Thousands protest Bulgaria ‘fracking’ plans

January 14, 2012

Agence France Press
January 14, 2012

Several thousand Bulgarians demonstrated across the country on Saturday against plans for shale gas exploration by US company Chevron that they say could harm the environment.

About 1,000 youngsters marched along the streets of the capital Sofia, beating drums and blowing whistles as “a wake-up call to all Bulgarians,” an AFP correspondent at the scene reported.

They urged people to push the government to impose a ban on hydraulic fracturing or “fracking”, the most commonly used method for shale gas exploration that opponents say might contaminate drinking water.

The protestors marched on the government buildings carrying banners saying “No to shale gas, Yes to nature”, and “Chevron go home” to protest the US company’s plans to extract shale gas in the European Union’s poorest member.

Similar-sized demos were held in the northeastern region of Dobrudzha, where Chevron wants to operate, as well as in the Black Sea cities of Varna and Burgas, Plovdiv in the south and Pleven to the north, national radio reported.

Environmental pressure group Fracking Free Bulgaria said Saturday it had obtained a promise from parliamentary speaker Tsetska Tsacheva for lawmakers to consider a moratorium on fracking for shale gas.

Similar legislation was already passed in France last June.

Fracking, which uses high pressure injections of water, sand and chemicals to blast through rock to release oil and gas trapped inside, has been widely used in the United States.

Bulgaria, which depends almost totally on Russian natural gas deliveries via Ukraine, has seen its shale gas potential as a possible way to diversify supplies.

Bulgaria’s government granted Chevron last June a five-year testing permit to explore a potentially huge field near Novi Pazar in northeastern Bulgaria.

The country’s reserves are estimated at between 300 billion and one trillion cubic metres of shale gas, Energy Minister Traicho Traikov had said, citing data by companies.

Environmental groups claim that some preliminary drilling was already done in the northeast as well as in the Black Sea shelf but the government has not confirmed this.

Filed under World Tagged with , , ,

Fracking is Likely Cause of Virginia Earthquake

August 25, 2011

Earthquakes induced by human activity have been documented in a few locations in the United States, Japan and Canada,” writes the USGS. “The cause was injection of fluids into deep wells for waste disposal and secondary recovery of oil and the use of reservoirs for water supplies.”

RT
August 25, 2011

Experts are looking for a reason behind Tuesday afternoon’s unlikely 5.8 magnitude earthquake that shook people up and down the East Coast, and some are saying that a recent rise in fracking could be the culprit.

Hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” is the man-made splintering of underground rocks to expedite the exploiting of natural resources. It’s become a widespread phenomenon since its introduction in 2004, and though the practice can help increase supplies of oil and gas without reaching out internationally for imports, the result it can have on the geological make-up of the Earth can be ravaging. Now some experts say the rise in fracking could be to blame for yesterday’s quake.

The odds of a quake exceeding a magnitude of 5.5 occurring in central Virginia are so slim that Dominion Power determined only around six quakes of that size would occur in the area over the next 10,000 years. Dominion was looking at building a third nuclear reactor at their power plant in North Anna, VA, where facilities had to be taken offline yesterday as a result of the quake. Despite predicting that the site would be scarcely affected ever by a tremor, the quake’s epicenter was only mere miles from the nuclear facility.

Dominion, which confirmed in February that it will be building a third reactor for the plant, was rated by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission as the seventh most-likely site to receive damage from a quake, taking into consideration the 100-plus plants from coast-to-coast. Even still, the plant had its earthquake-sensing seismographs removed in the 1990s in order to save money.

When sites are subjected to fracking, waste salt water is injected back into the earth once fractures are created; in some cases, as many as 3 million gallons of the waste can be put into the earth in each well. Though earthquakes out east are unlikely, Braxton County West Virginia, only 160 miles from the epicenter of Tuesday’s tremor, has seen eight minor movements in 2010 alone. That site has also seen a slew of fracking operations in the several years before it.

Explicitly, the United States Geological Survey has published a finding confirming that processes like fracking can be to blame for “natural” disasters. “Earthquakes induced by human activity have been documented in a few locations in the United States, Japan and Canada,” writes the USGS. “The cause was injection of fluids into deep wells for waste disposal and secondary recovery of oil and the use of reservoirs for water supplies.”

Out West, geologists have blamed fracking on earthquakes that unexpectedly shook up the state of Arkansas, which recently saw over 20 small tremors in a single day. Freak earthquakes have also occurred in regions of Texas, New York and Oklahoma that should not be likely sites of epicenters, though those locales have all seen a rise in fracking in recent years.

