A new study from Oregon State University found that infants born within 3 kilometers of oil and natural gas drilling facilities in Texas had slightly lower birthweights than those born before drilling began in their vicinity.
The study, published today in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, found that the type of drilling or resource being extracted did not change the result.
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Photo Credit: Eric Larson (FORGE Utah) via U.S. Department of Energy
Day: July 23, 2021
Earlier this month, Native American activists embarked on an epic, cross-country trek that began in Washington state and is slated to end on the front lawn of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) in Washington, D.C. on July 29.
The group is carrying precious cargo: namely, a monumental totem pole strapped to the back of a jumbo tractor-trailer, reports National Geographic. Organizers planned the journey to pressure the federal government, under President Joe Biden, to take immediate action to protect endangered areas that hold environmental and cultural significance for Native American tribes across the country.
Measuring 25 feet tall and 43 inches wide, the multicolored totem pole weighs some 4,900 pounds, reports Dana Hedgpeth for the Washington Post. Over two weeks, the object and its caretakes will cross the country on a trip dubbed the Red Road to D.C., stopping at sacred Indigenous sites including Bears Ears National Monument in Utah; Chaco Canyon in New Mexico; Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota; and Mackinaw City in Michigan, where the controversial Line 5 oil pipeline threatens the environmentally sensitive straits connecting Lake Michigan to Lake Huron. (Audiences can track the totem pole’s current location on the Red Road to D.C. website.)
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Photo Credit: Doug Duran/Bay Area News Group/Getty Images
As the sun set, more than a dozen young people carried a wooden bridge toward a narrow section of the Mississippi River. The bridge allowed the group to cross more easily from their camp to where the immense oil pipeline was being built on the other side.
They were cited for trespassing – but they had symbolically laid claim to the marshy landscape.
That same day, Dawn Goodwin’s voice was soft but forceful as she spoke into the camera: “I’m calling on you, Joe Biden, to uphold our treaties, because they are the supreme law of the land.”
Goodwin, an Ojibwe woman and environmental activist, was recording a livestream from a picturesque camp site amid northern Minnesota’s natural beauty – where she and dozens of others had come together to protest the construction of the Line 3 pipeline.
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Photo Credit: Sheila Regan/The Guardian
By: Simone Lewis, Communications Intern
After years of activism from Indigenous, environmental, and community groups, TC Energy announced on June 9, 2021 that the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline project would finally be terminated. The announcement ends a more than decade-long battle over fossil fuel use and the right to protect land and water sources.
I was in high school when the pipeline first started making national news because of the sustained protests from residents, farmers, and business owners along the proposed route from Montana to the Gulf Coast. The protesters voiced that the pipeline would send a flood of toxic tar sands oil – one of the dirtiest fuels in the world – through their homes and homeland, and would contribute to advancing climate change.
Now, as I enter my senior year of college, those who have never stopped fighting for their freedom from environmental stress finally have some level of peace. This is an incredible reminder of the power of grassroots mass mobilization, as well as the perseverance and struggle that is often required of citizens to protect themselves from polluting industries.
Proponents of the pipeline are criticizing its termination for sacrificing the jobs it may have created. In fact, the State Department reported in 2014 that less than two thousand jobs would be created during the construction phase of the pipeline and that the post-construction operational phase would only require about thirty-five people. The rhetoric surrounding job creation is often used by the oil and gas industry in contrast to clean energy policies and environmental protection. Economic goals and environmental goals, however, are not inherently at odds the way these industries would like us to believe. This false rhetoric around jobs often comes from corporations and not the people living in the areas affected by infrastructure projects, like those in the path of the Keystone XL pipeline. It is unacceptable that communities should be forced to choose between employment opportunities and their health and safety, though they consistently are when it comes to fossil fuel extraction and distribution. The fossil fuel industry leans on economic arguments to justify their operations, and even these arguments now are beginning to fail more and more.
I find it infuriating that our health and safety are weighed against profits, especially when environmentally safe investments can often be more profitable but are completely ignored. Solar energy, for example, has become not only the cheapest form of power but also the one with the highest potential for job creation. My generation realizes that there are alternatives to fossil fuels that create well paying, sustainable jobs and uplift communities rather than harming the environment.
If the argument is that investing in infrastructure creates jobs, then why not invest in positive infrastructure that communities can support? Why not invest in new pipes, so that citizens can have cleaner drinking water? Why not invest in forest waste clearing projects to lessen the environmental and economic severity of wildfires? Why not bolster public transportation to minimize air pollution, why not strengthen landfill linings to prevent leaching, why not renovate buildings to withstand extreme weather events and why not build homes and schools to be more energy efficient. These efforts, and a properly trained workforce, can all create significant numbers of jobs and strengthen local communities’ economies, as well as face the challenges of climate change. We know job creation can be consistent with environmental justice, so it’s heartbreaking that people continue to have to put their lives on hold to protest projects that deepen injustice.
As we celebrate the victory of the activists against the Keystone XL oil pipeline, we at CHEJ are awaiting the final outcome of the infrastructure bill. It is our belief that it has the capability to provide more environmentally safe communities, strengthen our infrastructure, and provide needed job growth.
Photo Credit: AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File; center, AP Photo/Evan Vucci; right; RICARDO TORRES / MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL VIA IMAGN CONTENT SERVICES LLC
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS withheld information about carcinogenic pollution from Illinois communities, according to a report released yesterday by the Environmental Protection Agency’s inspector general. Bill Wehrum, who served as assistant administrator of the office of Air and Radiation until 2019, kept information from residents of Willowbrook, Illinois, about results of air monitoring that showed they had an elevated risk of cancer due to ethylene oxide from a local sterilizing plant, according to the report, “EPA Delayed Risk Communication and Issued Instructions Hindering Region 5’s Ability to Address Ethylene Oxide Emissions,” which was produced in response to a request from Congress.
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Photo Credit: Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images
A youth-led protest against fossil fuels biked from Eugene’s Skinner Butte Park to the Northwest Natural office, where demonstrators made speeches condemning the natural gas provider and performed a die-in protest on its lawn Friday.
Two protesters, ages 19 and 21, were arrested for allegedly climbing over the Northwest Natural fence and were charged with trespassing, according to Eugene Police.
Photo Credit: Ryan Brennecke/The Bulletin
When a Nigerian judge ruled in 2005 that Shell’s practice of gas flaring in the Niger Delta was a violation of citizens’ constitutional rights to life and dignity, Nnummo Bassey, a local environmental activist, was thrilled.
Bassey’s organization, Friends of the Earth, had helped communities in the Niger Delta sue Shell for gas flaring, a highly polluting practice that caused mass disruption to communities in the region, polluting water and crops. Researchers had found that those disruptions were associated with increased rates of cancer, blood disorders, skin diseases, acid rain, and birth defects—leading to a life expectancy of 41 in the region, 13 years fewer than the national average.
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Photo Credit: Mike Kemp/In Pictures, Getty Images