Pollution

"McDONALD, Ohio - Officials said Saturday they believe the latest earthquake activity in northeast Ohio is related to the injection of wastewater into the ground near a fault line, creating enough pressure to cause seismic activity.

The brine wastewater comes from drilling operations that use the so-called fracking process to extract gas from underground shale. But Ohio Department of Natural Resources Director Jim Zehringer said during a news teleconference that fracking is not causing the quakes."

"A new report by the American Society of Civil Engineers takes a dim view of the state of the country’s 54,000 community-based drinking-water systems and its 15,000 public wastewater treatment facilities. The systems are rusty, aging and seriously inadequate for meeting future needs, the study warns."

"Early last year, deep in the forests of northern British Columbia, workers for Apache Corp. performed what the company proclaimed was the biggest hydraulic fracturing operation ever."

"A federal judge finds that the state Air Resources Board's regulations discriminate against crude oil and biofuel makers outside the state."

"Angered that a riverside industrial waste pit leached potent toxins into the San Jacinto River for almost half a century, the Harris County [Texas] Attorney's Office is asking that those responsible be fined as much as the law allows -- $25,000 a day -- all the way back to the site's 1965 opening."

"ALBANY, N.Y. — While health and environmental groups are praising the Environmental Protection Agency for reining in mercury emissions from power plants, a New York group says discarded thermostats remain a major source of mercury contamination in the state."

"OTTAWA — Contamination of a major western Canadian river basin from oilsands operations is a 'high-profile concern' for downstream communities and wildlife, says a newly-released 'secret' presentation prepared last spring by Environment Canada that highlighted numerous warnings about the industry's growing footprint on land, air, water and the climate."

A conservative GOP freshman congressman from Ohio, Bill Johnson, has been attacking federal surface-mining regulation for costing jobs. It advances him politically. The only problem is that it does not seem to be true.

"Humans are having an effect on Earth's ecosystems but it's not just the depletion of resources and the warming of the planet we are causing. Now you can add an over-abundance of nitrogen as another "footprint" humans are leaving behind. The only question is how large of an impact will be felt. In a Perspectives piece in the current issue of Science, Arizona State University researcher James Elser outlines some recent findings on the increasing abundance of available nitrogen on Earth."