Arkansas oil pipeline rupture foreshadows devastating environmental impact

[onawah]

A significant disaster in my neck of the woods, though on the other side of the state, has global implications.
This is about an aging ruptured pipe that spilled thousands of gallons of crude tar sands oil piped from Canada into an Arkansan suburban community's streets.
The same network of aging pipes goes directly under many other communities, including Little Rock, the state capitol of Arkansas, and a rupture there could go directly into the water supply.

I don't know how to embed the videos on these pages. Hopefully someone else will.

http://video.msnbc.msn.com/all-in-/51398983#51398983
4/1/2013
Chris Hayes discusses a recent oil pipeline rupture in Mayflower, Arkansas and the long-term effects this will have. He is joined by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., 350.org’s May Boeve, CNBC’s Dan Dicker, Glen Hooks from the Sierra Club of Arkansas.
(This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.)

>>> good news and bad news today for the residents of mayflower, arkansas . the good news is than exxon announced they're sdweping an official plan to evacuate an oil pipeline that ruptured underneath a mayflower subdivision friday. the bad news is this is how the residents spent their easter weekend ?

>> so that is a pipeline that is busted and has flooded the neighborhood and is going all the way to the drain at the end of the street. um, luckily our house is here, which is seemingly unaffected, but the smell is unbelievable. i mean, look. incredible. and that is oil.

>> that is oil. more precisely, that is heavy crude oil from the tar sands of cand cand spewing out onto the lawns and sidewalks and the basketball hoops of the suburban area . the 20-inch mobile pipeline carrying the crude burst on friday, almost in two dozen homes in the area have been evacuated while the clean-up gets under way. the epa has classified it as a major spill. exxonmobil has not announced how much has spilled yet as of this evening they have cleaned up 12 million barrels. it was common to hear the residents say they didn't know they lived essentially on top of a 60-year-old oil pipeline . and in the cable news business, the degrew of an oil spill is determined by the pictures. these come from arkansas . most of these birds are been bathed at least once before the pictures were taken. just two days before the big suburban spill in arkansas , a train derailed in minnesota spilling 15,000 gallons of crude into a rural minnesota field. we don't know for sure whether that was also tar sands oil, but we do know it came from alberta. as for the pipeline that ruptured in arkansas , that pipeline used to carry crude oil from texas up north to illinois, but in 2006 because there were so much heavy crude oil coming out of canada, exxon reversed it so now it flows north to south. as america is projected to become the western hemisphere 's hub for oil production , some estimate we'll outpass saudi arabia by 2020 , we have a view of what our oil fields can look like. this could be your neighborhood soon. they're set to do particularly at the keystone pipeline is ultimately approved whether it's fracking in your backyard or a pipeline under your subdivision, this is the future of fossil fuel america unless we decide collectively to join another future. joining me, bernie sanders , independent from vermont, may bouvier, from the classroots climate change , and dan, a cnbc contributor, and we're joined by glen hooks of the sierra club of arkansas . no one from exxonmobil or the american petroleum institute was available to join us. glen, i'll begin with you. how big of story is it there and what are residents being told?

>> we're here in mayflower, arkansas . thanks for coffering the story. when you get off the freeway, you can really smell the oil spill . i spent some time today walking through the evacuated neighborhoods. there aren't a lot of neighbors around to tell their story, but the story is told by their oil soaked backyard, the smell in the street, and the fact that the tar sands oil has taken a chunk out of mayflower, arkansas .

>> my producers and i were going through newsathies of the spill. it was so startling. almost no one seemed to know they were atop this oil pipeline .

>> no, they don't know that. and actually, what exxon has been telling folks, the story seems to be that this is just regular old west texas crude. when in fact it is tar sands thick canadian oil coming from alberta, as you mentioned. this is a much bigger mess than a simple crude spill. this is something if it gets in the water is going to sink. we're talking about dredging. you're right, not a lot of people knew it exists and didn't know it was carrying this dirty canadian tar sands .

>> will you explain why it's harder to clean up this stuff than your normal crude?

>> a lot of time whz you have an oil spill , you can use skimmers and skim it off the water because the oil will float. this is not your typical crude oil . it's heavier, thicker, dirtier, therefore a lot more dangerous. if it gets in the waterways, it's going to sink, not going to float. you're talking about a potentially disastrous dredging process in an area that is right here in the natural state. not where you would expect to find canadian tar sands oil.

>> a few years ago, there was an oil spill in kalamazoo, michigan, which was also this heavy oil . the epa staff that worked on this, had never encountered a spill of this type of material and this unprecedented volume under these kinds of conditions. you get a sense of this is stuff that is different than what people are used to being able to clean up.

>> right, so tar sands oil has the highest carbon content of any oil we know of. and right now, the spill we're seeing in arkansas is a devastating shocker about it, as you alluded to, is that this pipeline carries one tenth of what the proposed keystone xl pipeline would carry. imagine the photos we're seeing from arkansas times ten, and that overlaid over the ogalala aquafer in washington.

>> i'm going to push back, not because i'm in favor of all for keystone .

>> you're on record.

>> pro oil spill . here is what the oil companies --

>> i would have loved to have hem.

>> this is a brand new pipeline and is in fact much less likely to rupture than this 80-year-old pipeline . we have dozens of pipelines running through, and unfortunately infrastructure on pipelines is the same as the infrastructure on bridges and roads and tunnels. that is it's falling apart and no one fixes them unless they need them. not that i'm in favor of this, it's a horrible tragedy. we do have hundreds of spills every year and this is going to be one they say the keystone pipeline helps out on.

>> as a senator for the energy committee and someone who has talked a lot about the keystone , when you see these images, what is your response?

>> my response is it reminds me of what happened in the gulf coast , it reminds me of exxon valdez , but i'll tell you what, chris, it really raises the border question. and that is whether we continue to be a carbon based economy, whether we finally recognize that if we don't get a handle on greenhouse gas submissions that this planet is going to be facing some disastrous problems in years to come. as a member of the energy committee and the environmental committee we have talked to scientists and they say the estimations we made for global warming damage, we were wrong. good we don't get our act together and start cutting in a very significant greenhouse gas emissions , we're talking about this planet heating up by eight degrees fahrenheit by the end of the century . and that is calamitous for this planet.

>> and here's the thing. there are alternatives, and you never hear about a solar spill. when you hear about a solar spill, we call it a beautiful day .

>> okay, but keystone has become this kind of flash point for the environmental movement . and obviously, this being in the news is -- is useful. it's a catalyzing moment, right? as we all think about building this masage new pipeline . part is built, part is being built, the last part which crosses the border in the north is awaiting approval, and the idea here is the reason this is so important isn't just because you're going to get oil spills and that's part of it, but it's that this will push us over into some new territory. but dan, the argument that gets made by the state department and their draft environmental impact study and by a lot of people is that oil is coming out no matter what. when you look at how much money there is to be made from it and the amount of capital investment firms are willing to do to extract it, that seems like there's something to do with the argument.

>> and the spill proves to you, for example, that keystone is just one pipeline . and in fact, canadian sands are coming down to this country. even if the president were to disallow keystone from being built, it would not stop canadian oil sands from coming to this country. they will tell you they don't particularly need keystone xl in order to move the amount of canadian sands they want to move. it just makes things a whole heck of a lot easier. keysto keystone already exists. one of the issues you have to deal with is i think this is an important point that you have to take on keystone because it's a symbol, an important one. that shouldn't be lost. what should be remembered are the truths about canadian oil sands . they are coming into the country already. they will continue to come into the country.

>> i think very simply, here's what the truth is, the truth is the president of the united states , the congress and the american people have got to say this is it. not only do we not want a keystone xl pipeline , but we have got to fundamentally transform our energy system away from coil, away from oil, and into energy and energy efficiency . people talk about economics. we're fighting for the fumper of the planet. we're talking about more and more sandies and irenes, which cost huge amounts of money in terms of rebuilding those communities, not to mention the future disasters that we'll see.

>> yet, here strikes me as the problem. on march 22nd , a symbolic vote in your august body, the senate, 72-37 against a symbolic resolution calling for approval of the keystone pipeline including democrats, quite a few, baucus, casey, connelly, and senator pryor of the great state of arkansas .

>> i don't know how the president walks away considering he's appeared in the election period in front of the pipelines. he said he was waiting for the governor of alaska to approve routing. he's gotten studies. i don't know how he says no to keystone . even though he probably should.

>> i want to ask after the break, how do you say no to keystone ? and i want to hear your thoughts on your senator and how this might change his mind right after the break.

>>> i have led the efforts in the house to support the keystone xl pipeline . project that would bring more north american energy to the marketplace. and put thousands to work. the obama administration continues to...


THE DISCUSSION CONTINUES HERE:

http://video.msnbc.msn.com/all-in-/51399075/#51399075
(This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.)

>>> i have led the efforts in the house to support the keystone xl pipeline. project that would bring more north american energy to the marketplace. and put thousands to work. the obama administration continues to block keystone using every bureaucratic trick and excuse in the book. it's now been more than 1600 days since the initial permits were filed for building the pipeline. to put that in perspective, it took the united states a little more than 1300 days to win world war ii and it took lewis and clark about 1100 days to walk the louisiana purchase and back. the keystone xl pipeline is a no-brainer.

>> all right, so that is a little snippet of a larger rhetoric that's emerged not just around keystone , but in our politics, we have seen the right particularly republicans become more reactionary on this issue, right? they have gone from this kind of this is a necessary evil to this is an affirmative good. drill, baby drill. steve stockman tweeted the other day, a quite conservative republican congressman from texas, the best thing about the earth, this was his tweet, the best thing about the urkt is you can poke holes in it and oil and gas will come out. if that's the direction the republican caucus is moving, if you have democrats here voting for this resolution, how do the politics on this shift, on keystone particularly?

>> i think they shift, and they have shifted, by the way, when people watch their television and see what happened in new jersey and new york. when they hear scientists saying you're going to see this every year and it's going to be even worse . and people understand that. and when people see droughts in the southwest, and when they see flooding and they see heat waves all over the world, when people see their lakes aren't freezing over, they say, i may not be a scientist, i know something is wrong, and i understand that for my kids and for my grandchildren, we have got to do something about it. so i am not pessimistic about the future. i think with good organizations like 350.org, worthing with the grassroots, we can make the case, not only that we have to collect green house gas emissions, we can create jobs.

