Surface mining, road and pipeline construction are destructive

From an Article by Brett Israel, UC Berkeley News, March 29, 2018

Photo: Land degradation, caused by human activities like natural resource extraction and pipeline construction, is a global threat to humans and animals

More than 100 experts from 45 countries have published a three-year study of the Earth’s land degradation, calling the problem “critical” and saying that worsening land conditions undermine the well-being of 3.2 billion people.

The report was published by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) on March 26. Providing the best-available evidence for the dangers of land degradation for policymakers, the report draws on more than 3,000 scientific, government, indigenous and local knowledge sources.

Rapid expansion and unsustainable management of croplands and grazing lands is the most extensive cause of land degradation, creating significant loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services, which include food security, water purification, energy sources and other contributions essential to people, the report says. The problem is so critical that a co-chair of the report said, “The degradation of the Earth’s land surface through human activities is pushing the planet towards a sixth mass species extinction.”

Land degradation is also an underappreciated factor contributing to global conflict and migration, among other problems, according to study co-author Matthew Potts, UC Berkeley associate professor in forest economics in the College of Natural Resources.

“Land degradation presents unique and persistence challenges to humanity,” Potts said. “This assessment shows that we are at a crossroads and must take urgent action to combat land degradation and restore degraded land if we want to create a happy and healthy planet for all humanity.”

Photo Displays of Mountain Destruction

WV Mountain Party:  “Resolution to Ban Extreme Extraction”

From Tom Rhule, Mountain Party of WV, October 26, 2014

On September 30, 2014, a quorum of the State Executive Council for the Mountain Party of West Virginia passed the following Resolution to ban extreme extraction by unanimous vote*:

WHEREAS in the wake of the West Virginia American Water Crisis the pollution in streams, rivers, and other source waters from the mountain top removal of coal and associated operations, as well as the high pressure high volume hydrofracking of the Marcellus have caused the serious decline of public health and the economies of communities across the State; and

WHEREAS WV Lawmakers continue to allow the injection of coal prep slurry into abandoned coal mines despite the mounting evidence that doing so has poisoned the source waters for a number of our rural communities; and

WHEREAS there is official government documentation that the State of West Virginia has improperly permitted wastewater containing toxic amounts of radium along with other hazardous waste byproducts from horizontally hydrofracking the Marcellus to be injected into Class II underground wells; and,

WHEREAS Class II underground injection wells were never designed for hazardous wastes and therefore are insufficient to properly sequester such wastes from our drinking water sources; and,

WHEREAS there are currently over seven hundred Class II underground injection wells as documented by the EPA within the borders of our State; and,

WHEREAS since 2007, improperly marked tanker trucks are known to have dumped hazardous Marcellus drilling waste fluid onto roadways, into rural streams, rivers, and abandoned coal mines within the borders of our State; and,

WHEREAS in 2011 it was reported to the Joint Legislative Oversight Commission on State Water Resources that many millions of gallons of the waters of the State were being diverted for use to high pressure horizontally hydrofrack the Marcellus, but 62 percent of which is not being properly accounted for by that industry; and,

WHEREAS in Sept. of 2011, when passing into law governor Tomblin’s Horizontal Well Act (H.B. 401), WV Lawmakers wrongfully assigned the WV Department of Environmental Protection to measure, regulate and report on the radioactive waste byproducts produced by high pressure horizontal hydrofracking, and,

Whereas the aforementioned HB 401 remains in direct conflict with West Virginia Code of State Regulations §64-23-16, the proper title being “Radiation Safety Requirements for Technologically Enhanced Radioactive Materials (TENORM),” which mandates all oversight and regulatory authority including measurement, storage, and disposal for such radioactive waste to West Virginia’s Department of Health and Human Resources where that agency’s health experts must be mandated to be properly trained to protect West Virginia’s citizens and their future generations from the ravages caused by the mishandling of TENORM; and,

WHEREAS during the last regular session of year 2013,, WV lawmakers passed Senate Bill 243 to amend governor Tomblin’s Horizontal Well Act which now grants drilling companies the right to keep from public scrutiny the countless proprietary chemicals which are known to be used during the hydraulic fracturing process; and,

Whereas SB 243 now enacted essentially prevents well owners and public water providers from knowing which particular chemicals may be in their source waters thus preventing proper monitoring against contamination; and,

WHEREAS by 2014, numerous water wells both private and publicly owned are now known to have been compromised by the careless mishandling of toxic chemicals and associated waste byproducts of high pressure high volume horizontal hydrofracking operations across the State; and,

WHEREAS the Bill of Rights to the West Virginia Constitution prominently places the health, safety and welfare of the People of the State above all corporate right to profit from the aforementioned fossil fuel industries as they are presently permitted by State and Federal regulators and their respective governments:

BE IT RESOLVED that we, the Citizens of the Great State of West Virginia and members of the Mountain Party call for the ban of all surface mine and high pressure horizontal hydrofracking operations within our borders because every chemical associated with these extraction industries must be safely handled, properly identified, registered, prominently labeled, and regulations enforced. This moratorium resolution shall include every chemical substance, whether used or produced, organic or inorganic, in every phase of each industrial process including mixing. use. storage, transport and disposal.

Be it further resolved that the Mountain Party believes that the long term negative economic and environmental consequences of the aforementioned extreme extraction fossil fuel industry techniques dwarf the short term economic benefits to the Great State of West Virginia, and that all political and legal means must be implemented to protect the health, safety, and welfare of her Citizens.

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*After the above Resolution to ban extreme extraction was passed, the following informational paragraph was proposed to be appropriately inserted in accordance with the timeline of the Resolution:

Whereas, in 2009, tests by the State of New York of 24 samples of Marcellus flowback from West Virginia and Pennsylvania hydrofracked wells revealed the presence in toxic quantities of 4-nitroquinoline 1-oxide, one of the most cancer-causing toxins known to man, for which the State of WV has not, and is not currently testing in any drinking water source; and, …

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Contact:  Tom Rhule,  Communications Director,  at:  mountainpartywv@gmail.com