Arctic
Drilling?
Winter
2004/05
ConocoPhillips, largest oil company in Alaska, has dropped out of Arctic Power, the single-issue lobbying group that promotes opening the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas drilling. That means the two largest operators on the North Slope — BP and ConocoPhillips — are no longer in the lobbying group.
“This is a significant win for America’s Arctic,” said the director of U.S. PIRG’s Arctic Wilderness Campaign. It appears that ConocoPhillips and BP are more enlightened than the Bush Administration.
See more — “ConocoPhillips Drops Out of Arctic Power,” 05 January 2005, http://www.truthout.org
The actual death toll in Paris from the 2003 summer heatwave was nearly 15,000. Britain recorded 2,045 heat-related “excess deaths” during the August period. Predictions are that such summers will be regular occurrences by the middle of this century, thanks to global warming. It’s not just happening in Europe: More than 1,500 deaths were reported when a June heat wave struck India, and the city of Jacobabad in Pakistan reached 125.6°F, way above normal. Such temperatures make normal life impossible. If global warming continues to accelerate, Pakistan, the Middle East and North Africa may become literally uninhabitable in future decades.
According to the World Health Organization, 150,000 deaths were directly attributable to climate change in the year 2000. Warmer temperatures can increase disease both directly, by encouraging the faster growth and reproduction of bacteria and other pathogens, and indirectly, through increases in weather extremes. As is so often the case, those most at risk are people in poor countries who have done little or nothing to bring about global warming in the first place.
Problem: No one knows just how rapidly global warming is going to accelerate. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) gave an estimated range of 2.5 - 10.4°F for temperature rise during this century. How high greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere will rise depends on economics and politics.
What is clear is that even if all greenhouse gas emissions stopped tomorrow, the climate would continue warming for decades into the future — probably by double the 1.1°F so far experienced over the last century. This would make the planet hotter than at any time since the last ice age. The upper range of the IPCC scenario would raise average temperatures well outside the range ever experienced by humanity.
What about planetary health? Wildlife is already reacting to climate change. In Surrey, England, horse chestnut trees now come into leaf twelve days earlier than they did in the 1980s. In Alaska, spruce bark beetles have killed 2.3 million acres of trees since 1992. It’s the worst insect outbreak ever to hit North American forests, and is directly related to higher temperatures. In colder winters, the beetle eggs are killed off and the population is unable to explode. Oak wilt disease, which has laid waste to woodlands in the eastern US, may soon appear in Britain.
In past episodes of climate change, species could shift their range as the temperature warmed up. But this time, it’s going to be different. The rate of temperature rise seems likely to outstrip the migration capacities of many species. At the end of the last ice age, for example, trees could colonize new species at a speed up to a kilometer a year, by spreading their seeds and gradually establishing new saplings. But projected warming will far outstrip this rate; climate zones will be shifting north seven times faster than most plant species can follow them, in this century.
Secondly, human development now gets in the way. With much of our land space given over to cities, major roads and intensive farming, ecosystems are trapped in a patchwork of immovable nature reserves. For example, newts couldn’t move north — they can’t cross an expressway.
Finally, the earth is not shifting from a cold to a warm period, as it did when the ice sheets began to melt. It is shifting from a warm Œinter-glacial’ to an even warmer episode, where temperatures are likely to be outside the evolutionary experience of many species.
The threshold of thermal tolerance is already being crossed for tropical coral reefs, for example, which have been struck by severe mass bleaching episodes in recent years, as a direct result of the warming seas. Bleaching was catastrophic in 1998, during El NiŅo, when a sixth of the entire tropical coral reef ecosystem was destroyed. Disasters on this scale are likely to become commonplace within two decades.
The likely disappearance of tropical reefs is a big deal. Coral reefs are the most biodiverse marine ecosystems on the planet containing as many as nine million different types of plants and animals, including a quarter of all known sea fish. Most of the rest of the planet's biodiversity is in tropical rain forests — which are endangered not only from direct threats of logging and farming, but from shifts in climate which are already making them vulnerable to fire.
