Rep. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., wondered in a House hearing why everyone was makiing such a “big deal” out of the ExxonMobil oil spill in Arkansas, and said that though the spill was “horrible,” ExxonMobil should be “patted on the back” for the way it handled it, and it shouldn’t hamper support for the Keystone XL pipeline.”The percentages of barrels that are shipped daily from rail, from road, and from water the accidents versus the pipeline accidents, it’s a fraction,” Mullin argued. “Yet your group is making a big deal about this ExxonMobil spill? I think Exxon should be patted on the back for the way they handled this. Yes this was horrible, yes we don’t like to see it, but they handled it. They did a great job handling it.”As Rebecca Leber from ThinkProgress points out:Continue Reading… … Read More
Tar sand oil pipelines are natural disasters waiting to happen
This article was published in partnership with GlobalPossibilities.org.It’s now been almost two weeks since ExxonMobil’s Pegasus pipeline spill put at least 500,000 gallons of tar sands crude and contaminated water into the Arkansas community of Mayflower. Many of the evacuated families still haven’t been able to return to their homes.Sierra Club organizer Glen Hooks, who grew up about 20 miles southeast of Mayflower, in Gravel Ridge, attended a meeting for the displaced families at Mayflower High School: “I had to really stare down some ExxonMobil goons who told me to leave because it was a private meeting. I politely explained that it was a meeting in a public building about a public subject with numerous public officials in attendance, and that I was planning to stay.”Continue Reading… … Read More
Arkansas attorney general launches investigation into Exxon oil spill
Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel on Thursday night vowed to hold Exxon Mobil accountable after the company’s pipeline ruptured and flooded a small town. He told MSNBC host Rachel Maddow that he expected oil company, not the government, to foot the bill for cleaning up the spill….
Does tar sand oil increase the risk of pipeline spills?
An oil flood through an Arkansas subdivision on March 29 is just the most recent example of pipeline problems in the U.S. In recent weeks, months and years diesel has leaked from a pipeline into wetlands near Salt Lake City; oil has spilled into the Yellowstone River in Montana; and about 20,000 barrels of oil have spewed into the Kalamazoo River in Michigan. The question: Is the problem the pipelines themselves or what they carry?The answer may be an unfortunate combination of the two. Certainly, the infrastructure has issues. The U.S. is crisscrossed by more than four million kilometers of such pipelines, many decades old. These pipelines spring hundreds of leaks every year, most small. The pipelines can fail for reasons ranging from a backhoe inadvertently striking one to the slow but steady weakening from corrosion. “It’s not a matter of if, but when,” says Susan Connolly, a resident of Marshall, Mich., right near where the Kalamazoo River spill occurred in 2010 as a result of external corrosion.Continue Reading… … Read More
Colbert to Arkansas: That’s not even real oil sitting in your yards
On Thursday night’s edition of “The Colbert Report,” host Stephen Colbert talked about the ruptured Exxon-Mobil pipeline in Mayflower, Arkansas. While many residents of the neighborhood where the pipe burst may be unhappy to find themselves driven from their homes by an oil spill,…
Media Grounded: No-fly zone over Arkansas oil spill to censor news coverage?
http://www.youtube.com/v/EKHkXpq3o8E?version=3&f=videos&app=youtube_gdata Link to article: Media Grounded: No-fly zone over Arkansas oil spill to censor news coverage?
Keystone Polling and an Oil Spill Time Machine
Reporting positive polling for the Keystone XL pipeline, USA Today reports, “The numbers come amid continuing efforts to clean up a major new oil spill in Arkansas.” But “come amid” is another way of saying “entirely unrelated to.” … Read More