>> do you want to see the president not authorize the keystone pipeline ?

>> of course.

>> your senator was one who voted for that symbolic resolution. i'm curious if that opens up the conversation with the folks in arkansas ?

>> it's a good excuse to stop by. we talked about it before, he's been a champion for it, but certainly, senator prior, as his father david pryor both had a sign on their desks that say arkansas first. when we look at mayflower today and the devastation that could happen, this could be a devastating type thing. if senator pryor puts arkansas first, he might reconsider this. i might also point out our griszman from this district, tim griffin , has been a champion of the keystone project as well. this is in his district. this spill is in his district. i want him to take a close look at this and see is it worth a few small amount of jobs for the environmental risk that's at stake. i don't think so. so if you look at the local politics , it makes a difference, but i totally agree with senator leahy -- senator sanders , excuse me, about the environmental affect on a large scale. this keystone pipeline is bad news. we don't need it. it's going to shift the science in a way we don't need it.

>> there's a coalition that has been biltd in opposition. even included the governor of nebraska, included a lot of ranchers. what we're dealing with here is an assessment of the risk, not just of the climate, but the basic risk of is this going to get in the backyard of your subdivision, and this is data from the federal government 's regulatory body. and these are oil spills from pipelines over the last 20 years, 1993 to 2012 , and there's not really any trend. you say the technology is getting better. that does not indicate to me that the technology is getting any better.

>> the infrastructure for pipelines has been basically the same for the last 70 years and the number of spills have been the same for the past 70 years. this is just part of the business and a bad part of the business.

>> and we have to do better and we can do better. what has been so interesting in the keystone fight is it has brought climate change back into the focus, and we're working with the sierra club and glen and others to try and see how we can make president obama take this movement seriously.

>> but can you get the tim griffins of the world? this to me is the big question. if we're going to price carbon, you have a fantastic bill if you don't mind me saying that you cosponsors that would put a price on the carbon. dan, i think you would agree.

>> i think that's the real way to get back at exxonmobil. the only way --

>> we're not doing this out of punitive desire.

>> but the only way you get them to heel to task is to take away the economic advantages of getting oil sands out of the ground from canada. that means you have to put a price on what it is to take a canadian out of the affabaska or go into the gulf of mexico or somebody's backyard or go and get tide oil. the way you do that is put a price on what it is in terms of the effects it has on the environment. and once you do that, then it makes more sense for exxon to in fact pursue gasoline from algae as opposed to gasoline from natural gas or from oil sands in canada. that's where the rubber is going to meet the roads. economics.

>> exactly, and the point has to be made that we now have the technology in terms of energy efficiency , in terms the decreased price for solar panel panels, in terms of the need for wind. we now can do it. if there was a political will in the white house and in the congress, we can transform the energy system. we can create millions of jobs. we could lead the world and be an exporter around the world of that type of technology. that's the future, not oil sknrx that's why the keystone pipeline should be defeated.

>> we can't afford not to make that choice, in fact, and this is one of the most devastating projects on the planet. tar sands from outer space make the planet look like mordor. the scale of it is hard to comprehend wrfrb every three days, enough oil is moved in alberta to fill yankee stadium .

>> my take away from this is we should reach out to tim griffin tomorrow to ask about his reaction to the spill and whether it's changed his opinion on keystone at all. and we should check back in on how this cleanup goes in kalamazoo, which is the most expensive on-ground oil spill in american history . senator bernie sanders of vermont, may bouvier, dan dicker, and glen hooks, thank you all so much.

>>> a massive institutional scandal complete with theft, conspiracy, witness tampering and false statements, and the people at the heart of it just happen to be responsible for the futures of 52,000 children. that's coming up.

[onawah]

A technicality has spared Exxon from having to pay any money into the fund that will be covering most of the clean up costs of its Arkansas pipeline spill.
(Surprise! Surprise! )

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/04/02/1810571/exxons-duck-killing-pipeline-doesnt-pay-taxes-to-oil-spill-cleanup-fund/?mobile=nc

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Exxon’s Duck-Killing Pipeline Won’t Pay Taxes To Oil Spill Cleanup Fund

By Ryan Koronowski on Apr 2, 2013

A technicality has spared Exxon from having to pay any money into the fund that will be covering most of the clean up costs of its Arkansas pipeline spill.

The cleanup efforts themselves took a sobering turn as crews found injured and dead ducks covered in oil.

The environmental impacts of an oil spill in central Arkansas began to come into focus Monday as officials said a couple of dead ducks and 10 live oily birds were found after an ExxonMobil Corp. pipeline ruptured last week.

“I’m an animal lover, a wildlife lover, as probably most of the people here are,” Faulkner County Judge Allen Dodson told reporters. ”We don’t like to see that. No one does.”

Exxon has confirmed that the pipeline was carrying “low-quality Wabasca Heavy crude oil from Alberta.” This oil comes from the region of Alberta where the controversial tar sands are located. Heavy crude is strip mined or boiled loose from dense underground formations that often contain a large amount of bitumen. This oil is very thick and needs to be diluted with lighter fluids in order to flow through pipelines. Reports have stated that at least 12,000 barrels of oil and water spilled into the town.

A 1980 law ensures that diluted bitumen is not classified as oil, and companies transporting it in pipelines do not have to pay into the federal Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. Other conventional crude producers pay 8 cents a barrel to ensure the fund has resources to help clean up some of the 54,000 barrels of pipeline oil that spilled 364 times last year.

As Oil Change International said in a statement today:

“The great irony of this tragic spill in Arkansas is that the transport of tar sands oil through pipelines in the US is exempt from payments into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. Exxon, like all companies shipping toxic tar sands, doesn’t have to pay into the fund that will cover most of the clean up costs for the pipeline’s inevitable spills.”

Whatever you call it, as Judge Dodson says, “Crude oil is crude oil. None of it is real good to touch.”

The smell of the spilled oil (similar to asphalt) has reached residents five miles out in the country, and will likely keep residents of 22 nearby homes evacuated for several days.
Surreal video:

The Enbridge tar sands pipeline spill in Michigan happened in 2010 and parents are still concerned about the long-term health effects of having such toxic substances seep into areas where children play.
Update

As commenter Zimzone rightly points out, the proposed Keystone XL pipeline would indeed be carrying the type of heavy, corrosive diluted bitumen unconventional oil from the same region of Canada. It is unclear how many people who live along the path of KXL know that the roughly 575 barrels of oil per minute that could be passing through their neighborhoods wouldn’t be paying taxes to this cleanup fund. Exxon may have even less to worry about, as Alaska looks to lower its tax bill even further, while one state representative absolves the company of guilt for the Exxon Valdez spill.

[onawah]

France's Total SA Dumps Canadian Oil Sands Project for $1.65bn Loss


By Jen Alic | Sun, 31 March 2013


France’s Total SA (NYSE: TOT) will sell its 49% stake in its Canadian oil sands project to Suncor Energy Inc. for $500 million, netting the French oil giant a $1.65 billion loss on the beleaguered project.

Total would have had to spend another $5 billion (at least) on the Alberta oil sands Voyageur Upgrader project over the next five years—an investment that cannot be justified according to its executives.

The project is beleaguered by increasing labor costs, a shortage of labor and the falling prices of Canadian heavy crude against rising US oil production. Profit margins have narrowed to the extent that the project is no longer economically feasible.

The sale to Canada’s Suncor (NYSE: SU)—from which Total purchased the project in 2010--and the resulting loss hasn’t affected Total shares to any significant extent as of the time of writing. These net losses won’t be reflected until Total releases its first quarter 2013 results.

Not only does the Total divestiture raise questions about the long-term viability of Canadian oil sands investments, it also raises questions about whether the controversial Keystone XL pipeline project is really in the US’ interests—at a time when US oil output is rising and Canada’s oil sands are becoming less strategically advantageous.

Total is still hanging on to two other oil sands projects in Canada—at Fort Hills and Joslyn—and for now there is no talk of divesting, but later this year Total will make a final decision on its Fort Hills investment, according to Bloomberg.


http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Total-Dumps-Canadian-Oil-Sands-Project-for-1.65bn-Loss.html

[onawah]

US law says no 'oil' spilled in Arkansas, exempting Exxon from cleanup dues


Occupy Wall St. via Occupy Wall Street.Net
Via Occupy the Pipeline: "The end result is that both the US Congress and the Internal Revenue Service do not consider tar sand oil as oil at all, and thus exempt any company transporting the crude from paying an $0.08-per-barrel tax - which is the primary source of cash for the federal government’s oil spill cleanup fund."

This appears to be a perfect loop hole to allow unchecked environmental damage by the Corporations that are pumping TarSands OIL through pipelines over many environmentally sensitive areas. Does this also reveal the real "jobs" that the fossil fuel industry and their cronies keep referring to creating? The privatization of the clean up is big business.


Think it's time we embrace Wind & Solar?



US law says no 'oil' spilled in Arkansas, exempting Exxon from cleanup dues

April 03, 2013
Emergency crews work to clean up an oil spill in front of evacuated homes on Starlite Road in Mayflower, Arkansas March 31, 2013.(Reuters / Jacob Slaton)

The central Arkansas spill caused by Exxon’s aging Pegasus pipeline has reportedly unleashed 10,000 barrels of Canadian heavy crude - but a technicality says it's not oil, letting the energy giant off the hook from paying into a national cleanup fund.

Legally speaking, diluted bitumen like the heavy crude that's overrun Mayflower, Arkansas, is not classified as 'oil'. And it's that very distinction that exempts Exxon from contributing to the government's oil spillage cleanup fund.

ExxonMobil has already confirmed that the compromised pipeline was transporting “low-quality Wabasca Heavy crude” from Canada’s Alberta region. That particular form of crude contains large quantities of bitumen - a "thick, sticky, black semi-solid form of petroleum which is transported in a diluted form (dilbit) as it makes its way from Canada to US refineries," explains Oil Change International, which has brought attention on the strange legal exemption.

Companies that transport oil are required to pay $.08 per barrel into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. The cash is used by the US government to respond to oil spills. But there's a catch - Exxon is exempt from paying into the fund, because its pipelines aren't considered to be carrying "conventional oil."