Multi-stage fracking, which can drill several miles deep in the Earth, has only become prevalent in recent years. Once introduced, however, Arkansas, West Virginia and Texas all saw an unexpected increase in quakes across the region.  The correlation has caused concern in other parts of the country, including West Virginia, where residents are asking lawmakers to reconsider the legality of fracking, which can not only cause earthquakes but is overall detrimental to the local ecosystem. One incident in central Virginia occurred in 2008 when fracking caused an explosion of a natural gas pipeline that created a fireball that stretched up to half a mile long and tall and injured five people.

Mineral, VA, the site of Tuesday’s quake’s epicenter, is only 90 miles from the West Virginia border, where activists are rallying to change the lax state legislation which has caused companies to conduct fracking operations more and more and recent years.

Filed under World Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

Daftar Akun Bandar Togel Resmi dengan Hadiah 4D 10 Juta Tahun 2024

Togel resmi adalah langkah penting bagi para penggemar togel yang ingin menikmati permainan dengan aman dan terpercaya. Tahun 2024 menawarkan berbagai kesempatan menarik, termasuk hadiah 4D sebesar 10 juta rupiah yang bisa Anda menangkan. Anda perlu mendaftar akun di Daftar Togel yang menawarkan hadiah tersebut. Proses pendaftaran biasanya sederhana dan melibatkan pengisian formulir dengan informasi pribadi Anda serta verifikasi data untuk memastikan keamanan transaksi. Setelah akun Anda selasai terdaftar, Anda dapat berpartisipasi dalam berbagai permainan togel berbagai fitur yang disediakan oleh situs togel terbesar.

Bermain di Link Togel memungkinkan Anda memasang taruhan dengan minimal 100 perak, sehingga semua kalangan bisa ikut serta. Meskipun taruhan rendah, Anda tetap bisa memenangkan hadiah besar dan mendapatkan bonus. Untuk mulai bermain, Anda harus mendaftar terlebih dahulu.

Bagi pemain togel yang ingin menikmati diskon terbesar, mendaftar di situs togel online terpercaya adalah langkah yang tepat. Bo Togel Hadiah 2d 200rb tidak hanya memberikan jaminan keamanan dalam bertransaksi, tetapi juga menawarkan berbagai diskon untuk jenis taruhan tertentu. Diskon yang besar ini memungkinkan pemain untuk menghemat lebih banyak dan memasang taruhan dalam jumlah yang lebih banyak. Dengan begitu, peluang untuk mendapatkan hadiah juga semakin tinggi, sekaligus memastikan bahwa setiap taruhan dilakukan di situs yang aman dan resmi.

Link Slot Gacor Terpercaya untuk Menang Setiap Hari

Slot gacor hari ini menjadi incaran para pemain Link Slot Gacor yang ingin menikmati peluang jackpot besar hanya dengan menggunakan modal kecil, sehingga mereka bisa merasakan pengalaman bermain yang lebih menyenangkan dan penuh keuntungan.

Situs dengan slot Mahjong Ways gacor memberikan jackpot dan Scatter Hitam lebih sering di tahun 2024. Pastikan memilih situs terpercaya yang menyediakan fitur scatter unggulan, sehingga peluang Anda untuk menang lebih besar dan aman.

Dengan Situs Slot Depo 5k, Anda bisa bermain dengan modal kecil namun tetap memiliki kesempatan besar untuk meraih hadiah. Banyak platform judi online kini menawarkan pilihan deposit rendah ini, sehingga pemain dengan budget terbatas tetap bisa menikmati permainan slot favorit mereka. Bermain slot dengan deposit kecil seperti ini tentu memberikan kenyamanan bagi pemain baru maupun veteran.

Situs Slot Gacor Gampang Menang RTP Live Tertinggi

Strategi bermain slot online kini semakin berkembang, terutama dengan munculnya data rtp slot gacor tertinggi. Para pemain dapat memanfaatkan rtp live untuk memilih slot gacor dengan rtp slot yang terbaik, memastikan mereka memiliki peluang menang yang lebih besar. Slot rtp tertinggi yang tersedia hari ini bisa menjadi panduan penting bagi siapa saja yang ingin menikmati permainan yang lebih menguntungkan. Dengan memahami rtp slot online, pemain dapat bermain dengan lebih strategis dan mendapatkan hasil yang lebih memuaskan.

Related Links:

Togel178

Pedetogel

Sabatoto

Togel279

Togel158

Colok178

Novaslot88

Lain-Lain

Partner Links