Tag: water

  • Example Of Environmental Economics

     

    In this May 1, 2014 photo, irrigation water runs along the dried-up ditch between the rice farms to provide water for the rice fields in Richvale, Calif. California’s drought-ravaged reservoirs are running so low that state water deliveries to some metropolitan areas have all but stopped, and cutbacks are forcing growers to fallow fields. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
    Irrigation water runs along the dried-up ditch between the rice farms to provide water for the rice fields in Richvale, Calif. California’s drought-ravaged reservoirs are running so low that state water deliveries to some metropolitan areas have all but stopped, and cutbacks are forcing growers to fallow fields. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

    Environmental Strategist, between the lines:  The article below offers an excellent example of why we are transitioning away from our current slash and trash economic platform to an environmental economic platform.

    The basic difference is, under our current slash and trash economic platform our environment is a subset under the economy.  Operating under an environmental economic platform the opposite is true, our economy is a subset under the environment. 

    This article highlights how businesses operating in our past slash and trash economy decided they would bring the environment to where they wanted to grow food, which happens to be in a desert.  Under environmental economics, you grow food where there are already sufficient natural resources to support the business. 

    When mother nature removes or reduces a resource it has a tremendous negative impact upon a slash and trash economy. 

    Playing Dirty in the War for Water

    • January 26, 2016

    I am a farmer’s daughter. I grew up checking sprinklers and changing irrigation with my dad in a pair of muddy boots. The experience afforded me an intimate awareness of the importance of having affordable water to nourish one’s crops. My family still farms in California, and as my last name indicates, our heritage is Hispanic. Which is why I find this story especially upsetting.

    With poignant slogans and gripping imagery, an organization called “El Agua Es Asunto de Todos”—Water is Everybody’s Business—has demanded more water for the San Joaquin Valley. In video testimonials on the group’s website, Hispanic community members share stories of the valley’s once-productive fields as well as the suffering they experience now from lack of work. They discuss school closures, poverty, and loss of homes. The organization’s website reads: “No water. No work. No economy,” and, “Water is the key to our future. And the future is in our hands.”

    The group’s message is a valid one. Without water there are no fields and therefore fewer jobs. But its message also strikes me as disingenuous. While El Agua operates under the guise of a grassroots Latino community effort, as the New York Times reported in December, it is funded entirely by Westlands Water District.

    To be clear, nowhere on El Agua’s website could I find mention that the organization is bankrolled by Westlands. Nor could I find any statistic or reference to water availability and usage. Instead, its pages are filled with emotionally charged language and victimized pleas. “It’s a disaster,” one testimonial reads. “We’re going to lose everything we have.” But the fact is, that the group’s participants—presumably innocent, well-meaning people—are being played. And their heart-wrenching village campaign is, in reality, a thirsty wolf in sheep’s clothing.

    Westlands Water District is not your average water district. According to the New York Timesarticle, it supports about 600 large-scale farmers within a 600,000-acre stretch of land in California’s San Joaquin Valley. As the Times reports, it’s a $100 million-a-year agency and a powerful political force, with a litigious past and five lobbying firms under contract in Washington and Sacramento, all with one objective: to get its hands on inexpensive water.

    The New York Times reports that for decades a federal water management organization called the Central Valley Project offered farmers in California’s San Joaquin Valley an abundance of affordable water that it gathered in northern California and piped south via 500 miles of canals. Farmers within the district received a triple subsidy—cheap water, USDA crop subsidies, and below-market electricity. However, in the 1970s, the State Water Project created a second canal system and diverted some of the same water from the northern Californian source rivers.

    As you can imagine, devastating environmental problems emerged. Commercial salmon fisheries collapsed. At the confluence of the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers, fish populations declined dramatically. Congress’s solution was a law reserving at least a minimum amount of water for wildlife. Not surprisingly, it hit a nerve with farmers in the San Joaquin Valley. El Agua represents one facet of Westlands’ many efforts to access more federal water.

    Since then, Westlands has lobbied for new reservoirs to augment Central Valley Project reserves, according the New York Times. It has pleaded that water scarcity will ruin the lives of the district’s Latino population. Purchasing water at inflated prices from other sources would reduce agricultural profits and threaten farmers’ bottom line with ruinous results. The New York Times reports that Westlands is currently working to persuade Congress to loosen the rules that set aside Sacramento basin water for fisheries. And it will stop at nothing to get the federal tap turned back on.

    In a heartfelt message on El Agua’s website, general director Martha Elvia Rosas writes, “When we suffer water restrictions, all of us are affected. However the Hispanic community is especially vulnerable. We lose our jobs and our businesses. Furthermore, we lose educational opportunities for our children and, in general, our entire future is put at risk.” This statement, while partially true, leaves out the fact that Westlands has the power to change the current circumstances, or any role in the issue’s resolution for that matter.

    El agua es absolutamente asunto de todos. I couldn’t agree more. Water rights are indeed everyone’s business. And I wholeheartedly support an honest discussion of facts between farmers, politicians, and the Hispanic community. But manipulative tactics and self-serving slogans? That just seems sinister.

    I welcome your thoughts.

     

  • A Rising Tide of Contaminants

    environmental Strategist, between the lines:  It may surprise you to know the vast array of contaminates our waste water treatment plants are not equipped to treat.  The untreated contaminants are then discharged into our waterways.  This article gives 40,000 foot view of what is taking place with our waterways from some of the materials / chemicals we produce along with the politics.

    By DEBORAH BLUM – SEPTEMBER 25, 2014

    Deborah Swackhamer, a professor of environmental health sciences at the University of Minnesota, decided last year to investigate the chemistry of the nearby Zumbro River. She and her colleagues were not surprised to find traces of pesticides in the water.

    Neither were they shocked to find prescription drugs ranging from antibiotics to the anti–convulsive carbamazepine. Researchers realized more than 15 years ago that pharmaceuticals – excreted by users, dumped down drains – were slipping through wastewater treatment systems.

    But though she is a leading expert in so-called emerging contaminants, Dr. Swackhamer was both surprised and dismayed by the sheer range and variety of what she found. Caffeine drifted through the river water, testament to local consumption of everything from coffee to energy drinks. There were relatively high levels of acetaminophen, the over-the-counter painkiller. Acetaminophen causes liver damage in humans at high doses; no one knows what it does to fish.

