First In-Depth Report on Potential Impact of Fracking on Food

[marmar]

from Civil Eats:


First In-Depth Report on Potential Impact of Fracking on Food

November 29th, 2012
By Paula Crossfield


In the midst of the domestic energy boom, livestock on farms near oil-and-gas drilling operations nationwide have been quietly falling sick and dying, according to the latest report by [font color="blue"]Food & Environment Reporting Network[/font]. Elizabeth Royte wrote the cover story, “What the Frack Is in our Food,” for the December 17, 2012, issue of The Nation magazine.

“In Pennsylvania, the oil and gas industry is already on a tear—drilling thousands of feet into ancient seabeds, then repeatedly fracturing (or ‘fracking’) these wells with millions of gallons of highly pressurized, chemically laced water, which shatters the surrounding shale and releases fossil fuels,” Royte writes. “New York, meanwhile, is on its own natural-resource tear, with hundreds of newly opened breweries, wineries, organic dairies and pastured livestock operations—all of them capitalizing on the metropolitan area’s hunger to localize its diet. But there’s growing evidence that these two impulses, toward energy and food independence, may be at odds with each other.”

The story, the first in-depth look at the potential impact of fracking on food, cites the first and only peer-reviewed report, published earlier this year, suggesting a possible link between fracking and illness in food animals. It includes 24 case studies of farmers in shale-gas states whose livestock have experienced neurological, reproductive, and acute gastrointestinal problems after being exposed—either accidentally or incidentally—to fracking chemicals in the water or air.

Farmers are not required to prove that livestock are free of contamination before selling them to middlemen, and federal authorities are not testing for these compounds at slaughterhouses. “[Exposed livestock] are making their way into the food system, and it’s very worrisome to us,” says one of the authors of the report, Michelle Bamberger, an Ithaca, New York, veterinarian. “They live in areas that have tested positive for air, water, and soil contamination. Some of these chemicals could appear in milk and meat products made from these animals.” ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://civileats.com/2012/11/29/first-in-depth-report-on-potential-impact-of-fracking-on-food/

[Berlum]

1. Wow - How Fracking stupid can they (R) be?

[The Wielding Truth]

3. Very poignant.

[The Wielding Truth]

2. Just like the nuclear logic that it's very safe.... until there is an accident then too bad, every-

thing is ruined.

[tama]

4. Oil industry has bought Dems

So far I've learned that 2008 oil industry triipled it's lobbying costs; Susan Rice and John Kerry are huge investors in Tar Sands - who else and how did that happen?

There's a big story of corruption there, no doubt, and to fight back, the corrupt motherfuckers need to be exposed.