: New York State Regulation of Natural Gas Wells Has Been “Woefully Insufficient for Decades.”

Watchdog reporting scrutinized New York’s regulatory approach to natural gas development as the state weighed whether to permit high-volume hydraulic fracturing. New York–based Toxics Targeting examined the Department of Environmental Conservation’s own spill database, identifying 270 documented cases over three decades involving fires, explosions, wastewater releases, well contamination, and ecological damage tied to gas drilling — many still unresolved. The findings challenged repeated assurances that existing regulations were sufficient to safeguard public health and the environment.

Source: Democracy Now! (2009) Read More

Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet | 350.org Founder Bill McKibben

Bill McKibben’s Eaarth reframed climate change as an already altered planetary condition rather than a future threat. In the context of shale expansion, the book’s argument sharpened the stakes: energy choices shape not just markets, but the stability of the planet itself.

Source: Democracy Now! (2010) Read More

World-Renowned Scientist Dr. Theo Colborn on the Health Effects of Water Contamination from Fracking

Dr. Theo Colborn, founder of The Endocrine Disruption Exchange, warned that chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing could interfere with hormonal systems at low concentrations. Her research focused on endocrine disruption — subtle biological effects not always captured by traditional toxicology thresholds. The implications extended beyond spills to long-term exposure science.

Source: Democracy Now! (2010) Read More

Plan to send fracking wastewater near Keuka Lake is abandoned | stargazette.com | Star-Gazette

$Plan to send fracking wastewater near Keuka Lake is abandoned | stargazette.com | Star-Gazette$

A contentious plan by Chesapeake Energy to convert an abandoned gas well in Pulteney, New York, into a deep-well wastewater disposal site near Keuka Lake is officially dead—though the company left the door open for similar facilities in the future. The proposal, which would have handled more than 180,000 gallons of Marcellus Shale fracking waste per day, drew opposition from local residents, Pulteney Town Supervisor Bill Weber, U.S. Rep. Eric Massa, and Walter Hang of Ithaca-based Toxics Targeting, who argued that grassroots resistance in the Finger Lakes influenced decisions before the EPA and the New York DEC.

Source: Ithaca Journal (2010) Read More

Birth of EPA

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), officially established on December 2, 1970 by President Richard Nixon, emerged from a decade of rising environmental awareness sparked in large part by Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. As pollution crises mounted and public pressure intensified following the passage of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Nixon created a strong, independent agency to unify federal air, water, pesticide, and radiation programs under Administrator William D. Ruckelshaus.

Source: EPA Journal (1985) Read More

GovTrack.us: Tracking the U.S. Congress

Gov Track was the first website to apply the principles of open data and Web 2.0 to the U.S. Congress. It catalyzed the development of a community of like-minded developers and shaped the data-oriented open government movement that we see today.

Source: GovTrack.us (2004) Read More