Renewable Revolution

At least one concerned citizen thought so, and said so, in writing, before it happened.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-08-12/did-epa-intentionally-poison-animas-river-secure-superfund-money

Make no mistake. This spill is a disaster, no matter what. But if EPA malfeasance is involved, this will hurt the environmentalism movement, and the credibility of the government bureaucracy dedicated to preventing and  managing environmental problems will be completely undermined.

Talk about a turd sandwich.

I totally disagree. The EPA already has a track record, going back to Reagan, when he named an ENEMY of environmental protection to head that agency, of looking the other way on behalf of big money polluters like mining, fracking and fossil fuels.

The EPA needs to be cleaned up. They are full of pro-dirty energy foxes in the environmental protection hen house. Don't tell me you didn't watch Gasland. It was all laid out BY a former EPA scientist.

But even that wasn't enough for the dirty energy bastards; they had to castrate the little oversight power that the EPA had:

For this we can thank the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the law that holds the Halliburton Loophole. Named after Dick Cheney and the notorious corporation he led before becoming vice president, the law (championed by Cheney and disgraced Enron founder Kenneth Lay, among others) explicitly exempted fracking operations from key provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act.   These exemptions from one of America’s most fundamental environmental protection laws provided the oil and gas industry the immunity it required to develop a highly polluting process on a grand national scale. 

One of the most troubling repercussions is how fracking companies hide the contents of their toxic water and chemical solutions pumped into the ground. Contamination of underground drinking water sources from fracking fluids is a glaring threat to public health and safety. Yet even doctors responding to fracking-related health complaints can’t access data on what particular chemicals their patients may have been exposed to.

But the Halliburton Loophole wasn’t the only fracking enabler in the Energy Policy Act. The act granted the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) sweeping new authority to supersede state and local decision-making with regard to the citing of fracked gas pipelines and infrastructure. It also shifted to FERC industry oversight and compliance responsibility for the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, another key law. This was akin to putting the fox in charge of the hen house.

As it stands, FERC is entirely unaccountable to public will. It is unaccountable to Congress and even the White House. Commissioners are appointed to five-year terms and can do as they please. Until a law reigning in FERC is passed, the commission will continue to act as a rubber-stamp for the fossil fuel industry.

Additionally, the Energy Policy Act repealed an important anti-monopoly law, the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935 (PUHCA). PUHCA safeguarded consumers from the overreach of the oil and gas industry and banks that did business with those companies. It prevented the formation of giant state and regional energy cartels that could manipulate energy costs, engage in profiteering and exert undue influence over political debate. The Energy Policy Act transferred most of this oversight to FERC. Since then, the largest American energy companies have grown significantly more powerful and spent almost a billion dollars on federal lobbying, according to OpenSecrets.org.

EPA CASTRATION, as well as malfeasance, is PAR FOR THE fossil fuel fascist COURSE, Eddie! It's been like that since Reagan! It was given STEROIDS with Cheney! Wake up!


The Fossil Fuel Industry has given us Degraded Democracy and Profit over Planet Pollution
http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/fossil-fuel-folly/fossil-fuels-degraded-democracy-and-profit-over-planet-pollution/msg3594/#msg3594