One scientist discovered that even small rises lead to the loss of valuable habitat. Indeed, for a warming of anything over 6.3°°F the wipeout is almost total. In a paper recently published in Nature, Chris Thomas and his colleagues concluded that between a fifth and a third of species could be wiped out by global warming as soon as 2050. “These estimates show the importance of rapid implementation of technologies to decrease greenhouse gas emissions.” It’s difficult to imagine a clearer warning.
This warning is being heeded to a limited extent by the international community — though not by the Bush administration — with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol. If Russia can be persuaded to ratify, and Kyoto comes into force, then an important first step will have been taken.
But as long as governments dawdle it is largely up to individuals to take their own steps. These might involve joining campaigns for change. Or it may involve as simple as step as switching to green electricity in the home or workplace or using biodiesel to fuel cars and central heating systems. Reducing personal greenhouse gas emissions remains an option for all of us, but ultimately only a strong global agreement will protect the planet from the worst ravages of climate change.
— Mark Lynas, “Climate Change”, Resurgence May/June 2004
Ecuador is one of South America’s poorest countries, and like many poor countries, it is in considerable debt to developed nations. Fifty percent of its national budget comes from oil, and the International Monetary Fund is using its debt to pressure it to extract still more. Yet despite decades of oil development, the country’s debt continues to grow and poverty continues to spread.
So, finally, an indigenous group whose land is threatened with oil exploration is saying “no thanks.” “Petroleum’s development has been a disaster in Ecuador, generating environmental, social, and cultural crises, and ultimately causing the extinction of indigenous peoples,” says Mario Santi, a member of the Sarayacu tribe and coordinator of Kampari (Voice of Resistance). “We want to maintain our way of living, free of contamination, in harmony with nature.”
Despite offers of payouts from oil companies and the threat of military action from the Ecuadorian government, the Sarayacu have successfully kept oil drills off their land for now.
— Marisa Handler, San Francisco Chronicle, 13 Aug. 2004.
Oil
Leasing Delayed?
Summer
2004
The Interior Dept. said on August 16 that it will begin delaying some new oil and gas drilling projects until the effects on wildlife are studied more thoroughly.
But environmentalists said they were skeptical, since the department has routinely ignored its power to defer energy leases for the sake of wildlife. “Actions speak louder,” said Peter Aengst, an energy policy analyst for the Wilderness Society in Bozeman, Montana. “I haven’t yet seen where they’re doing that. It’s always been full speed ahead with energy development: lease, lease, lease.”
Assistant Interior Secretary Rebecca Watson described the new policy as a response to American Wildlife Conservation Partners, a coalition of groups ranging from Ducks Unlimited to the National Rifle Association. She said it would apply to all 262 million acres about one of every ten in the US managed by the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM). “We value them because we think they’re the experts on wildlife,” Watson said.
The BLM is rewriting 162 plans for managing that vast acreage. Watson said federal officials who decide what to do for those areas can choose to hold off offering new leases if they think the current plans for protecting wildlife are not adequate. She said 22 of the new plans are “time-sensitive” because they respond to lawsuits, apply to new national monuments without old plans, or speed energy development in New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and Montana.
Both President Bush and Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry have been seeking votes among hunters and conservationists. In June, Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal complained to BLM that it was “premature at best” to offer more land around Pinedale for oil and gas drilling while a new federal plan for managing the area was incomplete The BLM went ahead with the lease sales anyway.
Freudenthal had told BLM officials that the leasing would “further jeopardize sage grouse habitat, migration corridors, crucial habitat, and other important resources” for wildlife.
— John Heilprin, Associated Press, www.enn.com/news/2004-08-17/s.26570.asp
Fish
Food
Winter/Spring
2004
Fish, mercury, power plants what kind of connection could they have?
Last December the EPA and the FDA went public warning against eating too much seafood with high mercury levels. Eating more than three servings of fish per week could harm even women who “might” become pregnant, said EPA.
