"MEXICO CITY -- The new legal framework for Mexico’s oil industry has not placed controls on the use of harmful chemicals in the extraction of unconventional fossil fuels, and environmentalists and experts fear their consumption will increase in an industry that is opening up to private capital.

The energy reform “will exacerbate the use of chemicals. The new laws do not address this problem. We need to know what is used, because otherwise we cannot know the consequences. That’s why we want a ban on ‘fracking’ (hydraulic fracturing),” activist Claudia Campero, of Canada’s Blue Planet Project, told IPS.

A package of nine initiatives, including eight new laws and modifications to 12 others on fossil fuels, water, electricity and oil funds, came before the senate in the last week of June, after being debated since Jun. 10 by the Energy Commission."

Emilio Godoy reports for Inter Press Service June 28, 2014. [2]