Dissolving the Planet for Oil - Mankind: Death by Corporation, Part IV

[marmar]

Dissolving the Planet for Oil - Mankind: Death by Corporation, Part IV

Monday, 09 September 2013 09:06
By Dr Brian Moench, Truthout | News Analysis


One of the most iconic scenes in movie history occurs near the climax of Raiders of the Lost Ark. A fictitious German army officer and Indiana Jones's archeological nemesis have captured Jones and his newly found ark of the covenant. As Jones somehow knows to look the other way, his nefarious but ignorant captors open the chest holding the ark. Demons pour out and within seconds their exhilaration turns to horror as their flesh hideously melts off their bones, and they die a spectacular death by an unspecified supernatural acid.

There is a real-life counterpart to this Indiana Jones supernatural acid - hydrofluoric acid, or HF. It's not quite as depicted in Breaking Bad, but through exposure of skin or eyes, or when inhaled or swallowed, HF readily penetrates tissue, poisoning as it goes. Symptoms of exposure to hydrofluoric acid may not be immediately evident, but because HF interferes with nerve function it can wreak systemic havoc, resulting in death. HF is likely still being used and stored by a refinery near you.

But just when you thought that the oil companies couldn't possibly put more poison into our air and water, do more damage to the earth, to our climate, to our future and our hope for survival, along comes "matrix acidizing," the oil industry's latest stroke of genius to extract oil from shale formations by literally disintegrating underground rock formations using - you guessed it, hydrofluoric acid.

During the summer of 1986, Amoco, Allied-Signal, Du Pont and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory voluntarily conducted a series of six experiments involving atmospheric releases of HF in an attempt to characterize its behavior. These studies, known as the "Goldfish studies," were conducted at the Department of Energy Liquefied Gaseous Fuels Spill Test Facility in Nevada and showed that the HF did not remain a liquid following accidental release. Instead, under the conditions simulating a petroleum refinery explosion (HF above its boiling point and liquefied under pressure), 100 percent of the released liquid HF formed dense, rolling clouds of toxic vapor. The clouds expanded rapidly, and researchers measured dangerous concentrations at distances of three to six miles downwind. A person caught in this cloud would experience burning eyes, nose and throat. Soon their lungs would become inflamed and overwhelmed with fluid, followed by acute respiratory distress syndrome, ARDS, and most likely death within a few hours. .....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://truth-out.org/news/item/18369-mankind-death-by-corporation-part-iv-disintegrating-the-planet-for-oil