Corruption, Politics, Big Business and Environmental Injustice
POLITICAL CORRUPTION IS A NATIONWIDE ISSUE AFFECTING ALL OF US. ALABAMA RANKS #5 AS THE MOST CORRUPT STATE. *DOJ 2007 stats Something is very wrong in the Land of Cotton PERTINENT ENVIRONMENTAL AND CORRUPTION ISSUES IN OTHER STATES ARE ALSO DISCUSSED
NO OTHER COMMUNITY, RICH OR POOR, URBAN OR SUBURBAN,BLACK, BROWN,RED, YELLOW OR WHITE SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO BECOME AN "ENVIRONMENTAL SACRIFICE ZONE." Dr. Robert Bullard Environmental Justice Movement Founder
After years of "no findings of groundwater contamination" from natural gas drilling, for the first time the EPA now confirms that Ranger Resources hydrofracking has contaminated wells with methane, benzene and toulene in Texas Barnett Shale formations.
Range Resources lives in an alternate universe where saying something makes it true no matter the facts. Range wrote a letter where they claim the EPA met with them and agreed that they were not responsible for the garden hose turned flamethrower in Parker County. Okay, I’ll play: if saying something makes it true, then I’m a ballerina.
She's a feisty one and Texas is lucky to have her fighting for the truth about the big myth that hyrdrofracking is "safe." As usual, Texas state agencies are in denial along with Ranger Resources and the fight is on to have the EPA decide who they are going to believe: their scientific testing or the BS of the usual suspects-- the Texas Railroad Commission, TCEQ and Ranger Resources.
This case has the potential to set precedent on hydrofracking and will be very important to track to its conclusion. We are not holding our breath that the EPA and Texas politicians who write legislation for TCEQ to follow will stand tough on it though because it is political suicide to go up against big gas.
Texas big mule Governor Perry is at war with the EPA over environmental regulations and never met a big polluter he didn't like. He has done more wrong for the Lone Star state during his reign of destruction than even the "I love Halliburton" G.W. Bush did, but he follows in the same pattern of corporate enabler to great faults.
Another fracked up big business republican governor who gets rich off of federal subsidies and big polluters while his citizens suffer. Good job jackalope.
Texas is emboldened by a DC US Appeals Court ruling last Thursday that temporarily blocks the EPA from taking over flexible air permits in Texas after Texas Attorney General Greg Abbot filed suit to block the EPA. It's a momentary victory, but the court issued a warning that the ruling "should not be construed in any way as a ruling on the merits" of Abbot's appeal.
Texas filed suit to block the EPA's disapproval of flex permits, asserting that there is no legal or technical justification for the federal agency's action.
"It's interesting that these companies are recognizing the EPA's authority when TCEQ isn't," said Elena Craft, a Texas-based scientist for the Environmental Defense Fund. "At least someone is paying attention to the reality of the situation instead of being in this imaginary world where Texas doesn't follow the rules of the rest of the country."
Bill Becker, the executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, said Texas is in the minority when it comes to compliance with EPA's climate rules.
"Texas is the only one I've heard who have said, 'Over my dead body,' but most others are trying to make this work," Becker said.
The Lone Star state is dug in and ready for a shootout at the OK Corral with the federal government in defense of big coal. This will be one to watch. Maybe from behind the protection of a large and sturdy Live Oak.
"8 by 8" rule for healthy living - drink eight 8-ounce glasses of water per day.
Compelling investigative reporting by Forrest Wilder of the Texas Observer and Houston's CBS News affiliate KHOU has revealed some grave problems in the Lone Star State's drinking water supply in Harris County, Texas. The investigation found that its been going on for years, since the 1980s, and it appears that the state environmental agency, Texas Commission of Environmental Quality, (TCEQ) has been in on it and kept the public in the dark until they were caught, big time.
A state agency purposefully misleading the public? Hard to believe isn't it? NOT.
Investigation Finds Radiation in Texas Drinking Water
By Forrest Wilder
November 11, 2010
TCEQ was lowballng radiation levels
KHOU-TV in Houston is out with an explosive series on worrisome radiation levels in drinking water. Part I looked at the extent of the problem and what state and federal officials are doing about it.
Hundreds of water providers around the Gulf Coast region are providing their customers with drinking water that contains radioactive contaminants that raise health risks, according to state lab results and public health scientists.
The revelations came to light during a four-month KHOU-TV investigation, which examined thousands of state laboratory tests from water providers across Texas. The data, provided by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), ranged from 2004 to the present.
The radiation was first discovered as a part of required testing, under federal regulations, of all drinking water provided by community water systems in America.
It's important to note that the radiation levels in the drinking water are extremely low, on the order of parts per trillion. However, as KHOU reports, the tendency among environmental health experts and the EPA, is to regard any level as potentially dangerous to human health.
Part II aired last night and it reveals what appears to be scientific malpractice on the part of Texas Commission on Environmental Quality scientists. One expert in the KHOU story called it a "cover-up."
How can TCEQ defend this? Well, judging from the interview TCEQ staffer Linda Brookins gave KHOU they can't. Take a look.
KHOU:"What would you tell me if I told you that I have talked with numerous scientists across the nation that would say that what TCEQ did was bad science?"
Brookins: "Well, I guess I would have no comment on that."
"I do not believe that what TCEQ was doing at that time has impacted human health," she added.
KHOU also asked Brookins about the state’s continued subtractions for margin of error, even after the EPA published a federal rule banning the practice.
KHOU: "Did you happen to skip over page 76,727 of the federal rule? Because right here in 2000 EPA told you, ‘don’t subtract margin of error.’ Did you skip that part?"
Brookins:"It doesn’t say not to subtract."
KHOU:"It doesn’t?"
Brookins:"It is silent."
KHOU: "I’d like you to hold this in your hand for a moment and read the part underlined in blue."
Brookins:"I’m not going to do that on camera."
# # # The problem is not confined to Harris County, Texas alone:
One particular type of radiation that popped up again and again, in water provided by utilities all across Texas, was something called alpha radiation, which public health scientists say can be particularly problematic when consumed.
“The alpha particle -- this is the 800-pound gorilla of radioactive particles,” said Dr. David Ozonoff, an environmental health professor and the chair emeritus of the Boston University School of Public Health.
We're not surprised to hear of ineptness on the part of these state environmental agencies who are, more or less, purely figurehead entities who work in concert with the big polluters they make millions from. But, therein lies the problem as we have said before: How do you effectively regulate and enforce violations from these entities (many are known to the agencies as serial violators) when you are handsomely profiting from their emissions, discharges and permit fees?
ADEM and TCEQ are the poster children of state agencies gone nuts.
It's like one long and winding crazy train with the inmates running the asylum in Texas (TCEQ) and Alabama (ADEM) and unfortunately they've punched all of our tickets and won't let us off.
Governors Perry of Texas and the recently elected "Fife-ish" Bentley of Alabama, have made their positions clear on the EPA stepping in and attempting to force both states to comply with the federal laws (hum to the tune and tone of Barney Fife's famous "citizen's arrest" phrase):
"State's rights! State's Rights!"
Kudos once again to Wilder, the Texas Observer and KHOU's Mark Greenblatt.
Subscribe in a reader
