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RELEASE: 

Sally Brown and BioCycle Magazine, Supporters of Growing Food in Sewage Sludge, Call Organic Food Advocates "Ecoterrorists"



by Erica Pelzek — April 12, 2011 - 11:22am
  • Topics: Agriculture, Activism, Environment

    • CONTACT: John Stauber, Senior Adviser, Food Rights Network
    PHONE: (608) 260-9713; (608) 279-4044
    EMAIL: FoodRightsNetwork@gmail.com

    Sally Brown and BioCycle Magazine, Supporters of Growing Food in Sewage Sludge, Call Organic Food Advocates "Ecoterrorists"

    Organic Consumers Association and Food Rights Network Demand Retraction at April 12 BioCycle Conference (Brown Headlining)

    SAN DIEGO--Leading organic gardening and food safety advocates who oppose growing food in sewage sludge are attending the national BioCycle magazine conference Tuesday, April 12, 2011 in San Diego to demand an apology and retraction from Sally Brown, a columnist and editorial board member of BioCycle magazine, and from Nora Goldstein, the executive editor of BioCycle.

    News

    Fracking Insiders Score Big in New Gas Bill, But Americans Not Told the True Costs of Massive Drilling Plan

    by Steve Horn — April 7, 2011 - 11:00pm
  • Topics: Energy, Environment

    • Corporate insiders peddling the claim that drilling for methane gas will solve America's energy needs just scored big in Washington -- and for these insiders fracking for gas is very lucrative business. House Resolution 1380, given the feel-good moniker of the "New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions Act " or "NAT GAS Act," was announced on Wednesday, April 6, in the U. S. House of Representatives. The bill is 24-pages long and rewards the fracking industry with tax credits and products to help "drive" consumption. The bigger the vehicle, the more tax credits given.

    This initiative to expand the controversial fracking process -- which has already resulted in contaminated wells and rivers and even ignitable tap water for some -- is being spearheaded in Congress by Reps. John Sullivan (R-Oklahoma), Dan Boren (D-Oklahoma), John Larson (D-Connecticut), and Kevin Brady (R-Texas). The bill has 77 co-sponsors, with 40 Democrats in support, and 37 Republicans, from 33 different states.

    But, perhaps its most powerful supporter or potential supporter is President Barack Obama. Just two weeks ago, he alluded to being a strong supporter of a bill of this nature in a speech on March 30 on "America's Energy Security" at Georgetown University. In that address, he specifically mentioned T. Boone Pickens's name when discussing legislation to support expanded fracking for methane.

    News

    Attacking the Messenger: Smearing "Gasland" Producer Josh Fox

    by Steve Horn — March 30, 2011 - 12:23pm
  • Topics: Energy, Environment, Propaganda, Public Relations

    • Gasland, a documentary film that exposes the dangers accompanying methane gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale region, has been mercilessly attacked by Big Oil since the film was released during the summer of 2010. The attacks have only escalated both in intensity and volume as the film has grown in popularity and acclaim, reaching their peak when it was announced that the film was a candidate for Best Documentary at the 2011 Academy Awards.

    While most of the spin has centered around factual misinformation about fracking, utilizing the prototypical Big Oil, Big Lies playbook tactic, Big Oil has now raised the stakes. In lieu of lying about how "environmentally friendly" the fracking process is, they have shifted to the propagandist's last resort: shooting the messenger.

    David Koch Donates to Fight Cancer While His Company Fights the Regulation of Carcinogens

    by Anne Landman — March 5, 2011 - 10:39am

    Scientists, politicians and Nobel laureates lauded billionaire David H. Koch at an event on March 4, 2011 for donating hundreds of millions of dollars to cancer research. Koch decided to put money towards cancer research after he contracted prostate cancer in 1992.

    Main Source: 
    New York Times, March 4, 2011

    Who is Caving to Pressure Against Josh Fox's Oscar-Nominated Documentary, Gasland?

    by Lisa Graves — February 26, 2011 - 12:56am
  • Topics: Environment

    • (Editor's note: As we've noted, Josh Fox's documentary, GASLAND, is an Oscar contender this weekend, and the Big Gas industry has been doing everything it can to block this powerful film from winning. Below is the latest in this saga against a film which will open your eyes to the expanded drilling operations and the devastating consequences so far. Josh's film is just a day away from the Oscar ceremony. Visit our water portal page on SourceWatch to find out more about the dangerous practice of horizontal fracturing, "fracking," of the earth with a cocktail of chemicals. Here is a note from Josh on the latest news in the corporate PR spin campaign.)

