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State Department Keystone XL Contractor ERM Bribed Chinese Agency To Permit Project

January 5, 2015 By Steve Horn Leave a Comment

Environmental Resources Management (ERM Group), the consultancy selected byTransCanada to conduct the environmental review for Keystone XL’s northern leg on behalf of the U.S. State Department, is no stranger to scandal.

Exhibit A: ERM once bribed a Chinese official to ram through major pieces of an industrial development project. ERM was tasked to push through the project in Hangzhou Bay, located near Shanghai.

Accepting the bribe landed Yan Shunjun, former deputy head of the Shanghai Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau, an 11-year prison sentence. Yan “allegedly took bribes of 864,000 yuan (126,501 U.S. dollars), 20,000 U.S. dollars and 4,000 euros from seven contractors,” explained Xiuhuanet. “Yan was also accused of illegally setting up a channel to speed up environmental impact assessment processes, which are essential for companies wanting to build factories.”

Filed Under: Environment, Foreign Affairs Tagged With: #NoKXL, Alaska, Alberta canada, Alberta Tar Sands, bitumen, Bloomberg Businessweek, carbon web, Central Asia, China, communism, Copenhagen, Denmark, dilbit, diluted bitumen, Doug Hayes Sierra Club, environmental resources management, ERM Group, Hangzhou Bay, Heavy Oil, Hopenhagen, Keystone Pipeline System, Keystone XL, Keystone XL North, Keystone XL Northern Leg, Keystone XL South, KXL, KXL North, KXL South, London, oil sands, People's Daily, People's Daily Communist Party, Peru, Shanghai, Shanghai Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau, Sierra Club, Sierra Club Doug Hayes, Sinopecerm, Sunday Times, Tar sands, TransCanada, U.N., unconventional oil, United Nations, Xiuhuanet, Yan Shunjunbp

Revealed: How The Latest Defense Bill Supports Fracking On Public Land

December 16, 2014 By Steve Horn 1 Comment

The U.S. Senate has voted 89-11 to approve the Defense Authorization Act of 2015, following the December 4 U.S. House of Representatives’ 300-119 up-vote and now awaits President Barack Obama’s signature.

The 1,616-page piece of pork barrel legislation contains a provision — among other controversial measures — to streamline permitting for hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) on U.S. public lands overseen by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), a unit of the U.S. Department of Interior.

Buried on page 1,156 of the bill as Section 3021 and subtitled “Bureau of Land Management Permit Processing,” the bill’s passage has won praise from both the American Petroleum Institute (API) and the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) and comes on the heels of countries from around the world coming to a preliminary deal at the United Nations climate summit in Lima, Peru, to cap greenhouse gas emissions.

Filed Under: Environment, National News Tagged With: America's Natural Gas Alliance, American Petroleum Institute, ANGA, API, Bakken Shale, BLM, BLM Fracking Rules, BLM Hydraulic Fracturing Rules, BLM Permit Processing Improvement Act, BLM Streamlining, Buck McKeon, bureau of land management, California, Carl Levin, Department of Interior, DOI, fracking, Fracking on Public Lands, H.R. 3979, Heather Zichal, Howard McKeon, hydraulic fracturing, Independent Petroleum Association of America, IPAAS. 2440, John Hoeven, Michigan, National Defense Authorization Act of 2015, NDAA, New Mexico, S.2410, shale gas, shale oil, Sierra Club, U.S. Rep. Buck McKeon, U.S. Rep. Howard Buck McKeon, U.S. Representative Buck McKeon, U.S. Representative Howard Buck McKeon, U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, U.S. Sen. John Hoeven, U.S. Senator Carl Levin, U.S. Senator John Hoeven, unconventional gas, unconventional oil, Wyoming

Federal Reserve Policy Keeps Fracking Bubble Afloat And That May Change Soon

November 5, 2014 By Steve Horn Leave a Comment

In August 2005, the U.S. Congress and then-President George W. Bush blessed the oil and gas industry with a game-changer: the Energy Policy Act of 2005. The Act exempted the industry from federal regulatory enforcement of the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

While the piece of omnibus legislation is well-known to close observers of the hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) issue — especially the “Halliburton Loophole” — lesser known is another blessing bestowed upon shale gas and tight oil drillers: near zero-percent interest rates for debt accrued during the capital-intensive oil and gas production process.

Or put more bluntly, near-free money from the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank. That trend may soon come to a close, as the Federal Reserve recently announced an end to its controversial $3 trillion bond-buying program.

Filed Under: Environment, National News Tagged With: bloomberg, Carl Gibson, Collin Eaton, Credit Card Debt, Credit Cards, Drilling Deeper A Reality Check on U.S. Government Forecasts for a Lasting Tight Oil & Shale Gas Boom, Energy Aspects, Food & Water Watch, Food and Water Watch, fracked gas, Fracked Oil, fracking, Global Hunter Securities, Houston Chronicle, Hugh MacMillan, hydraulic fracturing, Interest Rates, James Bullard, Mike Hunter, Occupy, Occupy Wall Street, Peritus Asset Management LLC, quantitative easing, Shale Bubble, shale gas, Strike Debt, Student Loan Debt, The Urgent Case for a Ban on Fracking, Tight Gas, Tight Oil, Tim Gramatovich, U.S. Federal Reserve, unconventional gas, unconventional oil, US Uncut, Vivendra Chauhan

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