‘We’re Talking Very Big Bucks’: New Bill Could Put Oil Companies on the Hook for Climate Change Costs

Oil companies have become some of the wealthiest organizations in history by producing a product that we now know is endangering the future of humanity.

Many of these companies have known about the effects of carbon dioxide for decades, yet while they adapted their own businesses to survive climate change, they actively undermined efforts to understand it.

Should Canadians be able to sue oil companies for that?

“They are in a position to pay for this damage; they have the responsibility to pay for this damage,” Peter Tabuns, the NDP’s climate change critic in the Ontario legislature, told DeSmog Canada. “We’re talking very big bucks.”

Read Jimmy Thomson’s DeSmog Canada story - “‘We’re Talking Very Big Bucks’: New Bill Could Put Oil Companies on the Hook for Climate Change Costs.”

We Are Drowning In Plastic, and Fracking Companies Are Profiting

We are choking the planet in plastic. Everything from wasteful water bottles to grocery shopping bags are polluting our waterways, and endangering marine life and the natural environment. It’s fair to say that even the most casual news consumer has probably encountered a Facebook post, TV report, or radio segment about the garbage patches in the Pacific Ocean. 

Plastics and other detritus line the shore of the
 Thames Estuary on January 2, 2018 in Cliffe, Kent.

But what’s less well-known is what is fueling this plastics binge: fracking. As the Guardian recently reported, in less than a decade, tens of billions of dollars have been invested in creating new manufacturing sites around the world to turn fossil fuels into resin pellets used to manufacture plastic products. The companies profiting off this surge in plastics are contributing to a growing climate crisis while generating mountains of plastic garbage.

Read the Yes! Magazine story by Wenonah Hauter - “We Are Drowning In Plastic, and Fracking Companies Are Profiting.”

Toxic waste could endanger drinking water if Santos CSG project goes ahead – report

Up to 130 spills of toxic waste could occur if the Santos Narrabri coal seam gas project goes ahead, potentially endangering high-quality drinking and irrigation water, according to a leading academic.

An area of bushland being rejuvenated after a spill at
 Santos’ Bibblewindi water treatment facility which is
part of Santos’s Narrabri gas project. 

In a damning report obtained by Guardian Australia, RMIT hydrologist Matthew Currell said he found basic scientific gaps in the 7,000-page Narrabri gas project environmental impact statement (EIS).

Currell, a senior lecturer in environmental engineering, said the EIS was missing analysis of waste water from existing gas wells and contains conflicting information on whether the project area was part of the recharge zone for the Great Artesian Basin.

He said neither Santos nor the New South Wales government had enough monitoring wells to ensure groundwater was properly monitored.

Read Gabrielle Chan’s story on The Guardian - “Toxic waste could endanger drinking water if Santos CSG project goes ahead – report.”