Fact Sheets: Pollution

Enbridge Inc., Canada’s largest transporter of crude oil, claims to no longer be pursuing its ‘Trailbreaker’ plan as first proposed in 2008: to run Canadian tar sands oil through an aging pipeline that stretches across northern New England from Montreal, Canada, to Portland, Maine. Yet given that efforts to send tar sands oil south to refineries in Texas through the proposed Keystone XL pipeline — as well as efforts to send the oil west from Alberta to British Columbia — have face stiff opposition and stalled, New England remains at risk.

All too often when an economist or banker looks out at an expanse of virgin forest or free-flowing river, she doesn’t see nature — she sees “natural capital.” This concept promotes the view that our natural resources should be attached a value and managed using market-based principles of supply and demand. It is the cornerstone of the “green economy” that many free-market proponents and market-oriented environmentalists assert will provide environmental sustainability.

The State of California does not require companies to disclose if and where they are fracking, but industry docu- ments reveal that fracking has taken place in the counties of Sacramento, Sutter, Yolo, Solano, Kern, Ventura, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, Monterey, and in the San Francisco Bay Delta, a source of drinking water for over 20 million Californians.

The poultry industry continues to influence lawmakers to prioritize corporate interests over public health, sound food policy and environmental concerns. Citizens in Maryland and in other states are being asked to bail the industry out of its massive waste problem by financing poultry litter incinerators.

The oil and gas industry argues that the potential economic benefits of fracking justify the risks and costs to public health and the environment. But the industry has grossly overestimated the number of jobs that fracking would create, and has either ignored or dismissed the public costs of the practice.

Since launching its sustainability program in 2005, Walmart has tried to position itself as a leader on corporate environmental responsibility. In frequent press announcements and annual “Global Responsibility” reports, Walmart touts its activities on renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, waste reduction, and product improvements.

While Walmart’s sustainability campaign has done wonders for its public image, it has done little for the environment. In fact, Walmart’s environmental impact has only grown over the last seven years. Its business practices remain highly polluting, while its relentless expansion and consolidation of the market have come at the expense of more sustainable enterprises and systems of production and distribution.

Drilling and fracking a single shale well can produce millions of gallons of toxic wastewater and hundreds of tons of potentially radioactive solid waste. Disposal of these wastes poses serious environmental and public health risks.

Gas drillers use a water-intensive process called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, to extract natural gas from shale. The process injects millions of gallons of water, mixed with sand and chemicals, under high pressure to crack the rock formation to release natural gas. Much of that water returns to the surface, along with water from underground, contaminated fracking fluids and other, possibly radioactive, substances. Private water players can make money on both ends by selling water to drillers and then treating the wastewater.

Savefarmfamilies.org, a website launched on September 15, 2011, was purportedly created to help Alan and Kristin Hudson, who own a poultry operation located near Maryland’s Eastern Shore, pay their mounting legal bills from a lawsuit filed by the environmental non-profit Waterkeeper Alliance and its local member program, Assateague Coastkeeper. It claims to be a grassroots effort to help save the “family farm,” including the Hudsons’, from radical environmental groups. Unfortunately, it attempts to do so by perpetuating many myths about industrial chicken operations in Maryland and the lawsuit itself. In fact, SaveFarmFamilies.org is an “astroturfing” effort — an industry-generated website used to spread misinformation while purporting to be by farmers, for farmers. This fact sheet is intended to debunk some of the many inaccuracies and misstatements promoted by the website.

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a drilling process used by the oil and gas industry to extract natural gas that is locked away in tight rock formations and buried deep within the earth. The process injects large quantities of water mixed with sand and toxic chemicals under high pressure to break apart the rock and release the gas. Over the past decade, advances in fracking technologies have enabled the development of previously uneconomical sources of natural gas, so fracking has expanded rapidly. However, this expansion has faced increasing public resistance due to the resulting environmental pollution and public health problems.

Frac sand is a type of industrial sand — which is often referred to as “silica sand” because of its high levels of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Frac sand is mined like other types of sand and gravel, which typically entails an open pit using standard mining equipment.