    “We don’t know what these background levels mean in terms of environmental or public health,” she said. “It’s definitely another thing that we’re going to be looking at.”

    Or, she might have said, one of many, many other things.

    The number of chemicals contaminating our environment is growing at exponential rate, scientists say. A team of researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey tracks them in American waterways, sediments, landfills and municipal sewage sludge, which is often converted into agricultural fertilizer. They’ve found steroid hormones and the antibacterial agent triclosan in sewage; the antidepressant fluoxetine (Prozac) in fish; and compounds from both birth control pills and detergents in the thin, slimy layer that forms over stones in streams.

    “We’re looking at an increasingly diverse array of organic and inorganic chemicals that may have ecosystem health effects,” said Edward Furlong, a research chemist with the U.S.G.S. office in Denver and one of the first scientists to track the spread of pharmaceutical compounds in the nation’s waterways. “Many of them are understudied and unrecognized.”

    In an essay last week in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, titled “Re-Emergence of Emerging Contaminants,” editor-in-chief Jerald L. Schnoor called attention to both the startling growth of newly registered chemical compounds and our inadequate understanding of older ones.

    The American Chemical Society, the publisher of the journal, maintains the most comprehensive national database of commercially registered chemical compounds in the country. “The growth of the list is eye-popping, with approximately 15,000 new chemicals and biological sequences registered every day,” Dr. Schnoor wrote.

    Not all of those are currently in use, he emphasized, and the majority are unlikely to be dangerous. “But, for better or worse, our commerce is producing innovative, challenging new compounds,” he wrote.

    Dr. Schnoor, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Iowa, also noted rising concern among researchers about the way older compounds are altered in the environment, sometimes taking new and more dangerous forms.

    Some research suggests that polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, are broken down by plants into even more toxic metabolites. Equally troubling, scientists are finding that while PCBs are banned, they continue to seep into the environment in unexpected ways, such as from impurities in the caulk of old school buildings.

    PCBs have long been identified as hazardous, but not every contaminant is so risky, Dr. Schnoor emphasized.

    “Out of the millions of chemical compounds that we know about, thousands have been tested and there are very few that show important health effects,” he said in an interview.

    But, he added, the development of new compounds and the increasing discovery of unexpected contaminants in the environment means that the nation desperately needs a better system for assessing and prioritizing chemical exposures.

    That includes revisiting the country’s antiquated chemical regulation and assessment regulations. The Toxic Substances Control Act went into effect in 1976, almost 40 years ago, and has not been updated since.

    The law does require the Environmental Protection Agency to maintain an inventory of registered industrial compounds that may be toxic, but it does not require advance safety testing of those materials. Of the some 84,000 compounds registered, only a fraction have ever been fully tested for health effects on humans. The data gap includes some materials, like creosote and coal tar derivatives, which are currently manufactured at rates topping a million pounds a year.

    Not surprisingly, Dr. Schnoor and other scientists want to see the act updated and transformed into a mechanism for science-based risk assessment of suspect compounds. Indeed, everyone from researchers to environmental groups to the American chemical industry agree that the law is frustratingly inadequate.

    “Our chemical safety net is more hole than net,” said Ken Cook, president of theEnvironmental Working Group, an advocacy group. The Food and Drug Administration, for instance, doesn’t regulate the environmental spread of pharmaceuticals. And the toxic substances law ignores their presence in waterways.

    “Where does that leave us in terms of scientific understanding of what drugs to regulate?” Mr. Cook said.

    Anne Womack Kolton, vice president for communications at the American Chemistry Council, an organization representing chemical manufacturers, agreed. “Think about the world 40 years ago,” she said. “It was a vastly different place. It’s common sense to revise the law and make it consistent with what we know about chemicals today.”

    The two sides don’t agree on what standards for chemical testing are needed or what kind of protective restrictions should be put in place for chemicals deemed hazardous. And they are in deep disagreement about whether a revised federal law should preempt actions taken by tough-minded states like California.

    The council argues for federal standardization as the most efficient route; environmental groups believe that such an action would weaken public protection. Legislators have so far not been able to resolve those differences. This month yet another proposed update to the act stalled in a Senate committee.

    “Congress has not sent an environmental law to the president’s desk in 18 years,” Mr. Cook said. “And in the current environment, it’s very difficult to get something through.”

    Still, Dr. Swackhamer, who recently stepped down as chair of the E.P.A.’s science advisory board, notes that despite the lack of legislation, scientists have been working toward better ways to assess the risks posed by the increasing numbers of chemicals in our lives. Some may help whittle the inventory of T.S.C.A. compounds down to a priority list that focuses on less than a thousand products.

    That’s still a daunting number of chemical unknowns. But given the tens of thousands of materials in the inventory, it’s a start.

  • Potential value of environmental liability insurance — AST spills into Colorado River

    environmental Strategist, between the lines:  Businesses often times question the value environmental liability insurance offers their business model.  Below is s simple spill that only released 7,500 gallons of oil from an Above Ground Storage Tank.

    The premium for a $1,000,000 Above Ground Storage Tank policy runs roughly $400.  So the premium versus the face value of the policy means it cost the insured $.0004 cents on the dollar for the insurance versus self insuring and paying 100 cents on the dollar out of your own pocket for cleanup costs, defense, third party bodily injury, third party property damage, third party business interruption….

    Environmental insurance versus self insurance, what adds more value?

    7,500 gallons of oil spills into Colorado river

    Fort Collins Coloradoan – by Ryan Handy

    FORT COLLINS, Colo. — A storage tank damaged by recent flooding has dumped 7,500 gallons of crude oil into the Poudre River near Windsor, the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC) reported late Friday afternoon.

    “At this time we know of no drinking water intakes affected by this spill. The release is not ongoing,” COGCC spokesman Todd Hartman said

    The oil has stained vegetation as far as a quarter of mile away from the damaged tank, Hartman said.

    The tank’s operator, Noble Energy, discovered the spill Tuesday afternoon and later reported it to the COGCC, the state’s regulatory agency for the oil and gas industry. Recent high river flows undercut the bank where the storage tank was sitting, causing the tank to drop and breaking a valve. About 178 barrels of oil dumped into the river.

