Hold Your Breath: Fracking and Clean Air Don't Mix

Published on Dec 8, 2014 IS IT CLEAN? This video examines the impact of oil and gas development on the health of people living it. Using a FLIR (infrared) camera designed to detect normally invisible, sometimes toxic volatile organic compounds (VOCs), mother and activist and FLIR-certified-technician Sharon Wilson went on a road trip to document pollution at oil and gas operations -- and its human cost. EPA might require that oil and gas companies clean up their pollution. They're deciding now. Go to protectourair.org to urge them to act. FOR MORE INFO: 5-state study finds unsafe levels of airborne chemical near oil and gas fields, http://bit.ly/1zjgjv5. Oil & gas wells map: http://bit.ly/1gIR1xB fracking.earthworksaction.org CREDITS: FLIR video - Sharon Wilson, Earthworks Dir. of Photo. for non-FLIR video/photo - www.juliedermansky.com Video Production - www.globalperformancemedia.com

Fracking Debate at Cornell University Feb. 4

Published on Feb 5, 2014

With Tom Shepstone, Scott Kurkoski, John Conrad vs. Anthony Ingraffea, Sandra Steingraber, Walter Hang. Fracking II: Should We Lift the Ban ? Sponsored by the Cornell Forensics Society. Professor Sam Nelson moderating...

Healing: Thinking of Fracking and Mother Earth

In honor of Vera Scroggins, photojournalist and documentarian, a tour de force, and a wonderful human being.   I thought of her when I saw this picture.

Pete Seeger at Live Farm Aid 2013

Published on Sep 21, 2013

Pete Seeger performs "This Land is Your Land" with Farm Aid board artists John Mellencamp, Willie Nelson, Dave Matthews and Neil Young live at the Farm Aid concert in Saratoga Springs, NY on September 21, 2013. Farm Aid was started by Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp in 1985 to keep family farmers on the land and has worked since then to make sure everyone has access to good food from family farmers. Dave Matthews joined Farm Aid's board of directors in 2001.

For more information about Farm Aid, visit: http://farmaid.org/youtube

Farm Aid's performances are donated by the artists in order to raise funds and raise awareness for family farmers.

Smokey the Bear on Fracking

Jessica Ernst: The Consequences of Fracking

Ms. Ernst talks about the dark side of nature. She tells of her findings: Gas companies have learned that, in order to get away with destroying communities, they have to make communities sick. So they capitalize on greed, money, things that people want, and go in to communities and plant seeds to encourage these negative emotions. For the most part, people in communities do the gas company's job for them by creating ill will, polarization, and false hopes that lead to fragmentation of community. Communities become sick and vulnerable to the promises of prosperity. Brilliant method of making people work for their own demise.

Jessica Ernst said: No healthy community will allow hydraulic fracturing so they have to make the community sick -- And they do so by feeding the dark side a human nature which is greed, sloth, selfishness they feed the ego they promise a little bit... ...and then whammo, the community is divided. The people with concerns are then abused by the people who want more money and Encana doesn't even have to do the dirty work! A lot of the other companies; the people in the communities do the dirty work for them. It's an incredibly brilliant technique which works very well. Everywhere they're fracking this is happening. And my conclusion as a scientist, and as an environmental biologist-- as an environmental specialist that has worked in this industry... My conclusion is that no healthy community on this planet would allow hydraulic fracturing because it is not safe,  It is impossible to do even with the best rules and regulations.

Dr. Sandra Steingraber: Albany News Conference on Fracking New York

Dr. Sandra Steingraber speaks at a news conference in Albany, New York, on January 11, 2013. She describes the process by which NY residents responded in writing to the impending possibility that Governor Cuomo will allow permitting of gas wells in New York State. The governor's decision may come as soon as February- just a few weeks away.

Kids Stop the Frack Attack

Hot Off the Press: The No Frack Almanac Spring Issue!

Hot off the press from Susquehanna County, PA, and environs! Don't miss the Spring 2012 issue just out! Click here for great journalism.

Three Questions About Fracking

Five Stories and a Trailer Park:  Gerri Kane, Carol French, Carolyn Knapp, Bill Pabst, and Matthew and Tammy Manning have experienced problems related to gas drilling.  Read more...

The Fracker Family Closet

Betrayal: Article by Sandra Steingraber

Ten Ways Frackwater Can Get Into Everyone's Water

And much more........................http://nofrackalmanac.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/nfa-issue-3-to-press2.pdf

Amazing Fact: Under current SEC rules, gas companies can sweeten their balance sheets by claiming reserves that have never been independently proven to exist!