But it was EPA Director Mike Leavitt who, earlier in December, announced new rules that would allow three times as much mercury to enter the air compared with the Clean Air Act. Why weaken the clean air protection that would reduce mercury pollution? Not only was the permitted amount of mercury in the air increased, from 5 tons per year in 2008, but the time frame was also extended, to 15 tons per year in 2018.
Where does all this mercury come from? Right out of the smokestacks of our coal-fired power plants — coal is the main source. Power plants are the source of much more: abundant campaign contributions during every campaign season. And our own Southern Company is right up there with the rest, dragging their collective feet about upgrading the equipment that would reduce the amount of mercury released into the air. The upgrades were required by the Clean Air Act but there are ways of dodging the rules.
You could tell your congressmen to make Southern Company do the right thing: by phone 202-224-3121, or by mail U.S. Senate, Washington DC 20510 or U.S. House of Representatives, Washington DC 20515. Even a postcard can make a difference.
Some safer seafood is recommended by the Seafood Choices Alliance at http://www.thefishlist.org, or info@seafood-choices.com.
— Sierraclub.org/cleanair and sierraclub.org/planet/200402/industry.asp
Energy
Savers
Fall
2002
Spending on energy efficiency programs by the biggest polluters on the continent — North American power companies — dropped by 42% between 1995 and 1999, largely because of deregulation. The findings were made public in June in a report by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, a Montreal-based agency created under the North American Free Trade Agreement.
The drop in spending, from $2.4 billion to $1.4 billion, led to increased air pollution in the US, Canada and Mexico, affecting both human and environmental health.
Janine Ferretti, executive director of the commission, said deregulation offers utilities fewer incentives to implement conservation measures. The report came just two days after President Bush announced that he would relax rules requiring utilities to install state-of-the-art pollution-control equipment when repairing or expanding power plants, a move that triggered a storm of protest from environmental groups.
— Planet Ark, Reuters, Robert Melnbardis, 6/19/2002.
No
Funds for Cleanup
Fall
2002
It always seems to come down to money. Granite City, Illinois, a gritty place of steel mills and industrial plants, learned it has one of the 33 Superfund cleanup sites in 18 states whose funding has been cut off by the Bush Administration. “I think it’s a shame these things don’t get taken care of for so many years,” said Mayor Ron Selph of the cleanup where a railroad tie-treating facility operated until 1989. “But we have to live with it.”
In New Jersey the response was angrier. One site, in Edison, was where the herbicide Agent Orange was produced. What has state Sen. Bob Smith particularly upset is that the federal EPA is headed by one of New Jersey’s own, former Gov. Christie Whitman. “When Mrs. Whitman went to Washington, people hoped New Jersey would have an advocate,” he said.
The Bush Administration’s decision means the 20-acre Jennison-Wright Corp. site will remain polluted indefinitely. The site is literally a stone’s throw from nearby homes.
— http://enn.com/extras/printer-friendly.asp?storyid=47730.
Asphalt
Battle Continues
Winter 2001/2
On March 14 the EPD granted the permit for the Alto asphalt plant to the Georgia Dept. of Transportation, despite protests by over 100 people at the official hearing. Alto residents spoke of sick children and adults who would be severely affected by the asphalt fumes. Construction is already under way on the site just south of the Alto prison on North County Line Road.
This is not the end of our effort to stop the emission of noxious fumes that would trigger asthma attacks, allergies, emphysema and other respiratory problems. Local residents have been turning out regularly to vigil along Old Cornelia Highway. They collected 359 signatures on petitions we presented to the Governor and Lieutenant Governor, and we have hope of appealing the permit.
Asphalt plants can be modified to be less dangerous to residents. In California, new asphalt plants are completely enclosed so that emissions are not released when trucks are loaded. It’s those “fugitive” emissions that do the damage, as asphalt pours down the chute into the waiting truck. In addition, those trucks, as they pass through residential streets, release chemicals that are attached to tiny dust particles. And those tiny particles get stuck in our lungs and cause all the problems.
