FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The Power Past Fracked Gas and the Stand Up to Oil coalitions issued the following joint statement in response to the Oregon Department of Energy’s notice of violation to Chemical Waste Management for illegally burying fracking waste near Arlington, OR.
Joint Statement from Stand Up to Oil and Power Past Fracked Gas Coalitions:
“Today’s shocking announcement underscores the need to break from dirty fossil fuels. We’re calling on Governor Brown to protect all Oregonians from dangerous fracking waste,” said Dan Serres, Conservation Director for Columbia Riverkeeper and Co-Director of the Power Past Fracked Gas Coalition. “At every step, fracking is dirty and dangerous.”
“It’s a flagrant disregard for health and safety,” said Anna Doty, Director of the Stand Up To Oil coalition. “Whether fracking waste or crude oil, we cannot continue to allow the oil and gas industry to put our communities at risk by transporting and storing their toxic products unchecked throughout the Northwest.”
“Oregon Physicians for Social Responsibility has researched and witnessed the negative health impacts that the process of fracking both oil and gas causes for decades. We are deeply concerned that Chemical Waste Management has illegally dumped radioactive waste that could harm Oregonians, wildlife, and waters,” said Lluvia Merello, Energy Justice Organizer for Oregon Physicians for Social Responsibility.
“I call on Oregon to take immediate action to investigate and require Chemical Waste Management to remediate the damage,” said Cathy Sampson-Kruse, a member of the Confederated Tribes of Umatilla Indian Reservation and a Columbia Riverkeeper board member. “The action by Chemical Waste Management endangers all living beings in the path of this fracking waste as well as our land, air, and waterways.”
“It’s absolutely outrageous that radioactive fracking waste was apparently shipped through Spokane with no public knowledge,” said Laura Ackerman, Energy Program Director for the Lands Council in Spokane. “Our area depends on a sole-source drinking water aquifer. We cannot keep gambling with oil trains and fracking waste trains posing a threat to our drinking water and safety.”
This is a developing story and we will continue to monitor the situation.
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Stand Up to Oil is a growing coalition of groups opposed to new oil terminals and an increase in oil transport through the Northwest, while working to improve safety measures for oil currently traveling through the region.
Power Past Fracked Gas is a thriving coalition of Pacific Northwest health, environmental, faith, and community groups that believe in the power of clean energy and the value of clean water, and who oppose the expansion of new fracked gas projects.
Contact:
Dan Serres, Co-Director, Power Past Fracked Gas Coalition; Member, Stand Up to Oil Coalition; (503) 890-2441, dan@columbiariverkeeper.org
Background:
- The process of hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) uses tremendous amounts of fresh water which gathers and concentrates naturally occurring radioactive elements from rock formations. Filtering and processing the fracking fluid further concentrates the radioactive pollution.
- Rolling Stone recently reported that U.S. oil and gas wells produce almost one trillion gallons of liquid fracking waste yearly.