    The well near the tank has been shut in, and a second tank in the area appears to be unaffected, Hartman said in a news release.

    COGCC and water quality experts from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment were at the scene of the tank spill, where clean-up efforts were underway Friday. Clean-up crews are working to absorb the spilled oil and a vac-truck is removing oil-filled standing water from a low-lying area around the tank.

    The site of the spill is southeast of Fort Collins near the Poudre River Trail.

    Contributing: Associated Press

  • ‘New normal’: No one escapes pain in drought areas

    environmental Strategist, between the lines: Everything that exists on our planet is impacted by environmental exposures as the article below points out.  According to the report below “drought now covers about 38 percent of the lower 48 states”, so people living in drought areas are getting a real life experience just how precious a resource water is.

    We can’t control our environment but we can do a better job of utilizing the resources we need to live.  Since 99% + of species that have inhabited earth are extinct the odds say we better wake up or we won’t be smelling any roses.

    Our environment is creating demand for environmental Strategist™ much like computers created demand for IT professionals.  The big difference being one you can live without and one you can’t.  For a better life www.estrategist.com.

    Mark Koba | @MarkKobaCNBC , 5-20-14:

    The dry conditions in the western U.S. are so bad that even many of the companies that are thriving in the drought feel economic pain.

    Case in point—Limoneira, of Santa Paula, California, and one of the largest U.S. growers of lemons and avocados: It reached record revenue of $100 million this year thanks to higher prices brought on by a freeze in South America, said president and CEO Harold Edwards.

    Despite the higher sales, however, getting through the drought is costly, said Edwards, who noted that his firm constantly monitors its underground wells so as not to overuse them.

    “We have to do more water pumping, invest in sprinkler systems, and every extra irrigation costs us,” said Edwards, whose company has some 11,000 acres in agricultural production.

    eS factoid:  80% of the worlds fresh water is used for Agriculture.

    Analysts say that no matter what, farmers, businesses and consumers are going to feel the effects of the drought, and survival will mean shared pain through conditions that show no sign of letting up.

    “This is the new normal,” said Lori Anne Dolqueist, a partner at the law firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips and an expert in California water regulations. “In terms of the drought, we can’t just expect to wait it out and pray for rain. We have to do a lot more through education on how we use water, stricter laws on water use and other means to get a handle on it,” she said. “And that means a tough conversation for everyone about water.”

    Severity of drought

    The current drought is not a new one. Various states have been in drought conditions for the last three to four years. But the severity of what’s happening now is alarming to many observers.

    For the first time in this century, the entire state of California is in a severe drought or worse, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.

    Drought conditions in Oklahoma have farmers there expecting only 20 percent of their normal wheat yield this spring. States like Kansas Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and Colorado are also caught in the grasp of extremely dry conditions.

    And a dearth of rain over the past four years in Texas has climatologists saying the state is suffering the worst drought conditions of the past 500 years. Dozens of Texas communities, especially in the southern part, are said to have less than 90 days of water, putting lives at risk.

    California’s drought will deal a severe blow to Central Valley irrigated agriculture and farm communities this year, and could cost the industry $1.7 billion and cause more than 14,500 workers to lose their jobs, according to preliminary results of a new study by the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences.

    Consumers are taking a hit as well: Prices for meat, eggs, fresh fruits and vegetables and other foods are on the rise, in large part because of the drought that has seized western states.

    The drought has an economic trickle-down effect that could leave some towns and communities devastated, said Umar Sheikh, an industry sector credit analyst at insurance firm Euler Hermes.

    “Without water, there are no crops, and you have an exodus of people moving out of the areas,” argued Sheikh. “That means less kids in schools, less tax money for the towns and more dependence on government assistance.”

    With weather conditions as they are, a whole new way of thinking about water use is necessary, said Wayne Tucker, founder of BIO S.I. Technology, which makes microbial soil that helps increase water nutrients and efficiency for agriculture.

    “Instead of planting 5,000 acres of a crop that could use thousands of gallons of water, we need to reduce crop planting to something like 2,000 acres, ” argued Tucker. “We’re not getting the sufficient rainfall we need to keep doing what we have been doing.”

    Lynn Wilson, academic chair at Kaplan University and an environmental researcher said it will take more than just shorter showers to help the situation.

    “We have to look at all kinds of methods to save and produce water, like desalination as expensive as that is, and reusing waste water,” she said.

    Preparation for drought conditions is key, said Euler Hermes’ Sheikh.That means bigger reservoirs for storing water when it rains so there’s enough to go around during dry spells, he said.

    An online wine-selling outlet, NakedWines.com, said it’s helping wine growers in California with its own relief efforts. CEO Rowan Gormley explained that NakedWines, which uses crowd funding from its customers to invest in wineries, allows those wineries to switch to producing other wines that aren’t threatened by the drought.

    The online outlet has also invested in wineries that have their own water sources. But the company’s efforts don’t help everyone—Gromley noted that it’s primarily premium wines whose growers have sufficient water, whereas the drought is a bigger concern for “entry-level wines sourced out of the Central Valley of California.” NakedWines doesn’t focus on those areas.

    ‘Share the burden’

    According to the most recent outlook, drought now covers about 38 percent of the lower 48 states. Most of the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles, northeastern New Mexico, and southwestern Kansas received only a few tenths of an inch of rain from mid-April to mid-May, when precipitation is usually on the increase in this region.

    And drought persistence is highly probable along the West Coast and in the mountain areas of states such as Colorado, where summer is a relatively dry time of year and both surface and subsoil moisture almost always decline.

    Experts say even if there were huge amounts of rainfall in the months ahead, the drought won’t go away, and it’s time to look for new ideas.

    “Whole civilizations in the past have disappeared because of lack of water,” said Kaplan University’s Wilson. “We’re going to be fighting over resources like water and it’s time we looked at them as having limits.”

    —By CNBC’s Mark Koba.

  • Trawling: destructive fishing method is turning sea floors to ‘deserts’

     environmental Strategist™, between the lines:  Agriculture uses 80% of the worlds fresh water supply and it accounts for 70% of the contamination in our waterways.  Should we stop agriculture?