The D.O.T. may deny that there is anything dangerous in asphalt emissions, but their own literature admits that the material is classified as a carcinogen In California. Why is Georgia different from California?
The chemicals given off in manufacturing asphalt include benzene, which is known to cause cancer, the growth of tumors, birth defects, and such inheritable genetic changes as Downs syndrome and sickle cell anemia. Other chemicals, which include toluene, xylene and naphthalene, are almost as bad, irritating the nose, throat and lungs.
What will it take to make the EPD live up to its title: Environmental Protection Division? We’ll have to keep reminding them of their duty to protect the environment of Georgia and the health of its people. We hope it won’t take lawsuits to make EPD and DOT responsible for the failing health of residents and devaluation of property.
We could also wish that our elected officials had given us help, or at least encouragement.
Mushrooms
to the Rescue
Fall
2001
The humble mushroom could help clean up everything from oil spills to pesticides, thanks to a new technology called mycoremediation.
Mushroom expert Paul Stamets pioneered the technology against the bacteria e.coli and then partnered with scientists at the Pacific Northwest National Labs to try it against environmental toxins.
The technology uses the natural ability of fungi to break down dead plants and animals to accelerate decomposition of petroleum products. In a field study, fungi appeared to be remarkably successful at cleansing soil contaminated with oil and other petroleum products.
Fungi could help clean up the 24,000 oil spills that occur in the US every year. The scientists are also optimistic that the process could help limit environmental damage caused by agricultural runoff.
— San Francisco Chronicle, Leslie R. Guttman, 25 Nov 2001
Asphalt,
Feed Mills and Dust
Fall
2001
The asphalt plant near the Homer elementary school was only the beginning. Now a relocated asphalt plant is proposed for land just south of the Alto prison, to be operated by the state Dept. of Transportation. Since it will be on state-owned land, local zoning regulations do not apply. A public hearing will be held Jan. 29 at 7 pm, site to be announced.
Another asphalt plant is proposed for Jefferson on Holders Siding near the Academy Church subdivision on Academy Church Road. The hearing is scheduled for Jan. 14 at 7 pm at the Jefferson public library. The site is the very same land where the MarJac feed mill was proposed, but the mill was defeated by public opposition.
When the MarJac feed mill was proposed for land just outside Lula city limits, behind the hatchery on Route 52, public opposition defeated the annexation and rezoning. About 350 people turned out for that meeting and persuaded public officials that the feed mill would not be acceptable.
The City of Cornelia wanted to get rid of sludge from their wastewater treatment plant by putting it on pastures, in accord with EPD rules. The city has now withdrawn their proposal, perhaps due to several well-attended sludge education sessions held before the official EPD hearing.
It helps to do the education before whatever is proposed takes place. Once it’s in, it stays in despite public opposition, health effects, or bad air. The people in the Newtown area of Gainesville have suffered for years from high rates of sickness, dust on their cars every morning from the nearby Purina mill, visible dust in the air, and rats. But at the last EPD hearing on Purina’s proposed expansion, the EPD representative admitted that not only was the new boiler already in place before the hearing was held, there was little that could be done. The plant met the averages set up for production, and therefore was within proper limits.
Raccoons
in the Henhouse
Summer
2001
More bizarre appointments by the Bush administration. It’s not so much a matter of setting the fox to guard the chicken coop as it is letting the raccoons loose in the henhouse, says Molly Ivins.
In Texas, the most spectacular example is the state’s equivalent of an environmental protection agency, to which then-Gov. Bush appointed three commissioners who literally represent major groups of polluters. Texas is, of course, Number One in toxic pollution. The pattern continues in Washington.
Bush has nominated B. John Williams, a corporate tax attorney, as chief counsel to the Internal Revenue Service. According to The Wall Street Journal, Williams won a case that could jeopardize the government’s attempts to crack down on corporate tax havens. The decision allows two companies to post the same loss when one sells a money-losing unit to the other. Sure, that’s fair, just the way you get to double your deductions, right? If the decision stands, it is expected to cost the IRS $10 billion in annual revenue.