"Exxon, like all companies shipping toxic tar sands, doesn’t have to pay into the fund that will cover most of the clean up costs for the pipeline’s inevitable spills,” Oil Change International claimed on Tuesday.
Exxon's Response

Answering RT’s detailed questions, Exxon didn’t reveal how much it contributes to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, or the value of the company’s crude which is not taxed by the law. However, the company stated that it is paying for all costs related to the oil spill.

Exxon media relations manager Alan Jeffers told RT that teams are working directly with residents of Mayflower and are “paying all valid claims relating to the spill and providing for interim housing for people from the homes which the city of Mayflower recommended be evacuated following Friday's spill.”

Spilled crude oil is seen in a drainage ditch near Starlite Road in Mayflower, Arkansas March 31, 2013 (Reuters / Jacob Slaton)

http://rt.com/files/news/1e/93/c0/00/1.jpg

The strange exemption of heavy bitumen crude from classification as oil dates back to a time when the extraction of tar sands on a large scale was thought improbable with technology available at the time. However, while oil companies developed the means to transform Canadian tar sands into a booming energy sector, the legal definition of oil remained the same.

Money from that same fund has already helped to clean up another spill caused by a ruptured pipeline. In 2010, more than 1 million barrels of diluted bitumen (crude oil) were spilled into the Kalamazoo River. To make matters worse, unlike conventional crude oil, bitumen heavy crude sinks. The ensuing environmental impact has made that Michigan spill the most expensive in US history, as toxic substances seeped into the surrounding soil.

There is also the fear that bitumen heavy crude could be more corrosive to pipelines than conventional crude. Lorne Stockman, research director at Oil Change International, told ThinkProgress that it’s past time for the law to be changed:

"The question is why we should continue this exemption given that it's clear tar sands oil is more likely to spill because it's more corrosive... and more and more tar sand is coming into the US.”

For its part the oil industry disputes the claim, and has produced scientific impact research that does not reflect higher corrosion by transporting bitumen heavy crude.

Judge Allen Dodson of Arkansas’ Faulkner County seemed to reflect the concerns of those impacted by the latest spill of heavy bitumen crude, saying: “Crude oil is crude oil. None of it is real good to touch.”
Just as toxic

Although the Canadian crude travelling through the Exxon pipeline isn’t considered ‘conventional oil’ by the US government, it’s still extremely harmful when spilled.

The true impact of the disaster began to unravel on Monday, when a couple of dead ducks and 10 live, oily birds were found near the ruptured pipeline.

Faulkner County Judge Allen Dodson says he expects a few more oily birds to turn up in the coming days.

The spill has also had a severe impact on residents of Mayflower. Twenty-two homes have been evacuated, forcing many to move into nearby hotels until further notice.

RT spoke with local resident Chris Harrell, who described a horrendous smell both inside and outside his home, and even in his vehicle. Four days later, locals are still inhaling the strong odor.

He said that cleanup crews are operating non-stop, creating a lot of noise.

“It's quite an inconvenience to get in and out of the neighborhood,” he said.

Harrell and his neighbors are also worried that bigger problems will await long after the oil and the visible signs of the spillage are removed.

“The major concern for many people in our neighborhood is a longer-term impact from the spill, both environmentally and financially. For example, what's this going to do to our property values?” he said.

Not to mention what inhaling all those noxious fumes is doing to their health...
http://rt.com/usa/arkansas-spill-exxon-cleanup-244/

[onawah]

More news and a video in Giovanni's post #3881 at
http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?3596-Up-At-The-Ranch--James-Gilliland-and-Trout-Lake-&p=657382#post657382

[onawah]

A chance to take action re tar sands pipeline, Exxon coverup.


This past weekend, an ExxonMobil pipeline carrying nearly 100,000 barrels of toxic tar sands crude spewed into Mayflower, Arkansas. Yards are flooded in black crude, a river of toxic oil flows down the street, and the nearby fishing lake is covered in black grease. Families have been evacuated, but nobody knows what the dangers to the community are, or even how much oil has been spilled. Why? Because Exxon’s not talking.

Let’s hold ExxonMobil accountable for this spill by demanding it release all the information on this spill -- the good, the bad, and the ugly -- while the images of playsets and driveways overrun with crude oil are still in the public eye.

Tell ExxonMobil to release information about the massive oil spill in Arkansas.
. You can sign the petition at:
http://action.sumofus.org/a/exxon-spill/2/?sub=taf

[AutumnW]

That's terrible. Canadians have to become less dependant on oil for GDP. The U.S has to back it's currency with something else. I advocate sunshine.

[Referee]

No Fly Zone by Exxon not FEMA

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[onawah]

FAA puts no-fly zone over Arkansas oil spill with Exxon employee in charge

Published time: April 04, 2013 03:59


Breaking news

The FAA announced a temporary no-fly zone would be enacted indefinitely over the Arkansas oil spill. With word that an Exxon employee was controlling the airspace, though, speculation pointed to the idea the oil company was trying to keep the media away.

The Federal Aviation Administration announced Monday that until further notice, no aircraft will be allowed to operate over the Mayflower oil spill in Conway, Arkansas. While there was scant explanation for the mandate, it was “effective immediately” - and ordered to stay in place “until further notice.”

The FAA's online posting raised some questions Wednesday, though, by noting that “only relief aircraft operations under direction of Tom Suhrhoff” are permitted in the area. On his LinkedIn profile, Suhrhoff lists himself not as an emergency expert or safety official, but as an aviation adviser for ExxonMobil. Prior to ExxonMobil, according to his profile on the professional social network, he worked as a US Army pilot for 24 years.

http://rt.com/files/news/1e/97/a0/00/ex-1.jpg

The only reasoning provided on FAA.gov for “temporary flight restrictions” was a “hazard” warning.

On April 1, the day flight activity was suspended, an aerial video surfaced online revealing the extent of the damage.

An FAA spokesman told reporters that the flying ban applied to aircraft flying at 1,000 feet or lower and within five nautical miles, so that emergency support are able to respond to the disaster immediately.

However, there’s been rampant speculation that the ban was enacted to censor news cameras from taking shots of the disaster area.

http://rt.com/files/news/1e/97/a0/00/ex-2.jpg

Lynn Lunsford, a spokesperson for the FAA, revealed that the restriction was requested by local disaster officials and that the order would eventually be amended to include news helicopters.

“They are using at least one helicopter to provide aerial support for the cleanup,” Lunsford said. “For safety reasons, they asked us to protect the airspace 1,000 feet above the area to allow the aircraft to move as needed.”

Double standard

Exxon media relations manager Alan Jeffers told RT via email that teams are working directly with residents of Mayflower and are “paying all valid claims relating to the spill and providing interim housing for people from the homes which the city of Mayflower recommended be evacuated following Friday's spill.”

However, resident Chris Harrell tweeted after meeting with ExxonMobil that claims would only be dealt with individually and following the completion of the cleanup.

He added that ExxonMobil had given no assurances as to when the cleanup would be finished.


( Just spoke with @exxonmobil claims dept. "Compensation for property values and inconvenience will be addressed after clean up is complete."
— chris harrell (@shiftymcfive01) April 3, 2013 )

Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel, who spoke of future litigation as a “certainty,” derided attempts by ExxonMobil representatives to manage his visit to the site.

Speaking of potential reductions of property value in wake of the spill, McDaniel said that monetary loses resulting from those attempting to sell their houses “should not fall on the shoulders of homeowners.”

He added that he had issued a subpoena for documents, data and other evidence from ExxonMobil pertaining to the ruptured pipeline.

Lawyers from ExxonMobil were set to arrive Wednesday in Mayflower, Arkansas, where more than 10,000 gallons of oil spilled from a pipeline in the town over the weekend.

http://rt.com/usa/faa-zone-exxon-employee-306/

[onawah]

Greers Ferry Lake Natural Gas Watch shared Television Reporter Justin Lewis's photo.
4 hours ago
From KATV reporter Justin Lewis

"Told by "officials," no oil/remnants are in Lake Conway.
A biologist who was on scene tells me the exact opposite.
This picture is of oil-soaked snakes pulled from the tailwater of Lake Conway."

https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/546149_472221222851877_1463263828_n.jpg

[onawah]

Colbert Nation (see the link for Colbert's video commentary.)
April 4, 2013
Pegasus Pipeline Spill

For legal and tax reasons, the black, sticky stuff that surged through an Arkansas suburb isn't classified as oil, it's "diluted bitumen."

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/425100/april-04-2013/pegasus-pipeline-spill

[onawah]

Six things you need to know about the Arkansas oil spill
The damage it's wrought, human and environmental, could determine the future of the Keystone XL pipeline
By Tara Lohan
Thursday, Apr 4, 2013

http://media.salon.com/2013/04/AP613902001638-620x412.jpg
Crews work to clean up from an oil pipeline spill in a Mayflower, Ark., neighborhood. (Credit: AP/Danny Johnston)
http://www.salon.com/2013/04/04/6_things_you_need_to_know_about_the_arkansas_oil_spill_partner/


This article originally appeared on AlterNet.

AlterNet By now, you already know that at least 84,000 gallons of crude spilled from an ExxonMobil pipeline, swamping an Arkansas subdivision on Friday, and causing the evacuation of 22 homes. In addition to the loss of wildlife, damage to property, and environmental and human health hazards posed by the spill, it may have implications for the Keystone XL pipeline currently under consideration by the Obama administration.

There is a lot more to the story that’s important to understand. Here are six crucial things.

1. Not Your Average Crude

InsideClimate News reported shortly after the spill that an Exxon official confirmed the pipeline was “transporting a heavy form of crude from the Canadian tar sands region.” Specifically, it has been identified as Wabasca Heavy, Lisa Song writes, “which is a type of diluted bitumen, or dilbit, from Alberta’s tar sands region” although you won’t hear any Exxon folks calling it tar sands.