    The fact that each ones of us eats food means we support agriculture, therefore, each an everyone of us is a polluter.  The challenge we face is how can we pollute in a way that has the least amount of impact on human health and the environment?

    We can’t begin to answer that question until we are environmentally educated.  For businesses and business professionals, www.estrategist.com is your first step as a polluter to have the least amount of impact upon human health and the environment.

    From: Morgan Erickson-Davis, MONGABAY.COM,  Published May 29, 2014 01:30 PM :  Bottom trawling is a practice used by commercial fisheries around the world in which a large, heavy net is dragged along the ocean floor to scoop up everything in its path. Previous research has linked trawling to significant environmental impacts, such as the harvest of large numbers of non-target species, collectively termed “by catch,” as well as destruction of shallow seabeds. Now, a new study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds this method is also resulting in long-term, far-reaching consequences in the deeper ocean and beyond.

    diagram courtesy of FRDC Australia

    Trawling dates back to the 1300s, and it became widespread in coastal areas around the world after the industrialization of commercial fishing in the late-1800s. Bottom trawling targets commercially valuable species that live near the sea floor, such as cod, rockfish, and various kinds of squid and shrimp. Gear varies depending on the fishing outfit, but nets can be nearly as large as a city block and scoop thousands of fish and other marine animals in a single drag.

    Bottom trawling has one of the highest bycatch rates of all commercial fishing practices. In the North Pacific, the practice accounts for 18 percent of annual groundfish harvests, and 82 percent of the region’s discarded by-catch. At times, bycatch accounts for upwards of 90 percent of a net’s total catch.

    In addition to directly killing many fish and other marine species, studies have shown that bottom trawling is very destructive to the seabed. It dislodges sediment, which destroys the habitat of ground-dwelling organisms, makes the water more opaque and unsuitable for many species, and releases pollutants and carbon that had been trapped below the seafloor.

    As populations of many fish species dwindle due to intensive commercial fishing effort, bottom trawling outfits are searching for new fishing grounds in ever-deeper regions of oceans around the world. However, this new study indicates that deeper ocean bottoms are also being affected by trawling, as the nets destroy delicate seafloor ecosystems at a level akin to desertification.

    “Cumulatively, the impacts of trawling on the sediment structure, the benthic biodiversity, and the most basic of all of the nutritional resources in these deep-sea sedimentary ecosystems resemble the catastrophic effects caused by man-accelerated soil erosion on land, and the general environmental deterioration of abandoned agriculture fields exposed to high levels of human impact,” write the researchers, from various institutions in Italy and Spain.

    Continue reading at ENN affiliate, MONGABAY.COM.

  • Marinas, Yacht Clubs, and Shipyards…What is your strategy?

    Environmental Strategist, between the lines: 

    I often talk on the three benefits environmental insurance offers insureds besides what most people think of, first party cleanup.

    3 benefits of environmental insurance: 

    1.  Defense Coverage
    2. Specialists to assist you in handling a claim
    3. Coverage for third party Bodily injury, third party property damage, Third party business interruption.

    You can read the story below and view videos on how a simple boat fire impacts all three of the benefits offered by environmental insurance.  I would also like to point out that over the years when I have strategized on marine fires the quick response back I most often hear from the environmentally uninformed is a boat will burn and sink, besides fuel you won’t have any other liabilities.  Read On!

    La Conner boat fire. Photo courtesy of the Seattle Times
    La Conner boat fire 2/21/14. Photo courtesy of the Seattle Times

    La Conner marina fire: sunken boats and ‘broken hearts’

    A fire destroyed seven boats and damaged at least eight more, totaling an estimated $1 million in damage at Shelter Bay Marina near La Conner in Skagit County on Friday afternoon.

    The fire started at about 4 p.m. on one boat at the residential marina and quickly spread to adjacent boats, according to Shelter Bay community manager David Franklin.

    One dock was engulfed in flames, which allowed one burning boat to float to another dock and further spread the fire, he said.

    Firefighters were able to contain the damage on the adjacent dock, but they weren’t able to fully knock down the fire until shortly after 6 p.m., Franklin said.

    “There were no injuries,” he said, “just a lot of broken hearts for those boats that were lost.”

    Dylan Furst, of Bellingham, said he saw the cloud of black smoke from about two miles away while he was driving to Bellingham from Deception Pass. He could smell the smoke from more than 400 yards away, he said.

    Furst said firefighters had trouble aiming directly at the flames because the boats kept drifting.

    “It was just one big fire of boats,” Furst said. “They weren’t separated at all.”

    Firefighters from multiple agencies responded, including the Swinomish Reservation, Skagit County, La Conner and the U.S. Coast Guard.

    Some residents tried to move unaffected boats away from the flames as firefighters battled the blaze with water and foam, the Swinomish Yacht Club reported via Twitter.

    “With boat fires, with the water, fiberglass, fuel and the intensity of the flame, it’s very difficult to put out,” La Conner Fire Chief Dan Taylor said.

    The 15 boats that burned are 40- to 50-foot pleasure craft kept at the 325-slip marina in the private, gated community of Shelter Bay on the Swinomish Channel. Six of the seven boats that were destroyed sank, and the seventh was severely burned, Skagit County Fire District 13 Chief Roy Horn told the Skagit Valley Herald.

    One resident told the newspaper that his $300,000 yacht, with 400 gallons of diesel fuel, burned and then sank.

    “They were nice boats,” Franklin said. “Very nice boats.”

    Franklin said officials will work to determine the cause and the full extent of the damage Saturday, as well as the possible environmental impacts, including the diesel fuel that leaked into the channel.

    “We’ll see what the morning light brings,” Franklin said. “Hopefully, tomorrow, it won’t be as bad as we think.”

    Material from The Associated Press was used in this report.

    Paige Cornwell: 206-464-2530 or pcornwell@seattletimes.com

    Update 2-26-14:  LA CONNER —

    Recovery operations of several sunken ships continue this week in Shelter Bay.  Crews were able to remove two damaged vessels this weekend but have run into problems recovering the remaining five ships. Fire damage to the ships has complicated the salvage efforts.

    Crews are also using placing booms and absorbent pads on the water to recover fuel after discovering skimmers to be ineffective. Damage is estimated at more than $1 million. The cause is still under investigation.

