from Desmogblog California has become the newest battleground state in the fracking fight that is already being waged in states like Pennsylvania and New York. Why? The short answer is the Monterey Shale. It’s a massive oil deposit that is trapped in the shale formations underneath Los Angeles and most of California’s Central Coast and [...]

from InterContinental Cry As expansion of oil pipelines is reined in, oil trains are rolling out. Since last fall, the volume of oil shipped by rail from the Alberta Tar Sands and the Bakken Fields of North Dakota has increased dramatically. As Cory Morningstar reported in the April 12 edition of Counterpunch, this strategic shift [...]

Well Acidizing (a.k.a. Acid Jobs) is slowly gaining recognition as a potentially larger threat to the environment than fracking.  According the industry this is nothing new or scary, it’s just a way to “stimulate the well” to produce more oil.  Typically this is done in one of two ways- matrix acidizing (low pressure), and fracture [...]

Peru’s Congress is urging the attorney general to investigate a major opponent of the planned Minas Conga gold mine for misuse of public funds. Cajamarca Regional President Gregorio Santos says he is innocent and claims the attempted prosecution is part of an ongoing effort by the national government to discredit him and remove a powerful [...]

From BBC News: The Dominican Republic government has rejected a request by Glencore Xstrata to explore nickel in a mountainous area of the country. The Loma Miranda project would have a negative impact on communities living there, the authorities said. The area, in central Vega province, is mostly covered by tropical forest. The Dominican Republic [...]

Last month, Forbes predicted that Newmont Mining might be getting ready to abandon its embattled plans for Minas Conga, which would be the largest gold mine in Peru. Now, just days after police attacked indigenous anti-mine protesters, the CEO of Buenaventura, Newmont’s partner in the venture, has said that the protesters might win. In response [...]

From Counterpunch: In April, a grassroots movement led by Lakota grandmothers toured the country to build support for a formal complaint of genocide against the United States government and its constituent states. Though temporarily overturned, the recent conviction of Efrain Rios Montt for genocide against indigenous Guatemalans should give US officials, particularly members of the [...]

Following the collapse of an I-5 highway bridge in Washington state (in which fortunately no one was killed), watch out for infrastructure apologists from liberals to energy companies to push for a massive increase in infrastructure spending. Bloomberg’s coverage raises the issue in the fourth paragraph: An interstate highway bridge in Washington state collapsed [Thursday], [...]

From Bloomberg: Several major U.S. utilities are under “constant” cyberattack and haven’t taken precautions to protect critical systems from Iran, North Korea and other adversaries, according to a congressional survey of more than 100 companies accounting for much of the nation’s power system. The survey shows the nation’s electrical grid remains “highly vulnerable” to attack [...]

From El Paso Inc, via the Earth First! Newswire: The Energy Department on Friday conditionally approved a Texas company’s proposal to export liquefied natural gas, only the second such project allowed to move forward amid a production boom that has led to glut of domestic natural gas. The action would allow Freeport LNG Expansion L.P. [...]