Does Fracking Cause Earthquakes?

Gas Wells Are Not Our Friends (GWANOF) reader, Laurie, sent this link in today:

http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2012/04/does-fracking-cause-earthquakes

Good question. Recent articles have pointed to the probable answer: Yes. This issue is still under study.  But since we have more natural gas than we know what to do with at the moment, why not stop operations and get the answers BEFORE continuing natural gas drilling while crossing our fingers and hoping for the best?  In my view, we haven't had the greatest of luck with that method, given the number and variety of accidents which occur on a regular basis at well pads, compressor stations, and pipelines.  If public health and a sustainable planet mean anything to us, we must put moratoria on gas drilling operations EVERYWHERE.

See also: http://dearsusquehanna.blogspot.com/2012/04/earthquakes-directly-linked-to-oil-and.html

Denton, Texas, Goes For Fracking Moratorium

Go, Denton!

Biologist Sandra Steingraber at Shale Gas Outrage Conference

Ecologist Sandra Steingraber at Shale Gas Outrage Conference (10 min) from Kirsi Jansa on Vimeo.

Dr.Steingraber gives the keynote address in Philadelphia at the Shale Gas Outrage Conference on September 8, 2011.  She states that science tells us we could be off fossil fuels in 30 years by switching to solar and wind (not nuclear).  Japan and Europe are planning on this.  She also describes fracking as a form of substance abuse.  She gives us hope as well as food for thought.

Kerr Well Pad at Night: Susquehanna County

Do you want to see what fracking operations really look like?
The workers tried to get Vera, the videographer, to stop filming, told her she couldn't because they didn't want negative media. She was standing by the side of a public road, and was not trespassing.

Taken at night at 10:15 on 10-8-11. Lots of smoke and hellish scene and sounds.

GO, VERA!

David Rovics Performs His Song "No Fracking Way"

From Garden-concert at Alværn, Nesoddden by the Oslofjord August 8. 2011.

More about David Rovics here.

I just came home from a concert by David Rovics in Rochester, NY.   If you haven't experienced a Rovics concert,  you must try to catch up with him.  His songs are riveting, intense, and show a thorough knowledge and understanding of world events, both current and in history.  David Rovics is a class act.

My Water's On Fire (The Fracking Song)

This music video is great!  David Holmes, Andrew Bean, and Niel Bekker and others collaborated on this effort. Congratulations to all involved!

Song about Fracking by Cornpone Sally

"Tioga" is a beautiful, mournful song about the loss of a beautiful land that was once a sacred spot.

Walter Hang of Toxics Targeting on Democracy Now

Efforts by lawmakers and regulators to force the federal government to better police the natural gas drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," have been thwarted for the past 25 years, according to an exposé in the New York Times. Studies by scientists at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on fracking have been repeatedly narrowed in scope by superiors, and important findings have been removed under pressure from the industry. The news comes as the EPA is conducting a broad study of the risks of natural gas drilling with preliminary results scheduled to be delivered next year. Joining us is Walter Hang, president of Toxics Targeting, a firm that tracks environmental spills and releases across the country, based in Ithaca, New York, where fracking is currently taking place.

Josh Fox on Democracy Now: Gasland Film

The environmental contamination and human health risk associated with the extraction of natural gas using horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” was little known across the United States for years, until a documentary film brought the issue to the national stage. Josh Fox directed the film Gasland, which chronicles the devastation affecting communities where fracking is taking place and the influence of the natural gas industry over regulation of the techniques and chemicals used in the process. The industry aggressively attacked the film, especially when it was nominated for an Academy Award this year.

Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! (seen on Free Speech TV, LINK TV, and online at democracynow.org) is a superb journalist who, in her words,  "goes where the silence is," and brings us the real news from all over the world.  Take a few moments to watch this interview broadcast on March 4, 2011. (The video here starts with Walter Hang of Toxics Targeting. Mr. Hang was also interviewed by Ms. Goodman on Friday.)

Flaring at a New Well Near Montrose, PA

A resident of Montrose, PA, took this picture and wrote:

"Drove by the Markovitch well tonight and saw this spectacular sight. The sound was like a train or a jet engine. The flames were 30-40 ft. high. Flaring the newly fracked well. This is a Alta well, just north of Montrose, PA."

Especially eerie in the winter night scape.
Picture by Lynn Selnick