In another case, also reported in the Journal, B. John Williams (beware the man who parts his initials on the wrong side) tried to justify disputed tax credits taken by his client, Shell Oil Co. He did so by hiring a private investigator, who provided false information to destroy the credibility of the government’s expert witnesses. One witness later sued for defamation, a case that was settled out of court, the settlement paid for by Shell.
The curious case of John Graham, the “regulatory czar,” who can block any new regulation from his position inside the Office of Management and Budget, has attracted some attention because of Graham’s unusual public record. While serving on an EPA subcommittee on dioxin, Graham said reducing dioxin levels too far might “do more harm than good.” He argued that dioxin might prevent cancer in some cases, an argument so outlandish it produced more amusement than outrage. He also claims the problem of pesticides on foods is “trivial,” that the public has “paranoia” about toxic chemicals (it is to be hoped), that safe housing codes kill people and all manner of other dandy theories.
Graham was director of the Center for Risk Analysis at Harvard, which tries to apply cost-benefit exams to health, safety and other environmental protection. This curious idea, of assigning a dollar value to human life, illness and harm to eco-systems and then seeing if that outweighs the cost of regulation, is like some chilling mad-scientist fantasy. You say it will only cost three lives per million dollars spent and so it’s not worth it? Fine, then let one of them be your wife and the others your son and daughter.
As Arthur Miller once wrote, “Attention must be paid.”
— Molly Ivins, in Facing South Aug. 24, 2001, facingsouth@southernstudies.org
Why
Drill in ANWR?
Spring
2001
Sam Booher, Chair of the Georgia Chapter of the Sierra Club, has an explanation of the drive to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.
As a stockholder in several oil companies, he receives their annual reports and shareholder statements. Shareholders know they have oil capacity in the ground in capped oil wells in these large number of existing oil fields on the North Slope of Alaska, enough to keep the Alaskan oil pipeline full of oil for over 100 years. The new oil fields are already under lease so there is really no need for development in ANWR.
He writes, “I believe that our high fuel costs are closely tied to the lack of American refinery capacity to process our existing oil supply. ...Newspaper clippings report that existing refineries are running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. ...I realize new refineries, which must meet clean air standards, are a costly proposition to oil companies. It’s more lucrative ...to continue to import Saudi oil while passing the blame for high oil prices on their inability to extend oil drilling to the nationšs public lands.
“Of all the oil ever known to exist in the Texas and Oklahoma oil fields, only 1/3 has been removed. The remaining 2/3 are still in the ground. Why? Because it is cheaper to buy Saudi Arabian oil. When the price of oil goes up they will bring their capped Texas and Oklahoma oil out of the ground. ...As alternative energy methods become economical all the oil we need for the foreseeable future is already here.”
Why open up ANWR? “Could it be that end-of-year bonuses for oil executives are at risk because they are based on ‘New Land Under Lease?’ Maybe Congress needs to ask this question. Would you consider asking if that question could be asked?”
-- Sam Booher, “Chair’s Corner”, Georgia Sierran, May/June 2001.
Drilling
Hurts
Winter
2000/1
The oil industry has some powerful defenders, both locally and in Washington. Some claim that drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR) is beneficial to the caribou and other wildlife, with nice warm oil in the pipeline beneficial to the animals, and no harm done to anyone.
But whistleblowers among the pipeline workers tell a story of deferred maintenance and imminent danger. The Wall Street Journal reported:
“Whistleblowers have complained for years of deferred maintenance causing problems like a clogged fire suppression system and faulty vapor-control equipment [at the Valdez terminal] and the whistleblowers are fearful an accident could ignite a raging inferno.
“Mr. Hamel [the whistleblowers’ spokesperson] says the core of the problem at Valdez and other parts of the pipeline has been lack of money to make needed repairs and upgrades. Alyeska officials agree the pipeline had experienced reduced funding in recent years, due to what they called cost pressures when oil prices were low.”