Dilbit is some seriously nasty stuff. She writes about a previous dilbit spill by Enbridge in Michigan’s Kalamazoo River in 2010:

Dilbit is a mixture of heavy bitumen and diluents–light hydrocarbons used to thin the bitumen so it can flow through pipelines. While most conventional crude oils will float on water, the bitumen began sinking into the river as the diluents evaporated, leaving a sludge of submerged oil that defied traditional cleanup methods. …

Earlier this month, the EPA ordered Enbridge, Inc., the Canadian company that owns the pipeline, to dredge sunken oil from the riverbed. The cleanup has cost more than $820 million to date and could top $1 billion once the order is carried out.

The Arkansas spill wasn’t as big as the Michigan spill and it was farther from main water bodies, but it’s still serious business. If you want to know more about how dangerous tar sands/dilbit can be, the Dilbit Disaster is a must-read.

2. Not Your Average Pipeline

The Pegasus pipeline running more than 850 miles between Patoka, Illinois and Nederland, Texas, is 20 inches in diameter and was built in the 1940s to carry crude from Texas to Illinois. But in 2006 the flow was reversed in order to carry Canadian tar sands to Texas. As Ben Jervey wrote for DeSmog blog, the flow was reversed to “help relieve the tar sands crude bottleneck in Cushing, Oklahoma. (The same reason given by proponents for the construction of Keystone XL.)”

The pipeline was built to carry 65,000 barrels a day, but Exxon was allowed to expand that to 95,000 barrels a day just a few years ago.

All of these facts bring up some basic questions. What effect does a higher capacity have on the pipeline? What effect does reversing the flow have on the pipeline? And what effect does switching from conventional crude to dilbit have on the pipeline, considering it was built to have a much thinner crude flowing through it?

John H. Cushman Jr. wrote for InsideClimate News:

… seven years ago, when Exxon, the pipeline’s operator, turned it into a higher-volume line for diluted bitumen from Canada flowing under greater pressure to refineries on the Gulf Coast, federal rules did not require a new permit application or safety reviews, according to federal officials.

“Our regulations don’t specify how much product a pipeline carries. There is no regulation if they want to change the type of crude they carry,” said Damon Hill, a spokesman for the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, a part of the Transportation Department. “As far as reversing the flow of a pipeline, it is not a safety issue.”

To reverse the line that runs from Patoka, Ill. to Nederland, Tex. required 240,000 man-hours of work on pump stations, valves, bypasses and integrity tests, Exxon said when it opened the line.

But only after the spill occurred did the agency step in with an order, issued Tuesday, that clamps down on the Pegasus pipeline, for example by limiting the pressure at which it may operate once it reopens. Noting that the pipeline’s flow was reversed in 2006 so that it could carry Canadian tar sands crude 850 miles from Illinois to Texas, the agency’s corrective action order remarked that “a change in the direction of flow can affect the hydraulic and stress demands on the pipeline.”

3. Tax Exempt?

Who’s footing the bill for the cleanup? The government has an Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund that companies which transport oil must pay into. But, as it turns out, the bitumen that Exxon was transporting in its pipeline isn’t oil by government standards. Erin O’Sullivan writes for Oil Change International:

In a January 2011 memorandum, the IRS determined that to generate revenues for the oil spill trust fund, Congress only intended to tax conventional crude, and not tar sands or other unconventional oils. This exemption remains to this day, even though the United States moves billions of gallons of tar sands crude through its pipeline system every year. The trust fund is liable for tar sands oil spill cleanups without collecting any revenue from tar sands transport. If the fund goes broke, the American taxpayer foots the cleanup bill.

Keep this in mind as Exxon tries to wiggle out of connecting the contents of its pipeline with tar sands.

4. No Media Access

It feels like BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster all over again when it comes to media access. Lisa Song reported that the command center for cleanup is tightly controlled by Exxon, with even the parking lot off limits and guarded by security. She wrote:

The stakes are high and Exxon is running the show here, with federal agencies so far publicly invisible. The phone number of the command center in Mayflower goes to an ExxonMobil answering service based in Texas, and each day it is Exxon that distributes a unified command press release–which contains the logos of Exxon, Faulkner County and the city of Mayflower–with official updates on the progress of the cleanup. …

A request for a media tour of the spill site today was turned down by an Exxon spokesperson, who emerged from the command center to speak with a reporter at the gate. All areas being cleaned up so far have also been off limits. There is no central location where members of the media can gather to ask questions.

5. Under Investigation

Exxon may be feeling a little bit of heat as the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration has ordered a corrective action, which puts the broken pipeline under lockdown for the time being (pretty much a no-brainer). Jeannie Nuss reported for the AP that, “the order signed by Jeffrey Wiese, associate administrator for pipeline safety, says ‘continued operation of the Pegasus Pipeline would be hazardous to life, property, and the environment.’”

But that’s not all. She writes:

The federal agency’s order comes as Arkansas’ attorney general promised a state investigation into the cause and impact of the spill and other officials say they plan to ask Exxon to move the Pegasus pipeline to protect drinking water.

“There are many questions and concerns remaining as to the long-term impacts, environmental or otherwise, from this spill,” Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel wrote to ExxonMobil executives Tuesday. He also asked ExxonMobil to preserve records pending his investigation.

6. Effects on Keystone XL

So, how is this going to affect decisions about the Keystone XL pipeline? Those who have been against the pipeline because of its environmental risks have new fodder. Others who were previously in favor or indifferent may have second thoughts, especially considering that the Pegasus pipeline capacity was only about a tenth of what the Keystone XL would carry.

Any pipeline poses risks, but tar sands pipelines pose even more risks than conventional oil. “TransCanada’s first Keystone pipeline leaked 12 times in its first 12 months,” wrote Sierra Club’s Michael Brune. “Because tar sands must be pumped at higher pressures and temperatures than conventional oil, it corrodes pipes faster.”

Just days before the Arkansas spill, a coalition of environmental groups, led by the National Wildlife Federation, as well as landowners, and others filed a petition with the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and the EPA, calling on them to enact stronger safety regulations for pipelines carrying tar sands oil. The petition may well pick up more backers in the spill’s aftermath.

[Referee]

Fly Over

ugr22vI8RDs

[grannyfranny100]

What good are the containment baffles (or whatever they are called) on top of water when this stuff doesn't float, it drops to the bottom of rivers, lakes. etc.? Millions are being spent in MI to clean up the river bottom at a similar spill.

[onawah]

Good question.
I would suspect they do it to demonstrate that they are at least doing something
But probably more to divert attention away from the fact that the sludge doesn't float, which means it's going to be that much harder to clean up.

[onawah]

If you count oil spills in Canada, it's actually the 10th major oil spill or accident in less than two weeks.

ExxonMobil's Pegasus Pipeline in Mayflower, Arkansas

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/58916_562876650410158_565496417_n.jpg

If you count oil spills in Canada, it's actually the 10th major oil spill or accident in less than two weeks.

1) ExxonMobil's Pegasus Pipeline in Mayflower, Arkansas
2) Enbridge's Norman Wells Pipeline in the Northwest Territories
3) Suncor, Alberta Tar Sands leaking into the Athabasca River
4) Lansing Board of Water & Light in the Lansing Grand River in Michigan
5) Canadian Pacific Rail train derailment in western Minnesota
6) Canadian Pacific Rail train derailment in northwestern Ontario
7) DCP Midstream natural gas compressor in Guthrie Oklahoma
8) ExxonMobil chemical Leak at Chalmette refinery in Louisiana
9) S&S Energy in Damascus Ohio, oil tanker and gas well explode
10) Shell Pipeline in West Texas

Photo via We Are Sitting Bull & Idle No More.

[onawah]

Dispatches From Exxon’s Spill Zone, Day 2

Dispatches From Exxon’s Spill Zone, Day 2

April 5, 2013

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/exxonspill-dispatches-2/

Mayflower, AR, April 4 – We had hoped to interview some affected residents, but they were too sick to talk to us. They live on a street immediately adjacent to the ones which were evacuated. Some homes which were not evacuated are actually closer to the spill than those which were – they’re a couple minutes by car but they’re only separated by a small grove of trees. The residents had not been contacted by Exxon or warned in any way about the dangers of tar sands. Both canceled the interview because they were feeling too sick to meet. Vomiting, headaches, dizziness, burning throats and coughing: the exact same symptoms felt by Kalamazoo residents after the Enbridge tar sands spill there in 2010.

Evacuated residents are being housed in hotels. Exxon says it plans to rent homes for them. Non-evacuated residents who are actually closer to the spill site have been given nothing. No medical attention, no offers of alternate housing, no information.

Exxon finally admitted today that what spilled from the pipe was tar sands. Before that, they had admitted that it wasn’t crude but were coy with the semantics. One evacuee who had asked about the distinction in meetings with Exxon told us that he’d been asked “well what’s your definition of tar sands?”

We started the day at Lake Conway, trying to get more footage of the neighborhoods and ecosystems affected by the spill. We got permission from a woman in the neighborhood to go into her back yard and take pictures from her dock, which goes into the body of water, adjacent to Lake Conway but not technically part of it, which was most affected by the spill. It’s easier to see it in this aerial video, taken by a photojournalist who later become ill from exposure to the plume of toxins.

3iIdWGGlBP8

While we were taking pictures of the dead lake, two Mayflower police officers approached us. Once we explained that we had permission to be there, they left. Shortly afterward, two Faulkner County sheriffs approached us and told us to leave immediately or we would be arrested. At this point, the homeowners were outside and also explained that we were allowed to be there. The officer, Deputy Sweeney, said that we were “too close to the scene” and that we had to leave.
The American flag flies over a dead lake
http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/flag.jpg


Out of earshot of the residents, Sweeney told us to leave. We reiterated that the landowner gave us permission. Sweeney said that we didn’t have his permission. We said that it was the landowner’s property. He responded “It’s my property now.”

We returned to our car. It seemed like it would be okay to get more footage from the public road running between Lake Conway and the smaller body of water. Two of us walked along the road with a camera and tripod. Officer Sweeney crossed the road and bodily grabbed one of us, telling us to leave immediately or be arrested. We said that it was a public road and that we weren’t trespassing or breaking any laws. Sweeney said that it was his road today. We started filming the encounter, but Sweeney grabbed us again and forced the camera down.

Afterward, we reentered the woods to access the lake from a different angle. We were able to get near where some of the tar sands-soaked booms were anchored to trees.