    Update:  All burned boats removed from La Conner marina

    The Associated Press LA CONNER, Wash. — 

    All six boats that sank during the fire at the Shelter Bay Marina in La Conner have been pulled from the water.

    Ecology Department spokeswoman Lisa Copeland also says 600 gallons of diesel were removed from a seventh vessel that was destroyed in Friday’s fire but did not sink.

    The Skagit Valley Herald reports (http://bit.ly/1k9f0HC ) cleanup of an estimated 2,400 gallons of spilled oil and fuel may continue through Friday.

    Copeland says there have been no reports of oiled birds or other impact to wildlife.

    The property loss from the fire is estimated at more than $1 million.

    These videos give a prime example of the public outcry that results when pollution incidents occur, and show another major reason why environmental liability coverage is such a valuable asset for businesses. Especially when local residents are potentially impacted and government regulators get involved –

    Video of the fire scene and local residents reactions  

    Video of the aftermath

    Video of Salvage operations 

    Video of the fire from third party spectators  

     

     

     

  • Chemical spill a blow to W.Va. capital’s economy

    environmental Strategist™, between the lines:  This environmental loss below is a very simple real life example of why environmental Strategist state that every business is impacted by environmental exposures.  While the company that caused the spill is probably toast, how are the impacted third party businesses going to be compensated for being forced to shut down?  What about defense cost, third party property damage, third party business income…?  What about employees not getting paid because their employer was forced to shut down?  This means bills are going to be paid late so other business are also going to be impacted.  And so on and so on…

    Environmental losses can cut deep and wide with those they impact.  Since every business is impacted by environmental exposures, common sense tells us businesses must have an environmental Management Strategy (eMS) that shows how to manage and transfer their environmental exposures.  Why has an eMS become part of “Best Practices” for business?  Because common sense tells us without our environment nothing else really matters because we’re toast.

    For more on developing and executing an eMS go to www.estrategist.com.

    Chemical spill a blow to W.Va. capital’s economy

    Brendan Farrington and Jonathan Mattise , AP Business Writers, 7:59 a.m. EST January 12, 2014

    CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — On the third day without clean tap water, business owners with empty dining rooms and quiet aisles of merchandise around West Virginia’s capital were left to wonder how much of an economic hit they’ll take from a chemical spill.

    Most visitors have cleared out of Charleston while locals are either staying home or driving out of the area to find somewhere they can get a hot meal or take a hot shower. Orders not to use tap water for much other than flushing toilets mean that the spill is an emergency not just for the environment but also for local businesses.

    A water company executive said Saturday that it could be days before uncontaminated water is flowing again for about 300,000 people in nine West Virginia counties. The uncertainty means it’s impossible to estimate the economic impact of the spill yet, said the leader of the local chamber of commerce.

    Virtually every restaurant was dark Saturday, unable to use water to prepare food, wash dishes or clean employees’ hands. Meanwhile, hotels had emptied and foot traffic was down at many retail stores.

    “I haven’t been able to cook anything at home and was hoping they were open,” Bill Rogers, 52, said outside a closed Tudor’s Biscuit World in Marmet, just east of Charleston. “It seems like every place is closed. It’s frustrating. Really frustrating.”

    In downtown Charleston, the Capitol Street row of restaurants and bars were locked up. Amid them, The Consignment Shop was open, but business was miserable. The second-hand shop’s owner said she relies on customers who come downtown to eat and drink.

    “It’s like a ghost town,” Tammy Krepshaw said. “I feel really bad for all my neighbors. It’s sad.”

    The person she doesn’t feel bad for is Freedom Industries President Gary Southern, who told reporters the day before that he was having a long day and quickly wrapped up a news conference on the chemical spill so he could fly out of the area.

    “People want answers. They deserve answers,” Krepshaw said.

    The emergency began Thursday, when complaints came in to West Virginia American Water about a licorice-type odor in the tap water. The source: the chemical 4-methylcyclohexane methanol that leaked out of a 40,000 gallon tank at a Freedom Industries facility along the Elk River. State officials believe about 7,500 gallons leaked from the tank, some of which was contained before flowing into the river. It’s not clear exactly how much entered the water supply.

    Thirty-two people sought treatment at area hospitals for symptoms such as nausea. Of those, four people were admitted to the Charleston Area Medical Center but their conditions weren’t available Saturday.

    Federal authorities, including the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, opened an investigation into Thursday’s spill.

    By Saturday morning, FEMA said it had delivered about 50 truckloads of water, or a million liters, to West Virginia for distribution at sites including fire departments.

    There’s no question businesses have been hurt — particularly restaurants and hotels, said Matt Ballard, president of the Charleston Area Alliance, the state’s largest regional chamber of commerce.

    “I don’t know that it can be quantified at this point because we don’t know how long it will last,” Ballard said. “I’m hoping a solution by early next week so business can get back to normal.”

    While restaurants are having the most trouble, the effect ripples to other businesses, Ballard said. When people go out to dinner, they also shop. And restaurant workers who miss paychecks aren’t spending as much money.

    During the emergency, many people are just staying home, and some of those who aren’t are leaving the region and staying with family and friends who have a water supply. Ballard said that includes one of his employees who is staying in Ohio for the weekend.

    “It’s smart, but it certainly has a negative impact on what would be a normal business weekend,” Ballard said.

    The Alliance is urging businesses owners to check their insurance policies to see if they can make claims over lost business. It plans to hold workshops to assist businesses with those issues, Ballard said.

    In downtown, the store Taylor Books usually fills the 40 seats in its cafe. But the cafe was shut down by the state Department of Health on Friday because it said employees had no way to safely wash their hands before serving customers. On Saturday only three people sat in the bookstore using the wireless Internet. Manager Dan Carlisle said he canceled a musician scheduled to play that night and the store was going to close five hours early.

    “It’s pretty annoying,” Carlisle said about Freedom Industries’ response to the spill. “I feel like you should just be honest with people immediately.”

    Some bars have remained open, but they’ve seen a large drop in business. State officials were working Saturday on alternative sources of water that may allow restaurants to reopen.

    “We will work around the clock, 24-7, and try to open … as many businesses as possible in the next couple of days,” said Dr. Rahul Gupta, health officer for the Kanawha-Charleston and Putnam County boards of health.

