Josh Fox’s Gasland II to Expose Power Politics of Fracking

The energy boom comes at a heavy environmental cost, Fox argues. “We are talking about 1 to 2 million wells in the United States. This is transformative for huge sections of our country. The oil and gas industry has leased a combined total land mass bigger than California and Florida combined,” he said. “The industry is controlling huge sections of the US now.” Or as Steven Skyler Lipski discovered in the second film after moving into his dream house in Texas, with its lavish rooms and remote-controlled waterfall: “Just because you have a nice house doesn’t mean that they aren’t going to drill underneath it.”

Continue reading

Farmers Unite With Hydro-Fracking Activists

For over two years, the battle against fracking in Ireland has mostly been the preserve of the seasoned activist. But impressive organizing efforts in Fermanagh over the past few years have mobilized communities as campaign groups harangue elected representatives. A group of farmers drove 60 tractors in a ‘go-slow’, bringing a 24-kilometre stretch of road to a halt. The 16 June action opposed hydraulic fracturing – fracking – which could take place on both sides of the Irish border. It was followed by statements against fracking from the major farmers’ unions in the Republic of Ireland and in Northern Ireland. This is a significant development in the fight against fracking in Ireland and Northern Ireland,

Continue reading

Fearless Summer: Video: Mainers Block Frac-Oil Trains

This video shows 350 Maine, a grassroots movement addressing the climate crisis,blockading a Pan Am train as it passes through downtown Fairfield tonight, preventing roughly 70,000 barrels of crude oil from reaching the Irving Refinery in Saint John, New Brunswick. Police are on the scene. Trains running through Maine carry crude from the Bakken oil fields of North Dakota, where it is “fracked” or extracted by blasting a high pressure toxic cocktail deep into the ground to release the oil from shale rock, polluting air and water in surrounding communities.

Continue reading

Fearless Summer: Two Trains Carrying Fracked Gas Blocked in Maine

With hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” technology, oil that has long been impossible to extract is now the source of an explosive oil boom in the Midwest. Without enough pipelines to transport the Midwest crude to distant refineries, there has been a surge in the use of trains. Inspections of tracks are infrequent due to lack of resources to oversee them. “We oppose the continued extraction of fossil fuels, but we also oppose its transportation over thousands of miles of environmentally sensitive areas,” said Sass Linneken of Benton, student at Unity College. “Since my number one job is to protect my children, I feel an obligation to take action,” she said.

Continue reading

President Obama Continues ‘All of the Above’; Renewable Energy Focus Needed

Environmentalists warn that President Obama’s ‘climate plan’—announced Tuesday in a speech at Georgetown University—does not contain the urgency required by the fast-spiraling crisis of global warming and climate change and that though some aspects were welcome, the overall approach falls well short of what’s needed; critics say Obama’s plan is unclear about exactly how strict these regulations will be. “A sensible climate plan,” said Damon Moglen, climate and energy program director of Friends of the Earth, “would include a renunciation of the president’s “all of the above” energy strategy, which promotes biofuels, so-called clean coal, natural gas and dirty and dangerous nuclear power.”

Continue reading

Illinois Anti-Fracking Coalition “Horrified” By New Law, Issues Manifesto

SAFE (Southern Illinoisans Against Fracturing Our Environment) is horrified at the decision of the Illinois General Assembly, and Governor Quinn, to put the water, air, soil, health, and economic future of Southern and Central Illinois at risk from horizontal fracking. In the words of Tabitha Tripp of SAFE, ‘It’s a very sad time for Illinois. We have to fight our own government to keep our children and grandchildren safe from harm.’

SB1715 was negotiated behind closed doors, and was not based on scientific study, but rather on the question of what was politically possible, regardless of science. The resulting bill is woefully inadequate to protect Illinois residents from the known harms horizontal fracking has brought to residents across America. It also represents a denial of basic democracy for the residents of Illinois.

Continue reading

Shale Gas Protesters Regroup Following Arrests

Opponents of shale gas exploration in Kent County, N.B. are looking forward to continuing their protest, following the arrests of several demonstrators on Friday. Protesters have been rallying for support along New Brunswick’s Highway 126, near Harcourt, since Wednesday, by taking part in a native sacred fire ceremony. “We believe the fire helps and protects us and we lit it for four days as was told to us by our ancestors,” said Amy Sock — a “warrior” from Elsipogtog First Nation. “One of our weapons is our sacred fire,” she said

Continue reading

No Compromise With Hyrdo-Fracking: Ban It, Don’t Regulate It

The conflict between compromisers of Gang Green and front-line environmentalists sharpened in the fracking debate. A manifesto calling for no compromise with hydro-fracking clarifies the issues: “We assert that fracking is a moral crisis. In a time of climate emergency, it is wrong to further deepen our dependency on fossil fuels. . . We reject the legitimacy of Illinois’ fracking regulatory bill, which was the result of closed-door negotiations between industry representatives and compromise-oriented environmental organizations. Responsible only to their funders and their members, these environmental groups do not represent us nor are they empowered to negotiate on our behalf. We consider the fracking regulatory bill to be a subversion of both science and democracy. . . It is an unjust law.”

Continue reading

Video: Frack is Whack – Californians Against Fracking

Joined by “Gasland” director Josh Fox, environmental activists in LA gathered on May 30 to launch Californians Against Fracking and to deliver a petition with over a 100,000 signatures for banning fracking to Gov. Jerry Brown. His office was closed at 1 pm on a Thursday afternoon, so they went to Atty. General Kamala Harris’s office, where they were told that no one is there to address the concerns of the citizens. We hear from Rose Braz of the Center for Biological Diversity, Josh Fox of “Gasland,” and fracking activists Siena Lorraine and Aura Walker.

Continue reading

Frack Fight: A Secret War of Activists — With the World in the Balance

There’s a war going on that you know nothing about between a coalition of great powers and a small insurgent movement. It’s a secret war being waged in the shadows while you go about your everyday life.

In the end, this conflict may matter more than those in Iraq and Afghanistan ever did. And yet it’s taking place far from newspaper front pages and with hardly a notice on the nightly news. Nor is it being fought in Yemen or Pakistan or Somalia, but in small hamlets in upstate New York. There, a loose network of activists is waging a guerrilla campaign not with improvised explosive devices or rocket-propelled grenades, but with zoning ordinances and petitions.

The weaponry may be humdrum, but the stakes couldn’t be higher. Ultimately, the fate of the planet may hang in the balance.

Continue reading