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/TarSandsBoom.jpg



Suddenly, we scared up a duck completely covered in tar sands. It was totally black so there is no way we could guess at the species. It was clearly distressed, flapping and stumbling rather than walking. Having talked with some graduate student biologists helping with the cleanup, we knew that the duck would likely die without help. The volunteers had explained that tar sands cause more irritation that crude oil, and that ducks they had worked with were completely red and blistered underneath their feathers. The oil also goes through their whole digestive tract.

We immediately informed the HAWK Center (Helping Arkansas Wild “Kritters”) about the duck, but it fled into the water before we could catch it for cleaning and rehabilitation.

Next, we went down the road to another cleanup site at the edge of a plaza parking lot for a Subway, Dollar Tree and other businesses. A stream running behind the Subway was partially fenced off, and workers in yellow hazmat gear were milling around, occasionally doing something to adjust a pump or hose down a streambank. Subway and the rest were open for business. Neither Exxon nor local authorities have been warning shoppers about the dangers of tar sands exposure. There isn’t even a sign indicating what’s going on.

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/8621520804_facfab0377_z.jpg

We decided to return to the wetland area because we heard that crews had begun digging. Driving past on the highway, we saw dozens of trucks, construction vehicles, and police vehicles along the frontage road. The crews were clearing trees and digging big pits. For tar sands, “remediation” means completely removing every living part of the ecosystem. Unlike crude, it sinks. Water is drained, forests are cleared, and soil and sediment are scraped off in a somewhat grisly reenactment of the clear-cutting, strip-mining excavation of the Athabasca tar sands on the other end of this pipeline system.

We wanted to see up close what was going on here. We turned down the frontage road to get closer. The road is public, and there were no signs indicating that it was closed to traffic. It became one-way for a few hundred meters because of the line of trucks, but traffic was being waved through by flaggers.

One of the sheriff cars pulled us over. A very large officer barked commands at us, checking identification and making the driver get out of the car for interrogation. At one point, the cop said to the driver, “If it were up to me. I wouldn’t mind y’all being out here, but I’m getting paid a lot of money to keep you out of here.”

The cop threatened the whole media crew with trespassing and interfering with a government operation. This seemed strange, considering that Exxon and its contractors are overseeing every aspect of the spill and no government agencies are at the scene. It’s not surprising to us after seeing TransCanada hire local police officers as high-paid private security to guard our sustained 90-day tree sit against the Keystone XL pipeline.

This was our sixth encounter with the police in two days of filming and trying to talk to residents. We had even been kicked out of the adjacent neighborhood which was never evacuated. In four of them, the officers stressed (as police often do) that they understood what we were doing or didn’t have a problem with it, that they were following orders. Remarkably, they were unapologetic and open about the fact that those orders came directly from Exxon.

This is all standard practice when the dirty energy barons accidentally kill or sicken large numbers of people and eradicate whole ecosystems. Limit media coverage at all costs and deny everything. Once it becomes impossible to deny something, admit it and continue to deny everything else. We saw the same thing after over a million gallons of tar sands spilled in Kalamazoo, Michigan and Enbridge initially denied that the pipeline was carrying tar sands and continues to insist that peoples’ symptoms are not caused by the spill.

No one knows how to clean up tar sands, and no ones knows the extent of their health impacts. Mayflower, Arkansas is never going to be the same. One evacuee told us that several people don’t want to move back. He says he’s worried it’s broken the community. Stay tuned for more updates as we have them.

[onawah]

Exxon Receives Safety Medal From National Safety Council Days After Arkansas Oil Spill

Posted: 04/05/2013 12:37 pm EDT


Days after an ExxonMobil pipeline swamped an Arkansas subdivision, pouring an estimated 84,000 gallons of crude oil into residential streets, the National Safety Council presented Exxon Mobil Corporation with a safety award.

The Green Cross for Safety medal, presented at the council's annual fundraising dinner in Houston on Tuesday, honored ExxonMobil for its leadership and "comprehensive commitment to safety excellence."

"It is evident that ExxonMobil is committed to excellence in safety, security, health and environmental performance," said NSC president Janet Froetscher, who presented the award to ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson. "The Council is honored to recognize ExxonMobil with the Green Cross for Safety medal. This organization is a wonderful example of the role corporations can play in preventing injuries and saving lives."

The council stated ExxonMobil has distinguished itself over a period of years for achievements in workplace safety, community service and environmental stewardship.

"It is an honor to receive this medal on behalf of the men and women of ExxonMobil," said Tillerson. "We hold this award in high esteem because it recognizes the deep commitment of our company and our people to a culture of safety."

The rupture of Exxon's Pegasus pipeline on March 29 forced the evacuation of as many as 40 homes in Mayflower, Ark., to say nothing of the loss of wildlife, human health risks and damage to the surrounding environment.

"It's like a 'Brownie, you're doing a heckuva job' moment, if Brownie had a 100-year history of wrecking the climate, derailing progress on clean energy, and funding phony science," said Daniel Kessler, a spokesman for environmental advocacy organization 350.org.

The company also appears to have been unprepared for the scale of cleanup efforts in Arkansas. Mother Jones' Kate Sheppard reported that Exxon is apparently using Craigslist to recruit workers for the cleanup. "Need 40 HR Hazmat trained laborers. Emergency cleanup of oil," read an ad posted on the Little Rock site, which has since been removed.

When contacted by HuffPost, NSC spokeswoman Kathy Lane said that the safety award decision was made back in October of 2012.

"ExxonMobil has been a leader in safety performance in their industry for many years," she wrote in an email. "ExxonMobil's Total Recordable Incident Rate, Lost Time Rate, Lost Time Injury Frequency and Vehicle Incident Rate are all well below industry averages and within striking range of zero. There have been among the first among corporations to implement many actions that others subsequently followed."

[onawah]

If it weren't so sad, it would be funny...actually, it is funny...and very ironic...
Mayflower AR Oil Spill unwittingly narrated by NE Rep. Lee Terry

my1pb11fodw


Published on Apr 5, 2013

Much more here:
http://aksarbent.blogspot.com/2013/04...

On Saturday, March 30th, as Rep. Lee Terry betrayed the interests of farmers and ranchers in Nebraska by touting the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, tar sands oil was bubbling up through from a leaking underground pipe in Mayflower, Arkansas, sickening residents and even a photographer who flew over ExxonMobil's new flora/fauna killing fields.

Although ExxonMobil's law enforcement proxies from the Faulkner County Sheriff's office threatened media with arrest, and the oil company got the FAA to allow a ExxonMobil employee to refuse media requests for overflights, neither ExxonMobil nor Sheriff Andy Shock could stop the release of EPA photographs of the damage, which AKSARBENT has used to accompany the preposterous, unprincipled and false agitprop of Nebraska GOP Rep. Terry.

[Hermite]

How "odd." That tarsands blockade dot org website is no longer in existence. All I get is "Database Error"

[ThePythonicCow]

How "odd." That tarsands blockade dot org website is no longer in existence. All I get is "Database Error"

That's all I get too.

It's still in Google's cache, at http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:60Fi7p-atB4J:www.tarsandsblockade.org/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

[Hermite]

Thank you! I wanted to share this on some other forums and was quite unhappy to see it had gone "missing." I think that says a whole lot about what's really going on. :(

[onawah]

The tarsandsblockade site is quite active now, at least, and here is their latest update:
http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/exxonspill-dispatches-4/


UPDATE: Correction: We originally reported that Exxon had allegedly pumped diluted bitumen which spilled into the Northwood Subdivision into a nearby wetland. We were mistaken; they power washed it into the nearby wetland via storm drains.



Mayflower, AR, April 5: We spent most of the day chasing down reports of oil sightings and talking to residents. Check out this interview with Duck, who has lived near lake Conway for 12 years:

CS24BPoIV7Y

We also had our first up-close encounter with the dirty, toxic stuff itself.

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/FirstSighting.jpg


We also found what appears to be the Pegasus pipeline itself, with a newly added clamp of some sort, unearthed and sitting in a pool of water. There are multiple pipelines in the area and we can’t absolutely verify that this is Pegasus, but we compared it to photos of other oil pipelines built in the 1940s and they are similar. Do you think that this pipe should be carrying heated, pressurized, corrosive tar sands bitumen?

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Pegasus.jpg


On Saturday, April6, we finally found where Exxon’s been hiding their spilled diluted bitumen and we conducted more interviews. Watch this one with Sherry Appleman, who has lived on the shores of Lake Conway for 12 years. Her husband’s lung cancer has been worsened by the spill.

( OP's note: I don't know how to embed these videos, but you can see them at the links and embedded in the article):
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/30995359
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/30996235


Just down the street, we found a whole family that had gotten sick from the spill:
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/30996411

That afternoon, we went to the Faulkner County Library for a meeting of roughly 100 affected residents and concerned community members. We offered ourselves as a resource and source of information, based on our experience fighting the Keystone XL pipeline and working against TransCanada. People aired their grievances and started to form working groups to start addressing various concerns – such as the fact that the Pegasus pipeline still runs through the Lake Maumelle watershed which supplies water to 400,000 people in Little Rock.

Then, we went to the wetland where Exxon has allegedely been dumping the diluted bitumen. That’s right: in order to get the tar sands out of the neighborhood where it spilled and out of sight and into one place for cleanup Exxon power-washed the excess into a wetland area which had already been affected by the spill. We went there to find out. It was just before sunset, and most of the workers had gone home. We had tried to access this area before but always been kept out by workers and police. (coordinates: +34° 57′ 42.65″, -92° 24′ 52.64″, just a couple hundred feet from the Bell Slough State Wildlife Management Area)

This local decided to get a firsthand experience of the spill: (disclaimer: toxins in diluted bitumen can absorb from the skin. Not recommended):

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/FirstHandExperience.jpg

http://www.tarsandsblockade.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/TarBoat.jpg

For more photos, check our Flickr page.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tarsandsblockade/sets/72157633184439792/
(NOTE: Timestamps are incorrect and were added automatically by the camera. These photos were taken just before sunset on Saturday, April 6.)

A quick video tour of what used to be a wetland and now serves as a storage area for diluted bitumen spilled by Exxon’s negligence. (Explicit language warning):

5ugrkBFLkjM


Stay tuned for more developments and continue to follow our Twitter for live updates.