    Several businesses that had arranged other sources of water were inspected Saturday. Gupta said health officials considered the closures’ impact on workers when they decided to allow businesses to reopen if they have potable water.

    “This is not only the businesses but also the folks that work in those businesses,” he said.

  • Hydraulic Fracturing: Latest Developments and Trends

    environmental Strategist™, between the lines:  Fracking has been around for a long time.  With the oil and gas industry boom taking place in the United States it’s critical you have an understanding on fracking, resources used and potential third party impacts.

    environmental Strategist™ Position:  While this article takes a more negative stance, the bottom line is, in the near future, as long as people want to drive cars, fly on vacation / business, run industry… there will be demand for oil and gas resources.  Finding ways to utilize these resources that has the least amount of impact on human health and the environment is the goal.  In order to do so we have to be educated, pro / con or otherwise and with enough information you can make informed decisions.  This is just one piece of information.

    By Adam Orford /  October 6, 2013

    Hydraulic fracturing (commonly called “fracking”) remains one of the most controversial environmental issues of the day. The process involves breaking open otherwise impermeable oil and gas bearing geologic formations using a pressurized mixture of water, “proppant,” and chemicals.

    As the hydraulic fracturing industry matures and the nationwide controversy enters its fourth year, the legal landscape continues to change on numerous fronts. Continuing to identify trends within the massive amount of news remains an important task for those following the field, and this article seeks to highlight some of the most important recent developments. From chemical risks to water resources, from old battles over local bans to new battles over sand mines; governments, environmental interests, and industries across the country continue to struggle with governance of the fracking industry.

    Fluid Chemicals, Storage, and Disposal – the Blackside Dace Die-off Report

    Many opponents of hydraulic fracturing have emphasized the unknown risk characteristics of the chemicals used in the development of fracked oil and gas. They argue that the process has caused or has the potential to cause subsurface pollution of drinking water resources or to harm sensitive environmental receptors. They contend that fracturing may lead to the migration of unknown and potentially toxic chemicals into water resources. Proponents of hydraulic fracturing, on the other hand, contend that the fracturing process itself – occurring deep underground and geologically separated from near-surface water resources – is not likely to cause releases of chemicals to groundwater, and that a better focus is on well construction and integrity, and fluid handling and storage above ground. See generally A. Orford, Hydraulic Fracturing: Legislative and Regulatory Trends, Marten Law Environmental News (Oct. 4, 2011).

    The U.S. Geological Survey and Fish and Wildlife Service recently released a joint report which is likely to provide ammunition to both sides of this argument. In Histopathological Analysis of Fish from Acorn Fork Creek, Kentucky Exposed to Hydraulic Fracturing Fluid Releases, published in August in the Southeastern Naturalist,[1] federal scientists concluded that a surface spill of hydraulic fracturing fluids into a previously pristine stream inhabited by the blackside dace, a federally listed threatened fish species, was likely to have been the direct cause of a major die-off of that and other species in the stream. Although unable to identify precisely which chemicals were spilled (due to limitations on fluid chemical disclosure requirements), the federal scientists determined that immediately following the spill the stream’s pH dropped from 7.5 (neutral) to 5.6 (acidic), while stream conductivity increased dramatically, indicating the presence of dissolved heavy metals. Dead fish exhibited gill lesions consistent with exposure to acidic water and heavy metals, and thus the hydraulic fracturing fluid release was linked strongly to the die-off. This study is possibly the first to link a surface release of hydraulic fracturing fluid to significant ecologic harm, and certainly the first related to a federally listed species.While the facts underlying the report tend to support the argument that focus should be on surface and near-surface operations, not deep fracturing, the Kentucky blackside dace incident is likely to be influential in discussions over hydraulic fluid handling, storage, and disposal regulation going forward.

    Water Resources and Scarcity – The Rise of Recycling and Acidization

    The debate over hydraulic fracturing started with concerns about water quality, but greater concern may be with impacts on limited water resources. See A. Orford, Water Resources – Not Just Water Quality – Gains Attention of Opponents to Hydraulic Fracturing, Marten Law Environmental News (Apr. 22, 2013). Recent reports lend some support to these concerns. Ceres, a respected organization for the promotion of sustainable business practices, recently issued a report (available at this link) entitled Hydraulic Fracturing & Water Stress. Its core message – that shale plays are often located in water-stressed areas – supports the argument that industry needs to do everything it can to manage its water use. As one example of what can happen if this is not done, a recent report from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality estimates that, given ongoing drought conditions and a large increase in groundwater withdrawals for oil and gas development, over thirty Texas communities face the unprecedented risk of running out of water entirely by the end of 2013.[2]

    Industry is not unaware of these challenges, and entrepreneurial companies have been busy developing technology to minimize water usage in hydraulic fracturing. These technologies include both equipment to process and recycle used frac water (separating chemicals from flowback and produced water for reuse), and development of methods to better utilize brackish (salty) groundwater in the hydraulic fracturing process, minimizing the need for freshwater withdrawals. Currently, such methods are generally voluntary. The interesting question from a business perspective is whether (or when) such technologies will become cost-effective enough to be put into widespread use. Following from this, it will be important to watch the extent to which regulatory bodies, particularly state oil and gas agencies, impose limitations on freshwater withdrawals or require the use of recycled water over time.

    In California – a state familiar with water scarcity – industry is looking to a third, more controversial option to avoid a water scarcity problem.[3] The term “acidization” is not yet a household word, but in California it may become one in short order. In brief, Californian oil and gas producers face unique challenges due to California’s unique geology, transformed by earthquakes over millennia into a complex and fragmented jumble, often not conducive to directional drilling and high volume hydraulic fracturing. An alternative method is to pump mixtures of water and hydrofluoric and hydrochloric acids into the well to dissolve the rock and release the oil and gas trapped within. Acidization requires much less water than hydraulic fracturing – the acid must generally be diluted below 15% concentration in water, but at much lower volumes (the two processes can also be combined: an “acid frac”). It is unclear whether or to what extent such activities would be exempt from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act’s hydraulic fracturing exemption (which specifically references “hydraulic fracturing”). See 42 U.S.C. § 300h(d)(1)(B)(ii). In any event, there is little question that hydrofluoric and hydrochloric acids are dangerous hazardous chemicals and environmental and water protection interests have begun to urge California lawmakers to take a closer look at the process, which resulted in an amendment to a bill recently passed in California which would do just that.[4] As hydraulic fracturing has spread west, it will be important to observe the extent to which use of and concern over acidization spreads east – and how the states and federal government will respond.