    From Documentary Filmmaker Josh Fox--

    Something bizarre just happened at the Wall Street Journal. At 6 p.m. I was reading a home page story on WSJ.com called "Oscar's Attention Irks Gas Industry" by Ben Casselman which contained perhaps the most honest and revealing quote from the gas industry that I have read to date about their obsession with attacking my film GASLAND. The quote reads "We have to stop blaming documentaries and take a look in the mirror," said Matt Pitzarella, a spokesman for gas producer Range Resources Corp. Just thirty minutes later the quote mysteriously disappears, edited out and in its place is a far more typical spin controlled statement from Tom Price of Chesapeake energy saying, "We need to be able to respond objectively and accurately." Sounds like a robot at a PR agency, more than a person.

    Big Oil's Massive Diesel Injection

    by Steve Horn — January 31, 2011 - 7:47pm

    The Marcellus Shale lies are unraveling daily right before our eyes. T. Boone Pickens, for example, was on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show on Thurs. Jan. 27 to hype up the Pickens Plan. Yet, this is what the Pickens Plan will get us on a weekly, if not daily basis. The New York Times reports:

    Drilling service companies have injected at least 32 million gallons of diesel fuel underground as part of a controversial drilling technique, a Democratic congressional investigation has found. Injecting diesel as part of hydraulic fracturing is supposed to be regulated by U.S. EPA. But an agency official told congressional investigators that EPA had assumed that the use of diesel had stopped seven years ago ...The letter said they had not been able to determine whether the diesel injections threatened groundwater. The service companies told Waxman's staff they did not know how close their frack jobs were to sources of drinking water, saying their clients, the well operators, would have that information. Of the total figure, 10 million gallons was 'straight diesel fuel,' according to the letter, while another 22 million gallons was products containing at least 30 percent diesel.

    Main Source: 
    New York Times, Jan. 31, 2011

    Whole Foods Market Caves to Monsanto

    by PRW Staff — January 28, 2011 - 3:09pm

    After 12 years of battling to stop Monsanto's genetically-engineered (GE) crops from contaminating the nation's organic farmland, the biggest retailers of "natural" and "organic" foods in the U.S., including Whole Foods Market (WFM), Organic Valley and Stonyfield Farm, have agreed to stop opposing mass commercialization of GE crops, like Monsanto's controversial Roundup Ready alfalfa.

    Main Source: 
    CounterPunch, January 28, 2011

    EPA's Oil Dispersant Ignorance Again on Display

    by Steve Horn — January 28, 2011 - 2:50pm

    Back in July, 2010 PRWatch noted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ignorance about the potential for ecological damage from BP dumping millions of gallons of oil dispersants into the Gulf to try to limit damage from the BP Deepwater Horizon blowout. Yesterday, scientists released a report that re-confirmed the EPA's voluntary ignorance.

    Main Source: 
    ProPublica, January 27, 2011

    "Gasland" Up for Best Feature Documentary At Oscars

    by Steve Horn — January 25, 2011 - 3:40pm
  • Topics: Front Groups, Environment, Propaganda, Public Relations

    • Gasland, the documentary produced and directed by Josh Fox, is up for an Oscar for Best Documentary in the Feature Category.

    The film put the harms associated with natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale in the national limelight and begat a propaganda campaign by Energy in Depth (EID). EID, for those who have not heard of it, is a pro-oil-and-gas drilling industry front group formed by the American Petroleum Institute.

    Like their "Debunking Gasland" campaign, thoroughly debunked by Kevin Grandia of DeSmogBlog as an absurd misinformation campaign, EID is at it again, this time in the form of an idiotic smear campaign.

    "Clean Natural Gas?" Not So Fast.

    by Steve Horn — January 25, 2011 - 12:23pm

    Acquiring "clean natural gas" and "getting off of foreign oil" are pitched as reasons to continue natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale. And yet, beyond all the problems associated with fracking, Pro Publica's Abrahm Lustgarten revealed in a January 25, 2011 article that "clean natural gas" isn't all that clean after all. Lustgarten writes,

    The United States is poised to bet its energy future on natural gas as a clean, plentiful fuel that can supplant coal and oil. But new research by the Environmental Protection Agency … is casting doubt on the assumption that gas offers a quick and easy solution to climate change … Advocates for natural gas routinely assert that it produces 50 percent less greenhouse gases than coal and is a significant step toward a greener energy future …The EPA now reports that emissions from conventional hydraulic fracturing are 35 times higher than the agency had previously estimated. It also reports that emissions from the type of hydraulic fracturing being used in the nation’s bountiful new shale gas reserves, like the Marcellus, are almost 9,000 times higher than it had previously calculated …"

    Environmental groups say we should be certain of the factual data about emissions and environmental effects of shale gas drilling before making major policy decisions that push the nation into dependence on methane gas obtained through drilling.

    Main Source: 
    ProPublica, January 25, 2011
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