[grannyfranny100]

Is your 401K or retirement investments linked to the oil industry? Stop investing in industries that give you profits with one hand while destroying you and the planet with the other.

[onawah]

Living downstream from an oil spill...

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/532894_10200554462000723_1041114343_n.jpg


There are ~900,000 people who live downstream. Little Rock AR, Pine Bluff AR, Vicksburg MS, Natches MS, Baton Rouge LA, New Orleans LA -- WATER AT RISK (Red dotted line is flow of water downstream from the spill)

Please share this photo and this link to media outlets. Everyone seems fairly uninformed about watersheds and the flow of water... (including me, before I started looking into the oil+gas industry)


http://williamahuston.blogspot.com/2013/04/latest-on-exxon-mobil-pegasus-dilbit.html

[grannyfranny100]

onawah, thanks for this important map. Between this spill and the Gulf spill, it seems the oil industry is ready to take over the south with no regard for people or the planet. I hope some people have contacts in the lamestream media who will use this map.

[onawah]

Not to mention fracking, the pollution and earthquakes that is causing.
This is why we need alternative energy technology NOW!

[Sierra]

Temporary evacuation? Hello. The people of Mayflower AR will die before their time, if they return to their homes. The death cluster will be ignored by the media of course.

Perhaps a few barrels of crude should be left on the lawns, driveways, backyards, and doorsteps of the corporate execs of Exxon-Mobil. Only fair they experience what they've done unto others.

[onawah]

ExxonMobil Pipeline Rupture 'Substantially Larger' Than Previously Thought

Exxonmobil Pipeline Rupture
Crews work to clean up from an oil pipeline spill in a Mayflower, Ark., neighborhood Wednesday, April 3, 2013. (AP Photo/Danny Johnston)

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — An ExxonMobil pipeline that ruptured last month and spilled thousands of barrels of oil in central Arkansas has a gash in it that is 22 feet long and 2 inches wide, state Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said Wednesday.

"The pipeline rupture is substantially larger than many of us initially thought," McDaniel told reporters Wednesday evening.

McDaniel's update on the March 29 oil spill in Mayflower, about 25 miles northwest of Little Rock, comes as lawyers and investigators review more than 12,500 pages of documents his office received from ExxonMobil. McDaniel sent a subpoena to ExxonMobil, seeking inspection records, investigative documents and maintenance records related to its Pegasus pipeline that ruptured in Mayflower.

It wasn't immediately clear what all the documents contain; McDaniel said his office received them just before he held a news conference Wednesday.

"More documents will be received and requested from Exxon in coming days," McDaniel said. "But now everyone's priority continues to be the cleanup efforts in Mayflower."

So far, crews have recovered about 28,200 barrels of oily water and about 2,000 cubic yards of oiled soil and debris, according to a statement from ExxonMobil and local officials.

"We still do not know how much oil was released. We still do not know the exact makeup of the crude itself, of the chemical solvents used in the transportation process," McDaniel said. "And our immediate concern tonight is with the weather."

A severe thunderstorm raked the area Wednesday, but there were no immediate reports of weather-related incidents at the site of the oil spill. ExxonMobil and local officials in Mayflower said crews secured equipment and strengthened a containment system protecting the main body of nearby Lake Conway.

McDaniel said he retained a firm to conduct an independent analysis of the cleanup process. He's also retaining technical advisers to provide independent air sampling and other scientific data.

To cover those and other costs, McDaniel requested $4 million from Exxon.

ExxonMobil spokeswoman Kim Jordan says the company has received McDaniel's letter and will respond directly to his office.

___
http://i.huffpost.com/gadgets/slideshows/290462/slide_290462_2305191_free.jpg?1365200235194
Follow Jeannie Nuss at http://twitter.com/jeannienuss

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/11/exxonmobil-pipeline-rupture-arkansas_n_3060280.html

[grannyfranny100]

onawah

The same issue of Huff had this http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/11/kurt-mix-bp-investigation-oil-spill-text-messages_n_3063050.html?ref=topbar about BP's gulf spill. Who knows if this dude is a bad guy or is the sacrificial lamb.

The guys working the Exxon spill should pay attention since one of them will be Exxon's sacrificial lamb. That's how the oil companies play this game. Better to lose your job and come clean now as an American hero than be the Mayflower sacrificial lamb later.

[onawah]

How the New American “Oil Boom” Might Destroy the Environment and Decimate the Health of Millions
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUSiCEx3e-0

By Dr. Mercola

Recent headlines in the American press would have you believe we’re in for a robust economic boom, courtesy of the new shale gas revolution. Some forecasters claim the US will outstrip Saudi Arabia as the world’s largest oil producer by 2017, effectively rendering the US self-sufficient in terms of energy production.

But are we really “swimming in oil”? And is the shale revolution really the answer to all our energy and economic problems?

In pictures and words, three different publications tell the story, while EPA documents add a twist as to how wetlands should be protected through all this, but aren’t.

In 1977, President Jimmy Carter signed Executive Order No. 11990 for the protection of wetlands,1 which prohibits anyone, including farmers, from altering wetlands in any way.

As a result of that legislation farmers are unable to touch wetlands without fear of federal prosecution, which can at times put extreme limits on their farming protocols due to the stringent way wetlands are defined. Sometimes a simple puddle in a farmer’s field can be defined as a wetland.

Conversely, oil companies now come in and wipe out huge tracts of wetlands without any repercussions at all, showing that, apparently, wetland protection loses its importance when oil company profits are at stake.

The Great Oil Swindle

As reported in The Atlantic,2 the Bakken shale situated in North Dakota holds an estimated 18 billion barrels of crude oil. Originally discovered in 1951, the oil was too expensive to extract at the time, as it’s embedded in the rock.

That all changed in 2008 when hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," became widely available. Since then, North Dakota has experienced a massive oil drilling boom, and as of this year, the state has more than 200 active oil rigs producing about 20 million barrels of oil per month.

The oil business has dramatically altered the state’s landscape, and pictures3 show big fracking sites now located right next to private homes and farms, and as revealed in the PBS special above, having a fracking operation on your land can be devastating to your health...

Another article in Le Monde Diplomatique4 highlights the environmental destruction that accompanies oil and natural gas fracking, and also questions whether the fracking boom is little more than another bubble—“a temporary recovery that masks deep structural instability”:

“These resources can only be mined at the cost of massive environmental pollution: their extraction involves hydraulic fracturing... using the technique of horizontal drilling... But their exploitation in the US has brought about the creation of hundreds of thousands of jobs and offers the advantage of cheap and abundant energy...

But is the shale revolution all it’s fracked up to be?

The ongoing fragility of the global economy should give pause for thought... But policymakers have learnt few lessons from the 2008 crash, and may be on course to repeat similar mistakes in the petroleum sector.

A New York Times investigation first unearthed major cracks in the 'shale boom' narrative in June 2011, finding that state geologists, industry lawyers and market analysts 'privately' questioned 'whether companies are intentionally, and even illegally, overstating the productivity of their wells and the size of their reserves.'

According to the paper, 'the gas may not be as easy and cheap to extract from shale formations deep underground as the companies are saying, according to hundreds of industry e-mails and internal documents and an analysis of data from thousands of wells.'”

Two US energy consultants reportedly sounded the alarm at the beginning of 2012 with an article in the British energy industry journal Petroleum Review. They wrote that there’s a “basis for reasonable doubts about the reliability and durability of US shale gas reserves.” They claim the reserves have been “inflated” under new Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) rules that allow gas companies to make claims about the size of the reserve without an independent third party audit. This overestimation of reserves can hide lack of profitability.

According to former UK chief government scientist Sir David King, production at wells tends to drop off by 60-90 percent within the first year of production alone, and petroleum geologist Arthur Berman has noted that the annual decline in production exceeds 42 percent. All in all, this makes drilling for shale gas extremely unprofitable...

As noted in the featured article:

“Finance specialists have not been taken in. 'The economics of fracking are horrid,' writes US financial journalist Wolf Richter in Business Insider. 'Drilling is destroying capital at an astonishing rate, and drillers are left with a mountain of debt just when decline rates are starting to wreak their havoc. To keep the decline rates from mucking up income statements, companies had to drill more and more, with new wells making up for the declining production of old wells. Alas, the scheme hit a wall, namely reality.'”

According to financial analyst John Dizard, producers of shale gas have borrowed large amounts of money just to fund the initial land acquisition drilling. Operating under “deficit financing,” they’ve spent two to five times their operating cash flow just to get started, and with production dropping off at a staggering rate, these producers quickly find themselves operating in the red.

What it all amounts to is an “oil bubble” that could rival the recent bank bailouts. The question is where is the bailout money for the oil and gas industry going to come from? Worse yet, depending on how far the bubble is allowed to expand and how many new wells are drilled to maintain even production, the environment could be absolutely decimated in the process of trying to avert what appears to be an inevitable financial cataclysm...

Unsealed Records in Pennsylvania Fracking Case Reveals Contamination Problems

A lawsuit recently unsealed in the Washington County Court of Common Pleas reveals the health hazards associated with the fracking process, and how revolving doors between industry and agencies tasked to investigate wrongdoing places your health a distant second to industry profits. According to stateimpact.npr.org:5

“The Hallowich family sued the gas drillers after they say nearby drilling activity, including compressor stations, made their children sick. The mother, Stephanie Hallowich became an outspoken critic of gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale. But the final settlement imposed a strict gag order on the Hallowich family, as well as the gas drilling companies. The Hallowich family has since moved from their home.”

The drilling companies, Range Resources, MarkWest Energy and Williams Gas, settled the contamination case for $750,000, according to recently unsealed records, of which the Hallowich children receive $10,000 each. The order to unseal the records was entered on March 20, reversing a previous decision to have them permanently sealed. According to the judge, claims of privacy rights on behalf of the drillers had no merit. The records are now posted in full on the NPR site.6

The records show that the fracking activities had leaked acetone into fresh water supplies, and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) inspector tasked with investigating complaints about the water contamination went on to work for the drilling company, Range Resources. Not surprisingly, complaint files at the DEP were subsequently found to be missing...