    Supply Line Warfare – The Battle Over Frac Sand

    In addition to direct assaults on the hydraulic fracturing industry, opponents have started moving down the supply chain to target the makers of process inputs. In the case of hydraulic fracturing, the focus has turned to “frac sand” – the proppant that, together with water and chemicals, allows hydraulic fracturing to work. Frac sand is what it sounds like – silica sand – and makes up 80% of the multi-billion dollar proppant industry. The best sand is very round-grained, has high quartz content, and can withstand very high pressures. It must be mined, and mining requires permits. Consequently, opponents in jurisdictions without any significant oil and gas development have found a way to involve themselves in the debate, joining forces with local interests concerned with the environmental effects – particularly air, light, noise, traffic, and stormwater pollution – associated with frac sand mining.

    The fight has been especially heated in Wisconsin, which hosts the nation’s largest accessible reserves of high quality frac sand, and where over 100 frac sand mining operations have started business in the last several years, largely in previously undeveloped wilderness areas. Wisconsin’s pro-business Walker administration strongly supports the economic benefits and jobs that this increased mining has brought, and is planning infrastructure improvements to permit the industry to expand even further.[5] In response, environmental groups and concerned citizens have begun filing lawsuits over individual mining approvals, particularly with respect to review of the industry’s primary air emission: fine silicate particles smaller than 2.5 micrometers (PM 2.5), which are subject to EPA regulation. It takes around 2,000 tons of sand to frac a well – and the business and environmental stakes of these lawsuits will be very high.

    Other states face similar issues, but have taken different paths. Minnesota, across the Mississippi River, imposes much stricter environmental review standards on its sand mines, but even there new mines have been approved and are operating – over local opposition. In neighboring northeastern Iowa, there is currently only one frac sand mine operating. However, operators have been scouting additional locations, prompting two county governments in northeastern Iowa (the location of the most viable deposits) to impose 18 month mining moratoriums earlier this year.[6] The frac sand mining debates are currently the Midwest’s primary contribution to the larger fight over hydraulic fracturing, and interested parties should keep an eye on sand mining proposals elsewhere.

    Meanwhile, the federal government has become indirectly involved, as the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) has just announced a long-delayed proposed rule on crystalline silica exposure (OSHA rulemaking information available at this link) that will affect both mining and hydraulic fracturing operations where exposure occurs. Current rules are over 40 years old, and the new proposed rule would significantly lower the permissible exposure limits (PEL) for workers. OSHA has promulgated a notice of proposed rulemaking, which as of this writing is yet to be published in the federal register. Upon its publication, interested parties will have 90 days to submit comments on the proposed rule.

    Local Bans – Court Challenges Continue

    Finally, continuing a trend that has its roots in local opposition to hydraulic fracturing in the Mid-Atlantic region, some individual municipalities continue to exercise their authority to ban oil and gas development at the local level.

    Local bans on fracking started in upstate New York, where municipalities have won significant victories in court against challenges to their home rule authorities. The towns of Dryden and Middlefield have each passed resolutions banning hydraulic fracturing within their borders. These local ordinances were upheld by New York State trial courts – see A. Orford, Local Bans on Hydraulic Fracturing Upheld in New York State, Struck Down in West Virginia (April 10, 2012). The towns also prevailed in New York State intermediate appellate courts earlier this year. Given the lower courts’ reliance on prior binding precedent from New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, it was no surprise that the losing parties (landowners and drilling companies) sought review there. On August 29, 2013, the Court of Appeals agreed to hear argument on both cases, meaning that the question of the legality of local bans in New York state should be finally answered within a year.

    Next door in Pennsylvania, things have taken a slightly different course. The Pennsylvania state legislature passed Act 13 of 2012. Among its provisions, the law specifically preempted local governments from banning oil and gas development. See 58 Pa. CS. § 3304 (Act 13 available at this link). A coalition of local governments challenged the constitutionality of the law’s preemption provisions as impinging upon their ability to protect the health and safety of their residents. In Robinson Township v. Pennsylvania, Case No. 284 M.D. 2012 (July 26, 2012), the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania (the state’s special court of appeals for cases involving the Commonwealth) struck down the law’s preemption provisions, paving the way for municipalities in Pennsylvania to enact municipal zoning bans. The decision was appealed and argued to the state’s Supreme Court in late 2012, but no decision has yet come from the six justices who heard the case, prompting speculation that the court is deadlocked and calls for re-argument before a seven-judge court. In the meantime, Pennsylvania lawmakers will consider a proposal to be introduced that would repeal the controversial provisions prior to a decision being made.

    Most recently, a milestone has been reached in a long-running controversy in the city of Dallas, Texas. After leasing land – in a floodplain considered municipal parkland – to a gas developer for $19 million in 2008, the City of Dallas delayed issuing necessary drilling permits after strong public opposition rose to what would be the first hydraulic fracturing to be performed within the City’s limits. On August 28, 2013, the Dallas City Council finally voted to reject the company’s permit applications (the vote was 9-6 for approval, but required a supermajority of 12 to pass). The City’s Mayor has warned that the result of the vote will very likely be a costly lawsuit. A lawsuit in Texas would be one to watch carefully, as it could raise not only municipal home rule issues, but also constitutional takings questions due to the prior lease of the land for development purposes.

    Conclusion

    The above is an overview of some of the most important recent developments in the world of hydraulic fracturing. Many others deserve honorable mention. In Colorado, an appeals court has ruled that plaintiffs need not present prima facie evidence of harm (so called Lone Pine showings) before pursuing discovery in a toxic tort case related to hydraulic fracturing, a decision which was just argued to the state’s Supreme Court.[7] In Pennsylvania, landowners are contending that they are not receiving the royalties they were initially promised in lease agreements, which will likely lead to lawsuits.[8] In North Carolina, a controversial proposal is under consideration to require so-called “forced pooling,” under which landowners would be forced to lease their mineral rights if a certain number of their neighbors do so (a practice intended to protect parties from having the gas stolen from underneath them by migration to the neighboring property, but with obvious property rights implications).[9] Tracking current developments requires acknowledging that after the last several years of hydraulic fracturing, the industry is maturing. Many “firsts” have come and gone; the law is stabilizing and jurisdictions confronting new issues have an ever-larger body of precedent to refer to. Certainly, new fights are brewing, but the industry continues to grow, and opponents in general have yet to slow the train down.