Of course this situation applies to other industries as well. One can only wonder whether the waste industry, under financial pressure, would accept responsibility for leachate from its landfills, once contaminated drinking water turned up.
Having seen photographs of oil drilling stations in Alaska, it is obvious that the damage to habitat is done once construction begins. The station is not just a single well in the wilderness. Rather, it takes up many acres for drilling equipment and connections to the pipeline, storing and repairing equipment, shelter for vehicles and supplies, housing for workers, food storage and preparation, and all the other necessities.
As for the pipeline itself, all it would take is one leak. All that for a six months supply of oil?
-- “Harassment of Whistleblowers Still Exists on Pipeline, Study Finds,” Wall Street Journal 11/13/00.
Deregulating
Utilities
Winter
2000/1
Electricity is an absolute necessity that should not be a speculated product. Consumers have a right to affordable energy, produced in the most environmentally sustainable fashion possible. But, when treated as a speculative commodity, the cost and supply of electricity becomes uncertain. This situation invites price-gouging and profiteering, as we are witnessing today in California.
Public Citizen has prepared a 17-page report debunking ten myths of utility deregulation. Among the fallacies exposed in the report are:
1. Deregulation does not work because California did not deregulate enough.The report outlines how the utilities agreed to assume a financial risk under deregulation, that risk did not pay off in their favor, and the industry proceeded to demand that consumers pick up the tab resulting from their speculative misfortune. The problem was no regulation, not over-regulation.
2. Deregulation will lower costs for consumers.This is a myth that plainly demonstrates the sophistry that the utilities are willing to employ in order to keep their profits at record levels. Soon after the deregulation legislation passed through the California legislature, proponents predicted a 20% reduction in consumer electric rates. When the blackouts came, deregulation proponents pushed for an increase in consumer rates to encourage competition. The evidence suggests that deregulation leads to higher consumer prices.
3. Deregulation is good for the environment.Thanks to an artificially created “power shortage crisis” California utility corporations have created a situation in which the “free market” utility business game is rigged, and the environment typically loses. Old, inefficient, dirty coal power plants keep running below their maximum output; new, unneeded plants are built (with consumers footing the bill); and utilities cry for more resource exploitation (such as natural gas in California) and more transmission lines.
4. California’s utilities are close to bankruptcy and need to be bailed out. California’s two major utilities failed to profit within the deregulated energy market structure. Now they are demanding corporate welfare from the state, and claim with great alarm that they will not be able to afford to supply their customers with electricity. Looking at the money that their parent corporations have spent elsewhere, it is clear that these utilities don’t need a taxpayer-funded bailout.
The full report is available from Public Citizen, 215 Pennsylvania Ave. SE, Washington DC 20003, 202-546-4996, www.citizen.org, or from ACE for the cost of copying.
What
Price Oil?
Fall
2000
The high price of gasoline is pushing companies to drill for oil everywhere they can.
BP is gearing up to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean off the northern coast of Alaska, a highly controversial venture that has been the target of protests. The project in the Northstar field of the Beaufort Sea could get underway as soon as November, and a similar project in the Liberty field could be launched soon after. The US Army Corps of Engineers is expected to complete an environmental impact study on the Liberty project early next year.
Enviros oppose both projects because they would use undersea pipelines, and warn that a spill in the region, which is rich in wildlife and often covered in ice, would be difficult to clean up. Five Greenpeace activists were arrested after protesting at BP’s Northstar site in February. Activists occupied a barge transporting equipment to the Arctic Ocean’s first offshore oil installation.
Senator Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) continues to push for opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling, even though that field is estimated to contain only a six months supply for the US. The Refuge, where caribou herds have their calves, is also home to many animal and plant species. It is doubtful the wildlife could survive oil drilling in the area. Meanwhile, reports of oil spills come in from all over the world.
Most of the oil was removed from the sunken oil tanker Erika off the west coast of France in August.
