Архів позначки: shale gas

Is the Oil and Gas Industry Using the Crisis in Ukraine to Increase Profits?

New York Times has a front-page story reporting on a major push in the Obama administration and by Speaker Boehner to increase exports of fracked gas in response to the crisis in the Ukraine. While events there are certainly disturbing, they should not be used as an excuse for ramping up dirty gas exports that will harm communities air, water and health in the United States.

According to the Times, a major push to export dirty fracked gas is underway, led by “major oil and gas producers like ExxonMobil and Republican leaders on Capitol Hill.” Just last Tuesday, Speaker John Boehner called on President Obama to “dramatically expedite the approval of U.S. exports of natural gas.”

Yet according to the Times, the administration is already moving to advance a “State Department initiative to export American natural gas to Europe as a lever against Russia.”

One of the craziest things about this, is that the U.S. currently does not have the capacity to export large amounts of natural gas overseas, and so the claim that building out infrastructure to export fracked gas would help with the current crisis in Ukraine is just disingenuous. Long term, we need to invest in sustainable renewable energy, at home and abroad.

ExxonMobil should not be controlling our foreign policy, and we should not be sacrificing communities across the United States for illusory and short-term foreign policy objectives.

As a movement, we have made tremendous progress, but if the oil and gas industry get their way, ramped-up exports would drive even more fracking. Ironically, as fracking accounts for a large amount of climate pollution, increasing exports and accelerating fracking will actually lead to more long-term instability and global security issues.

 

Food & Water Watch

Unfracked: Watch the recorded livestream

Watch the recorded Livestream of the conference here

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On the eve of the conference, we will also hosted a special screening of GASLAND: PART II with Director Josh Fox
Wednesday 4th September 2013 18:00-21:00
Room A1G3, European Parliament, Brussels

NOTE:
This public conference by the Greens/EFA group was fully interpreted by 
International Sign (IS) interpreters as well as Live Speech to Text in the room on the livestream

There are several myths circulating about the extraction of shale gas, coal bed methane and other unconventional fossils, through different methods, notably hydraulic fracturing. These include: – that the extraction of such fuels will bring prosperity to Europe – that we can replicate the economic boom of the US, without repeating their environmental mistakes – that shale gas and other UFFs are necessary transition fuels – that they are good for the climate – that we do not need any extra legislation in Europe to regulate these technologies – that the risks to public health are minimal. Читати далі Unfracked: Watch the recorded livestream

Shell: Global Mega-Frackers

Pages-from-Shell-Global-MegafrackersThis briefing compiles numerous examples of Shell fracking around the world, but does not claim to be an exhaustive list. By timing the release with Yoko Ono’s involvement in the Meltdown Festival at the Shell-sponsored Southbank Centre, we hope to:

  • Increase awareness of the enormous role that Shell is playing in expanding fracking operations all over the world.
  • Create political space amidst the cultural showcase of the Meltdown Festival to understand the role that sponsorship plays in creating social legitimacy and cover for Shell’s dangerous operations.
  • Promote the creative, community resistance to fracking that is taking place all over the world, which is especially instructive in the context of the industry being poised to start fracking in numerous sites across the UK.

Download the briefing here.

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The era of relatively ‘easy to reach’ oil is over.

All fossil fuel extraction involves drilling and localised pollution, so none of it was ever ‘easy’ to reach. But global extraction levels for the oil that is comparatively straight forward to pump out of seems to have peaked. Instead, the fossil fuel industry is increasingly focusing on harder to extract resources. Enter ‘unconventionals’ – dirtier fossil fuels which are more complicated to extract and refine, like tar sands, oil shale and shale gas, or those that are located in hazardous and challenging regions like the Arctic, or deepwater drilling. Читати далі Shell: Global Mega-Frackers