The Hallowich’s drinking water was found to be contaminated with acrylonitrile above “safe” levels, a highly flammable and toxic chemical compound classified as a probable carcinogen. The Hallowich's also claimed air emissions from the gas processing plant made them sick. However, as part of the settlement, the Hallowich's signed an affidavit stating there’s "no medical evidence" that their children's symptoms are "definitively" connected to drilling activity.

Is Fracking Really Safe for the Environment and Residents of the Area?

Fracking proponents claim it is a safe and effective drilling method that reduces the surface footprint of the drilling operation. However, people across the US have reported serious adverse health events resulting from contamination of air and/or drinking water.

The method entails pumping chemical-laced water and sand at high pressure into shale rock formation, thereby releasing hydrocarbons. The chemicals used in the process have the potential to leak into nearby groundwater, as they did in the Pennsylvania case above, either from the well, or from spills above ground. Yet another concern is fracking-induced earthquakes. Reported adverse effects of exposure to fracking chemicals include:

Respiratory ailments; shortness of breath
Chemical sensitivities
Skin rashes; swelling; lesions
Severe headaches
Nausea and vomiting

According to Reuters,7 several drillers have been fined for water contamination due to spilled fracking fluids, and in 2011 the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released findings of a potential link between fracking and water contamination after sampling water supplies in Pavillion, Wyoming. The EPA is scheduled to release an in-depth study on fracking’s impact on water supplies in 2014. In the following video, Cornell University professor Anthony Ingraffea explains the destructive process of fracking. The lecture was given at Luzerne County Community College in Nanticoke, Pennsylvania in 2010.

Freshwater in Increasingly Short Supply

mSWmXpEkEPg

While it may seem unthinkable to some, especially Westerners, freshwater supplies are dwindling across the globe, making protecting drinking water supplies all the more critical—be it from agricultural or industry pollution, or any other source of contamination. According to a recent article in Scientific American,8 the combined water use by US agriculture, industry and population exceeds all the water flowing in the nation’s rivers. The remainder is supplied from groundwater aquifers, which are receding at a faster pace than being replenished. Financial products innovator Richard Sandor predicts water (both quantity and quality) may soon be traded as goods. Needless to say, at that point, those who cannot pay will not get any...

In light of that, it seems irresponsible to allow shale fracking operations to blast toxic chemicals into the earth that can then contaminate groundwater supplies. Fines and payouts to victims who successfully sue will not protect our water supplies. Only stopping the fracking will. According to water-contamination-from-shale.com:9

“The major concern with shale gas drilling is the chemicals used in the process. Because the federal Energy Policy Act of 2005 exempted hydraulic fracturing from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act, shale gas drillers don’t have to disclose what chemicals they use.

A study conducted by Theo Colburn, PhD, the director of the Endocrine Disruption Exchange in Paonia, Colorado, has so far identified 65 chemicals that are probable components of the fracking fluids used by shale gas drillers. These chemicals included benzene, glycol-ethers, toluene, 2-(2-methoxyethoxy) ethanol, and nonylphenols. All of these chemicals have been linked to health disorders when human exposure is too high.

Concerns are growing that many of the chemicals used in shale gas drilling are seeping into groundwater. While some of the injection fluid used in the process comes back to the surface, 30 to 40 percent is never recovered, according to the industry’s own estimates.”

Improper disposal of waste water from fracking operations have also been noted. In 2011, natural gas drillers in Pennsylvania were found to have shipped toxic and radioactive hydraulic fracking waste water to sewage treatment plants that were not properly equipped to treat it. From there, it was dispersed into rivers and streams which provide drinking water to millions of people.

What's the Best Option for Safe, Pure Water?

There’s no doubt about it: Safe, pure water is becoming increasingly difficult to come by, even in otherwise affluent, developed nations. For most people, regardless of where you live, purifying the water you drink is more a necessity than a choice. By this I do NOT mean resorting to bottled water from your supermarket. Bottled water is typically nothing more than bottled tap water that may or may not have received additional filtration, and the federal testing requirements for bottled water are actually more lax than those for communal water supplies.

One of the best alternatives to the tap may be finding a gravity-fed raw spring in your area—barring contamination from nearby agriculture or fracking operations, that is. Fortunately, natural springs are often monitored by the local municipalities for contaminants.

Natural spring water is naturally filtered by the earth and is "living water," in the same way that raw food is "living food," which is why it's some of the most healthful water on the planet. Before you dismiss this idea because you think there are no such springs in your neck of the woods, there is a Web site called FindaSpring.com10 that can help you locate springs in your area.

The next best option is to filter the water that comes out of your tap, but there are benefits and drawbacks to virtually every water filtration system on the market. Currently I use a whole house carbon-based water filtration system. Prior to this I used reverse osmosis (RO) to purify my water. This previous article
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/12/18/distilled-water-interview.aspx
can help you make a decision about the type of water filtration system that would be best for you and your family. Since most water sources are now severely polluted, the issue of water filtration and purification couldn't be more important.

[onawah]

Some good news for a change...


The Exxon Oil Spill in Mayflower, Arkansa
April 24, 2013

Arkansas AG on Why He's Taking Exxon Spill Probe Into His Own Hands
Dustin McDaniel is on a mission to resolve the many unanswered questions about the March 29 pipeline rupture. 'The timeline is going to be very important.'
By Lisa Song, InsideClimate News
Apr 24, 2013
Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDanielArkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel/Credit: Arkansas Educational Television Network (AETN)


Since launching an investigation into the Mayflower, Ark. oil spill on April 2, state Attorney General Dustin McDaniel has pushed hard to resolve unanswered questions about the pipeline accident.

McDaniel, a Democrat in his second term as attorney general, caused a stir on April 3 when he insisted on touring the site of the spill with his staff instead of in a bus tour organized by ExxonMobil, the company responsible for the 210,000-gallon pipeline rupture. He drew attention again when he was among the first public officials to acknowledge that some of the oil had reached Lake Conway, a popular recreational area. And instead of relying solely on the U.S. Department of Transportation to investigate the spill, he issued a subpoena that forced ExxonMobil to provide his office with documents about the pipeline and its operational history.

The investigation is an enormous undertaking for McDaniel's office, which has little experience with pipeline accidents. The office has hired dozens of experts to review the more than 12,500 pages of documents Exxon turned over, a process that could take many months. McDaniel requested $4 million from Exxon to fund the investigation, but the company turned down that request last week.

In an interview with InsideClimate News on Friday, McDaniel said he hopes his investigation will lead to faster and greater transparency about the cause and consequences of the spill.

InsideClimate News: You've said publicly that you were frustrated with ExxonMobil during your first visit to the spill site. Can you tell us what happened?

Ark. Attorney General Dustin McDaniel: As soon as I saw on the news what was happening on Good Friday [March 29, the day of the spill], I was communicating with my staff, and they were communicating with other state agencies who were involved in the initial response. I contacted the county judge [Allen Dodson]. In Arkansas, a county judge is the county administrator, the top executive of the county—it's not a judicial position. I let it be known we would be coming with our environmental team up to the site, and obviously offered our support in whatever way that we could in the first couple of days.

On the morning of [our visit on April 3], one of the lawyers from my office got a call from a lobbyist for Exxon, one of their government relations guys. He told my staff that what would need to happen was to meet at City Hall, not at the operation center, and that I could get into a 15-passenger van along with the local member of Congress, the county judge, the mayor of the town, and the president of ExxonMobil Pipeline Company, and that I could go on a tour.

So when my staff told me that I said, 'Well that's nice, but I'm not going over there for a tour. I'm going to stay with my investigators and team, and we're going to go where we want to go and view what we want to view, and take pictures of what we want to take pictures of and talk to who we want to talk to. And I certainly can't do that if I'm on a guided tour with a member of Congress and a bunch of Exxon lobbyists. And so tell them, thank you but no thank you.'

That set off a morning flurry of phone calls. They were just dumbfounded that I wasn't going to take the tour, and they wanted me to know that they'd set this tour up, they'd rented this bus, and they had the president of ExxonMobil Pipeline Company, and they just couldn't understand why I wasn't going to get on the bus.

When I walked into the operations center, I just walked up to the kid who was running the check-in, and I told him who I was and that I was there to get my ID badge. The next thing you know there's about three people from Exxon public relations going 'Wait a minute, you're not supposed to be here. You're supposed to be on the tour!'

...Throughout the morning I kept getting phone calls or emails or people showing up to say 'hey, you're missing the tour. We really need you to go on the tour.' So I had to decline the tour about 12 times.

(McDaniel's office said the attorney general and his staff were able to walk through the site and conduct their investigation that day without any problems.)

ICN: How many people are working on the investigation your office is conducting?

McDaniel: I have a very limited environmental division directly in the AG's office. I have two lawyers and an investigator, and they coordinate with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality daily. I don't think over the course of a normal year I need any more than that, because we certainly use the rather sizable staff at the ADEQ.

For this case, I'm contracting with outside sources to supplement our workforce…with air sampling and soil sampling [experts]. So we are continually gathering the necessary resources to deal with this incident ... I think it would be fair to say I'm retaining dozens of additional personnel to assist in various areas of expertise.

ICN: Does that include pipeline experts?


Much more at
http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20130424/arkansas-ag-why-hes-taking-exxon-spill-probe-his-own-hands

[onawah]

Health Symptoms Persist Despite Denials from Exxon and Agencies

Independent Air Test at Mayflower Oil Spill Reveal 30 Toxic Chemicals at High Levels



April 26th, 2013

Independent Air Test at Mayflower Oil Spill Reveal 30 Toxic Chemicals at High Levels

For immediate release

4/26/13

Contact: April Lane, Faulkner County Citizens Advisory Group, 501-538-7002

Ruth Breech, Global Community Monitor, 415-238-1766

Independent Air Test at Mayflower Oil Spill Reveal 30 Toxic Chemicals at High Levels

Health Symptoms Persist Despite Denials from Exxon and Agencies

Little Rock--A citizen based organization responding the recent Exxon Pegasus Pipeline rupture and tar sands oil spill discovered over twenty-five toxic chemicals in the first ambient air sample collected on March 30.

Community leader, April Lane, has been collecting health reports from residents since the pipeline rupture on March 29. Lane relayed that “even four weeks later, residents are still feeling symptoms from the chemical exposure. People have consistently talked about gastrointestinal problems, headaches, respiratory problems, skin irritation including chemical burns, and extreme fatigue.” These symptoms are consistent with exposure to the chemicals found in the independent air testing.