    For more information, please contact Adam Orford or any member of Marten Law’s Energy practice group.

    – See more at: http://www.martenlaw.com/newsletter/20131007-hydraulic-fracturing-developments-trends?utm_source=Marten+Law+News&utm_campaign=ba137c5111-Marten_Law_News_October_17_201310_16_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_ff00f67215-ba137c5111-222187793#sthash.0SgUGR9X.dpuf

  • Mercury Sediment Carried Forth by California Floods

    environmental Strategist, between the lines:  I don’t care where you own property in the United States, historical contamination is a massive environmental exposure for real estate owners.

    This article gives an excellent overview on the impact storm water runoff has on third party properties from historical contamination.

    This also highlights how historical mining operations are causing environmental liabilities for unsuspecting property owners.  Out of sight, out of mind is the attitude of the masses but this has proven to be catastrophic for tens of thousands of real estate owners.

    I recently drove from Denver to Aspen, throughout the mountains you can see old mines scattered along the hill sidess.  Each one of these mines represents a contamination source to the local environment.  A number of years ago Copper Mountain Ski area in Colorado was cited for exacerbating contamination while performing their snow making operations.  Copper Mountain was pulling water from the river that flows along the base of Copper Mountain for snow making.  Unknown to Copper Mountain was that the river is full of old mine tailings causing contamination.  When Copper Mountain pulled the contaminated water from the river for snow making and spread it on their ski runs they exacerbated the extent of the contamination.

    Mercury Sediment Carried Forth by California Floods

    From: Robin Blackstone, ENN
    Published October 29, 2013 01:59 PM

    Mercury contamination in sediment has been a big concern in the Central Valley lowland areas of California. But associate researcher from the University of California, Michael Singer has unearthed new information and considerations utilizing modern topographic datasets and modeling to track mercury-laden sediment. Singer hypothesizes that the progradation process resulting from 10-year flooding events within the valleys below the Sierra Nevada Mountains are the key to understanding and tracking the presence of mercury. Singer has connected the mercury amalgamation process, which was used to extract gold from the mountains during the 19th century with the current high incidence of mercury in regional delta sediment.  

    Documented by Singer, the progradation process results from a combination of flood driven fan erosion and sediment redistribution over time into the valley. Of particular note are the floods of 1986 and 1997 of the Yuba River, which churned up deep river valley sediments containing toxic remnants of the gold mining amalgamation done more than 150 years prior.

    The ecological impact of mercury presence throughout the sediment is significant because mercury is taken up into the food webs. This coupled with regional shifts in climate, poses a huge risk to the lowland ecosystems and the human population because many people eat fish from this system.

    The initial discovery of the connection between the sediments and the gold mining was happenstance as the research team identified huge pockets of coarser sand in amongst sediment. This led them to ask why there was so much sand in the area.

    “We thought that was quite strange because the floodplains around us were so much finer — composed of silt and clay materials,” recalled Singer. “So we followed the signs and ended up in a huge sand mine. They were mining sand by the truckload for the construction industry and said they would be doing so for at least the next several decades.”

    Singer posits that because the upstream Yuba was the biggest gold-mining drainage of all the Sierra drainages used in the 19th century, it made sense to suspect the presence of possible mercury.

    The research team compared gold rush data with modern topographic datasets, which showed that the Yuba River was progressively cutting through the sediment and in the process leaving behind massive contaminated terraces along the riverbank. Flood data and modeling indicate that these terraces move only when a flood event is big enough to saturate them so that the terraces fail and the mercury-laden sediment is carried and driven downstream.

  • San Mateo Creek: Water leak kills fish

    environmental Strategist™, between the lines:  What is a pollutant?  In this case fresh drinking water. environmental Strategist (eS) define a “Pollutant” as a material, substance or product that gets introduced to an environment for other than its intended use or purpose.  In other words, something that ends up where it does not belong, like fresh drinking water.

    Water leak kills fish –  Tuesday, February 12, 2013

    A broken pipe sent thousands of gallons of drinking water cascading into San Mateo Creek over the weekend, killing scores, possibly thousands, of fish from chlorine poisoning.

    The dead fish began floating to the surface Saturday when a thousand gallons a minute of chlorinated water flowed down a forested hillside into the creek about a half-mile below Crystal Springs Reservoir, according to utility officials and residents.  Utility officials located the break in a 60-inch-diameter pipe next to a concrete bridge.  It took them eight hours to cut off the flow along a 4-mile section of pipeline, but water was still leaking out Monday at a rate of 200 gallons a minute, officials said.

    The exact death toll has not yet been determined.  Rare steelhead trout, which have been listed as threatened along the Central Coast under the Endangered Species Act since 1997, were believed to have been killed.

    The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission oversees the sprawling network that supplies drinking water to 2.5 million people in San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara and Alameda counties.

    Aging pipes, “We don’t know if it was corrosion or a seal or what,” said Steven Ritchie, the assistant general manager for water at the utilities commission. “There are joints in pipes. Sometimes they shift. We don’t know exactly why it broke, but it was undoubtedly related to its old age.”

    “One of the challenges with drinking water is that the things we need to add to it to make it safe can be toxic out in the environment,” Ritchie said. “The chlorine is what makes it safe for us to drink, but it doesn’t do very well in a stream. It’s basically bleach and it kills fish.

    Besides trout, sculpin, stickleback and suckerfish were killed. Ducks, great blue herons and other wildlife were feeding on the dead fish, which range in size from 6 inches to a foot. “I don’t know if it killed all the species,” Rogers said, “but the creek looks sterile. It could take years for it to recover.”

    “As far as I’m concerned, any fish that we kill is a problem,” Ritchie said. “We pride ourselves on taking care of the environment, so this is

    really of great concern to us. Our job now is to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

    Peter Fimrite and Kevin Fagan are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers.