womanofthehills
womanofthehills's JournalOilfield Wastewater Used to Grow Food in California May Contain Toxins
Did you know that some of the fruits and veggies out on supermarket shelves are grown using wastewater from oil and gas operations?
Now a new report by the Environmental Working Group says that this wastewater is possibly tainted with toxic chemicals, including chemicals that can cause cancer and reproductive harm. Farmers in Kern County have irrigated some 95,000 acres of food crops with billions of gallons of oil field wastewater, according to the report, which is based on an analysis of state data.
Actually, oil companies have been quietly selling wastewater for irrigation in California for decades, but it's only in recent years that the matter has become public knowledge. In the past, the state required regular testing for only a handful of pollutants to satisfy permit requirements for use of wastewater on agriculture. This is the first time we are getting a detailed look at the makeup of the toxic cocktail that could be lurking in the water.
According to state data, oil companies operating in California have reported that recycled wastewater sold to Kern County irrigation districts since 2014 contained more than 20 million pounds and 2 million gallons of dozens of toxic chemicals. These chemicals included 16 that the state classifies as carcinogens or reproductive toxicants. Levels of the chemicals were not measured and a full assessment of what exactly is in this water is pretty much impossible because the companies have withheld the identity of almost 40 percent of the chemicals as so-called trade secrets.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/38168-oilfield-wastewater-used-to-grow-food-in-california-may-contain-toxinshttp://www.truth-out.org/news/item/38168-oilfield-wastewater-used-to-grow-food-in-california-may-contain-toxins
As Election Day Nears, 1 in 6 Americans Say They're Buying Guns and Half of Voters
Expect Violence
There is no shortage of evidence pointing toward some violent outburst surrounding the presidential election results. Reporters interviewing Trump supporters at rallies, national polls showing likely voters are expecting Election Day violence, consumer-trend tracking firms saying demand is rising for gun purchases, and rhetoric from the longstanding cadre of right-wing loudmouths, all suggest some type of ugly response.
Sixteen percent of Americans plan on buying a gun as a result of the upcoming election, said a press release Thursday from Elementum, the real-time supply chain platform company, who polled 2,000 Americans from October 20-24 and found that among those living in the South, 19 percent will buy guns and among Gen Xers, the number is nearly 23 percent, especially among women, 24 percent.
http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/election-day-nears-1-6-americans-say-theyre-buying-guns-and-half-voters-expect
Pregnant women in south America with Zika not having fetal deformaties
(Could be an environmental connection - wow! big surprise - nt) This comes after Washington Post's big article saying Zika was the definite cause.)
But to the great bewilderment of scientists, the epidemic has not produced the wave of fetal deformities so widely feared when the images of misshapen infants first emerged from Brazil.
Instead, Zika has left a puzzling and distinctly uneven pattern of damage across the Americas. According to the latest U.N. figures, of the 2,175 babies born in the past year with undersize heads or other congenital neurological damage linked to Zika, more than 75 percent have been clustered in a single region: northeastern Brazil.
The pattern is so confounding that health officials and scientists have turned their attention back to northeastern Brazil to understand why Zikas toll has been so much heavier there. They suspect that other, underlying causes may be to blame, such as the presence of another mosquito-borne virus like chikungunya or dengue. Or that environmental, genetic or immunological factors combined with Zika to put mothers in the area at greater risk.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/scientists-are-bewildered-by-zikas-path-across-latin-america/2016/10/25/5e3a992c-9614-11e6-9cae-2a3574e296a6_story.html
Renewables just passed coal as the largest source of new electricity worldwide
Renewable energy sources have passed coal as the largest new source of electricity in the world, according data released Tuesday by the International Energy Agency (IEA).
The transition of the worlds energy sources is critical for avoiding a 2°C rise in global temperatures. Coal, for instance, represented about a quarter of U.S. CO2 emissions in 2012.
Solar and wind account for almost two-thirds of the growth in renewables, which is coming from industrialized and developing nations alike.
https://thinkprogress.org/more-renewables-than-coal-worldwide-36a3ab11704d#.nc0wdlkiu
220 'Significant' Pipeline Spills Already This Year Exposes Troubling Safety Record
1. Oklahoma: On Oct. 24, the 30-inch S-1 pipeline carrying crude oil from the critical Cushing, Oklahoma hub to refineries and chemical plants on the Gulf Coast began to leak and was shut down overnight. It was the second release connected with the Cushing storage facility in less than a month.
2. Pennsylvania: On Oct. 21, 55,000 gallons of gasoline gushed from a ruptured Sunoco Logistics pipeline in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, just upstream from the Susquehanna River. Carol Parenzan, Middle Susquehanna Riverkeeper, said that witnesses who contacted her office reported that the "smell of petroleum is so thick you can taste it." The 80-year old pipeline was damaged by a heavy storm that dumped seven inches of rain on the area.
3. Alabama: Last month, the Colonial Pipeline in Alabama leaked an estimated 336,000 gallons of gasoline and triggered concerns about gas shortages for drivers in the East. That spill was Colonial's fifth in the state this year and occurred on a 43-year old section of the pipeline.
http://www.ecowatch.com/pipeline-spills-2061960029.html
Felons Now Have The Right To Vote In Virginia – Rehabilitation Made Possible
This is a valuable step in working to fix Americas broken criminal justice system which currently seeks to punish rather than rehabilitate felons. Taking steps like these nationwide will eventually work towards reducing recidivism and helping to rebuild the damage done by an excessively harsh criminal justice system.
https://trofire.com/2016/10/21/felons-now-right-vote-virginia-rehabilitation-made-possible/
EPA Bows to Chemical Industry in Delay of Glyphosate Cancer Review
But oddly, the EPA Scientific Advisory Panel (SAP) meetings, called to look at potential glyphosate ties to cancer, were postponed just four days before they were to begin Oct. 18, after intense lobbying by the agrichemical industry. The industry first fought to keep the meetings from being held at all, and argued that if they were held, several leading international experts should be excluded from participating, including any person who has publicly expressed an opinion regarding the carcinogenicity of glyphosate.
As the meetings drew near, CropLife America, which represents the interests of Monsanto and other agribusinesses, specifically took issue with at least two scientists chosen for the panel, alleging the experts might be unfavorably biased against industry interests. On Oct. 12, the group sent a letter to the EPA calling for Dr. Kenneth Portier of the American Cancer Society to be more deeply scrutinized for any pre-formed conclusions about glyphosate.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/carey-gillam/epa-bows-to-chemical-indu_b_12563438.html
North Dakota - Fracking water - illegal dumping of radioactive toxins
Hope no DU members live in western North Dakota - total mess with radioactive dumping here and there. Radioactive filter socks found in abandoned gas stations, dumpsters, abandoned truck beds, on the prairie, on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation, etc.
"There are socks throughout the country that we might never find."
One of those people who live less than a mile from the IHD facility is Susan Perry. One day, the local bus driver who picks up dozens of kids who live in Perry's neighborhood stopped by her house to ask if Perry would sign a petition to the North Dakota Department of Health. The petition asked the state not to increase the allowable radiation limits for oil field waste dumped in landfills. Perry was alarmed. She knew the landfill accepted oil field waste but had never heard anyone talk about radioactivity.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/38022-where-has-the-waste-gone-fracking-results-in-illegal-dumping-of-radioactive-toxins.
At my Saturday bookclub meeting - we were discussing "Men Explain things to Me"
by Rebecca Solnit and of course this led to a Trump discussion and Trump's sexual abuse and two of the women starting sobbing and a few others said they feel so stressed by this election. It was probably the most emotional book club meeting we have ever had and we have been meeting for many years.
Gary Johnson in Virginia - CLARENCE THOMAS is the type of jurist he would elect-
Once a Republican, always a Republican
With regard to Supreme Court justices, it would be an issue of justices ruling on the basis of original intent of the Constitution, Johnson said in a question and answer session following his remarks at the nations largest evangelical university.
I think that Judge Thomas has probably been at the forefront of the kind of a judge that I would like to appoint.
http://www.richmond.com/news/virginia/government-politics/article_25113cf3-d0e6-5fbf-95df-827e9e1eb469.html
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