According to Dr. Neil Carman with the Lone Star Chapter of Sierra Club and former Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, “Thirty toxic hydrocarbons were measured above the detection limits. Each of the thirty hydrocarbons measured in the Mayflower release is a toxic chemical on its own and may pose a threat to human health depending on various exposure and individual factors. Total toxic hydrocarbons were detected at more than 88,000 parts per billion in the ambient air and present a complex airborne mixture or soup of toxic chemicals that residents may have been exposed to from the Mayflower tar sands bitumen spill.”

Response from Exxon, State & Local Officials

Lane is interviewing residents about their health effects and collecting air quality data because state agencies have not been proactive in informing residents of the possible health effects associated with this particular chemical mixture also known as Wabasca Heavy Crude oil. Wabasca Heavy Crude oil, as identified by Exxon, is heavy oil (bitumen) that is diluted with lighter hydrocarbons like Benzene to allow for easier flow through pipelines.

Lane is a student at the University of Central Arkansas and President of Environmental Alliance at UCA; she also works with the Faulkner County Citizens Advisory Group. FCCAG was trained last November by Global Community Monitor in Bucket Brigade air sampling techniques.

Lane’s initial air sample on March 30 detected over twenty-five toxic chemicals including cancer causing benzene and ethylbenzene. According to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, chemicals can have varying health effects depending on intensity and frequency of exposure. Short-term, high levels of exposure and long-term low level exposure to benzene and ethylbenzene have led to increased cancer rates. Many of the chemicals have developmental, neurological and reproductive health effects.

Chemical detected


Long term health effects


Short term health effects

Benzene


Cancer, possible reproductive and/or developmental effects


Breathing very high levels of benzene can result in death, while high levels can cause drowsiness, dizziness, rapid heart rate, headaches, tremors, confusion, and unconsciousness.

Ethylbenzene


Cancer and reproductive effects.


Exposure to high levels of ethylbenzene in air for short periods can cause eye and throat irritation. Exposure to higher levels can result in dizziness.

n-hexane


Damage to the nervous system, numbness in the extremities, muscular weakness, blurred vision, headache, and fatigue have been observed.


The only people known to have been affected by exposure to n-hexane use are at work. Breathing large amounts caused numbness in the feet and hands, followed by muscle weakness in the feet and lower legs. If removed from the exposure, the workers recovered in 6 months to a year.

Toluene


Breathing very high levels of toluene during pregnancy can result in children with birth defects and retard mental abilities, and growth. We do not know if toluene harms the unborn child if the mother is exposed to low levels of toluene during pregnancy.


Toluene may affect the nervous system. Low to moderate levels can cause tiredness, confusion, weakness, drunken-type actions, memory loss, nausea, loss of appetite, and hearing and color vision loss. These symptoms usually disappear when exposure is stopped. Inhaling High levels of toluene in a short time can make you feel light-headed, dizzy, or sleepy. It can also cause unconsciousness, and even death.

High levels of toluene may affect your kidneys.

Xylenes


Studies of unborn animals indicate that high concentrations of xylene may cause increased numbers of deaths, and delayed growth and development. In many instances, these same concentrations also cause damage to the mothers. We do not know if xylene harms the unborn child if the mother is exposed to low levels of xylene during pregnancy.


High levels of exposure for short or long periods can cause headaches, lack of muscle coordination, dizziness, confusion, and changes in one’s sense of balance. Exposure of people to high levels of xylene for short periods can also cause irritation of the skin, eyes, nose, and throat; difficulty in breathing; problems with the lungs; delayed reaction time; memory difficulties; stomach discomfort; and possibly changes in the liver and kidneys. It can cause unconsciousness and even death at very high levels.

Source: Agency for Toxic Substances & Disease Registry Tox Faqs and the US EPA Technology Transfer Network, Air Toxics Website

Hazardous air pollutants or HAPs detected include seven hydrocarbons identified as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, m,p-xylenes, o-xylene, hexane, and cumene. HAPs are regulated under the 1990 Federal Clean Air Act amendments as the most toxic of all known airborne chemicals.

The Bucket Brigade uses a certified laboratory capable of detecting VOC’s in the low level part per billion range because residential health safety levels are set in parts per billion, not parts per million. Air testing in the parts per million range is approved for worker-only exposures and not residential exposures where vulnerable populations like children, pregnant women, seniors and sick people may live.

Benzene vapors in the Mayflower sample were measured at 220 parts per billion by volume (ppbV), exceeding the Texas short-term effects screening levels (ESL) for benzene of 54 parts per billion (ppb) by four times. Many residents were exposed for several days and are still being exposed to crude remaining in the environment.

Global Community Monitor Bucket Brigade Trainer Ruth Breech commented, “The spill and response has been a disservice to the community. People are obviously suffering and experiencing health symptoms from chemical exposure related to the oil spill. State and Federal need to step up immediately to document and prevent any further health issues associated with the Exxon oil spill. Agencies need to share information in a manner to ensure informed decision making and enable access to necessary resources such as medical treatment for chemical exposure.”

In addition to exposure to these chemicals associated with the Wabasca Heavy Crude oil spill, residents have many questions about the cleanup operations and long-term exposure to chemicals.

On April 22nd, FCCAG held a Town Hall Meeting to discuss issues related to the oil spill. The goal of the event was to make a prioritized list of recommended actions and time frame for completion. Several presentations were given by Board Members of FCCAG, including the results of the Bucket Brigade air testing. Experts in oil spill pollution Dr. Wilma Subra and Dr. Riki Ott also presented an analysis of the available air, water, and soil data that has been collected by Exxon, EPA, and the state. These experts relayed their first-hand experiences while working on the Exxon Valdez oil spill and the BP disaster in the Gulf.

Over 100 people attended the all-day event that was held at the Faulkner County Natural Resource Center. The list of recommended actions has been hand-delivered to the Mayflower City Planning Committee. FCCAG will continue to work with the people of Mayflower and state and local officials to ensure the health and safety of the communities and ecosystems that are affected by this disaster.
http://www.gcmonitor.org/article.php?id=1672

[onawah]

Exxon Spills Tar Sands Oil Again In Missouri, Can’t Find 126,000 Gallons Spilled In Arkansas

By Ryan Koronowski on May 2, 2013 at 10:07 am
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/05/02/1952171/exxon-spills-tar-sands-oil-again-in-missouri-cant-find-126000-gallons-spilled-in-arkansas/



http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/exxonmissouripipelinespill-300x225.jpg

Exxon, cleaning up another oil spill from the Pegasus tar sands oil pipeline. (Credit: KAIT)

ExxonMobil has now confirmed that on Tuesday, the Pegasus pipeline that has been out of service since it spilled thousands of barrels of oil into Mayflower, Arkansas in March spilled some more into a yard in Missouri. In the town of Doniphan about 190 miles north of Mayflower, a resident reported seeing some oil and dead vegetation in the yard. Though small in scope, perhaps as little as 42 gallons, the spill is a reminder that oil is messy, tar sands oil particularly so, and transporting it across the country is extremely risky.

More pressing is the missing oil in Mayflower from the spill last month. The Sierra Club requested the accident incident report, which said that 3,000 barrels of oil (some 126,000 gallons) have not been recovered no matter how energetic Exxon’s response was:

Despite a massive cleanup effort in the Mayflower, Arkansas, neighborhood, the federal pipeline safety agency reports that ExxonMobil has recovered only 2,000 of the total 5,000 barrels of spilled tar sands crude. The accident incident report, which the agency shared with the Sierra Club after a Freedom of Information Act request, gives new insight into the size of the spill and the ineffectiveness of the cleanup effort. The report reveals that in total 83 people were evacuated from their homes, emergency response took 40 minutes, the pipeline was operating at 708 pounds of pressure when it burst, and 2,000 barrels reached local waterways.

The Pegasus pipeline was built to carry diesel fuel in 1947, Exxon converted the pipeline to carry tar sands crude and reversed its flow in 2006. In 2011, the federal pipeline safety agency fined Exxon $26,500 for failure to properly inspect a section of the line.

The report also states that even though there are at least 3,000 unrecovered barrels of oil, the current “estimated cost of public and non-Operator private property damage” is $0. At the same time, when ClimateProgress reported on the tax loophole that allows oil companies like Exxon to avoid paying into the federal Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund because tar sands oil is not classified as oil, Exxon’s response was that it was “paying all valid claims relating to the spill.” They even doubled down and tweeted as much. But Exxon’s opinion of what a constitutes a “valid” claim is key here.

The oil in this pipeline is not paying a cent per barrel into the cleanup fund created to be the backstop for corporate intransigence: “When the responsible party is unknown or refuses to pay, funds from the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund can be used to cover removal costs or damages resulting from discharges of oil.”

Last month, local residents filed a lawsuit against Exxon seeking $5 million in damages. The cleanup is still ongoing, and many residents have still not been allowed back into their homes a month after the spill. In fact, Exxon has offered to buy some of the affected homes.

http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/8.13.24.ksiph_.jpg

Exxon's tar sands oil spills into a cove of Lake Conway, Arkansas. (Credit: Greenpeace Photo by Karen E. McCall)

Those 3,000 barrels, or 126,000 gallons of heavy tar sands crude oil, went somewhere. Exxon acknowledges that it did spill into a cove near Lake Conway. Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel confirmed that the cove does connect to Lake Conway. Third-party observers have noted that this means there is oil flowing into the Arkansas River.

Exxon points to testing from the Arkansas DEP that find no oil in Lake Conway, but those tests only sample the top and bottom of the Lake. Other tests sampling the whole water column have found oil in Lake Conway. If the spill has spread beyond Mayflower, an apologetic “community newsletter” featuring the release of selected ducks and turtles into marshland will not be enough.

While Exxon’s Valdez spill more than 20 years ago was much larger that the Mayflower spill, the company was rebuffing claims of liability for future losses as recently as 2011.

Exxon pulled in $9.5 billion in pure profits in the first quarter of this year.

[grannyfranny100]

I hope that Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel continues to pursue this. It is so easy for all of us to "forget" these incidents as we get on with our lives.