In the worst river pollution incident ever to hit Brazil, a million gallon oil spill in September threatened drinking water, wildlife, and farmland along at least 25 miles of the Iguacu River. The spill was caused by a ruptured pipe at a refinery of the government owned Petrobras oil company. The company will be fined at least $28 million. Dead oil-covered fish, birds and mammals have been washing up along the river banks.
Two weeks later, Petrobras admitted another of its pipelines leaked, spilling 1,000 litres (270 gallons) of toxic fuel additive near Rio de Janeiro.
In an ironic twist, the chairman of one of the world’s largest oil companies, Shell, will co-chair a task force on renewable energy. The task force was created by the G-8 nations when they met in Okinawa in July. It was given a mandate to report to next year’s summit in Genoa, Italy.
There’s an oil rush in Baku, and a former DOE official is in the money. As deputy energy secretary under President Clinton, Bill White was a key player in establishing energy policy in the Caspian Sea Region -- an area experiencing what the Washington Post called the “last great oil rush of the 20th century.”
White worked to improve relations with the leaders of Georgia and Azerbaijan, to oppose a Russian plan that would give Moscow control of the pipelines. Upon resigning in 1995, White founded Frontera Resources, an international energy company that develops oil and gas projects. In 1997, Frontera became the first American company to close an agreement to work five oil fields. White has also kept a strong foothold back in Washington. His board at Frontera boasts former CIA Director John Deutch and ex-Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen.
Income from the oil fields of Angola has kept the country going despite years of civil war, and American politics is heavily involved.
“One of the biggest humanitarian disasters in Africa has been created by a war paid for with oil and diamonds,” says author Jon Lee Anderson. More than 8% of the oil imported by the US comes from Angola -- more than we get from Kuwait.
“What the US seems to be doing is allying itself with the government,” said a UN official. “It seems to have decided that all that’s important is pumping oil, and it’s going to let the war continue.”
-- Jon Lee Anderson, “Oil and Blood,” The New Yorker, 8/14/00, “Shape Policy, Profit Privately,” Mother Jones, May/June 2000, http://ens.lycos.com/ens/aug2000/2000L-08-01-10.html and 08-01-03.html and 08-07-10.html and 08-07-02.html; Richard Valdmanis, Planet Ark, Reuters, 9/21/00, Stephen Buckley, Washngton Post, 7/19/00.
Oil
Battle
Winter
1999/2000
The battle for Alaskan oil is on. Sen. Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) wants to open the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge to oil exploration, according to an article he wrote in the Feb. 17 Los Angeles Times. Read it at www.enn.com/news/enn-stories/2000/02/02242000/newsbytes.asp
Eight Greenpeace activists have set up camp on arctic ice to protest and monitor BPAmoco’s drilling project at Northstar, the first offshore oil production program in the Beaufort Sea off Alaska’s fragile north coast.
— www.enn.com/news/enn-stories/2000/03/03022000/northstar_10610.asp
Champion
Buy-Out
Fall
1999
Residents of Canton, N.C. had to breathe sulfur and nitrogen dioxides from the Champion paper mill for close to 100 years. Enough wastewater poured into the Pigeon River to inspire years of protests and lawsuits.
Now the largest union-led employee buy-out in the history of the Southeast should clear the air. Backed by a New York investment firm, workers bought the mill and six other plants from Champion for $200 million last May. The purchase resulted from an unlikely collaboration between workers, private investors, environmentalists, state government and the seller.
The green light came only after assurances that the new ownership would not only pursue more eco-friendly products, but would also spend over $160 million on capital improvements to meet stringent air and water quality standards.
State Commerce Secretary Rick Carlisle applied the law that gives the industry access to incentives previously reserved for luring out-of-state corporations. The Southern Appalachian Center for Cooperative Ownership, which gave strategic advice to the union, called the new state policy a landmark development.
— “Workers Champion Employee Ownership in Western North Carolina,” Southern Exposure, Summer 1999.
