Environment

Image: Polling results as a graph.

cleantechnica.com - January 23rd 2015 - Joshua S. Hill

The US Natural Resources Defense Council has released the results of a new “bipartisan” poll of five key states that sought “Views on Environmental Regulations,” which clearly show Americans are not only in favor of existing environmental protections — and in some cases favor tougher enforcement — but also support President Obama’s climate and clean energy initiatives.

The polling results are labelled as “bipartisan” due to the combined efforts of Democratic pollsters Hart Research Associates, and Republican polling firm American Viewpoint.

Together, the two firms — which conducted a survey of 2016 likely voters in Colorado, Florida, Maine, New Hampshire, and Virginia — found that “there is no appetite” for the “weakening of environmental regulations,” adding that “most respondents in these states believe that enforcement of environmental regulations is not tough enough.”

cnn.com - January 20th 2015 - Holly Yan

A Montana pipeline burst sent as much as 50,400 gallons of oil gushing into the Yellowstone River, prompting the governor to declare a state of emergency.

Residents in nearby cities were told not to drink the tap water, which some said smelled like diesel.

The massive oil spill happened when the 12-inch pipeline, which crosses the Yellowstone River, ruptured Saturday about 5 miles upstream from Glendive, Montana's Department of Environmental Quality said.

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environmentalleader.com - October 16th, 2014

By 2020 the world economy could be facing a skills deficit driven by mega-trends such as population growth, increasing demand for natural resources, and soaring costs of energy, coupled with the impacts of climate change and ecosystem degradation, according to a report by the Institute of Environmental Management & Awareness.

Although the transition to a sustainable economy presents significant opportunities for business, according to an IEMA survey of over 900 organizations, only 13 percent of companies are fully confident that they have the skills to successfully compete in the sustainable economy.

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Image: North Dakota is in the midst of an oil boom. Farmers are coping with the environmental and financial costs of wastewater spills from the drilling.Dermot Tatlow / LAIF / Redux

america.aljazeera.com - September 6th, 2014 - Laura Gottesdiener

Last summer, in a wet, remote section of farm country in Bottineau County, landowner Mike Artz and his two neighbors discovered that a ruptured pipeline was spewing contaminated wastewater into his crop fields.

“We saw all this oil on the low area, and all this salt water spread out beyond it,” said his neighbor Larry Peterson, who works as a farmer and an oil-shale contractor. “The water ran out into the wetland.”

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