Thursday, June 24, 2010

Gasland: America's Inconvient Natural Gas Truth

I know it's been almost a month since I last posted, but this topic is so important I let go of my petty little life problems and sat down to write about it.  If you are subscribed to HBO, record and watch Gasland.  If you're not, find a friend who is.  This is a story every American needs to know and, having learned the truth about another dirty little secret from the previous administration, everyone needs to work to stop the increase of natural gas production.

Like most, I believed the hype.  I saw T. Boone Pickens on TV advocating for natural gas as a way to bridge our country's transition to clean renewable energy.  I thought, "Maybe this man isn't as crazy as he sounds?"  Of course, then I learned how much money he was making from natural gas and I became suspicious.  Tonight, I watched the documentary Gasland on HBO.  My suspicions were confirmed still further, with horror and fear to top it all off.

I'm sure everyone has heard about people who can light their water on fire.  Personally, I thought it was an urban legend or just some dumb joke.  Instead it is a waking nightmare for thousands of people in the Midwest and Middle South, from New Mexico to Colorado, Utah, Texas, Arkansas, and yes Louisiana.  Contaminated drinking water, not fit for anything living to drink, pours into these people's homes through their faucets.  When you watch the documentary, you'll see many people light their water on fire.  And by many, I mean just about every person the director/writer interviews.

There are jars of murky water.  There are dead animals who drank the contaminated creek or river water.  There are chemical emissions hundreds of times above heath standards.  And there are companies (and yes Halliburton is one of them; they even have a loophole named after them) who are involved, but they constantly deny all of it: the problems faced by the victims, the toxic chemicals they refuse to disclose, the harm it is all causing.

Watching this movie was like watching An Inconvenient Truth, but going 100mph.  Neurological problems, cancer, loss of hair, deaths.  It's all happening right now.  And the public at large just doesn't know.

This is the type of movie that makes you want to scream, to hit someone or something, and then ride your bike to work.  If you watch this movie, you will not want to use any natural gas.  I say this as a person who is about to move into an apartment where my heat is created through natural gas (and yes, it gets very cold in the winter where I live).  I say this as a young America who wants her future children to have clean air and clean drinking water.  And I say this as a person who votes.

Watch this movie.  It is yet more you need to know and more you need to work towards fixing.

At the end of this movie, I remarked how I would love to see wind turbines on the sides of highways, out in the ocean in the horizon, in back yards, in fields, anywhere you could fit them.  The same holds true for solar panels.

I can't remember what I was watching, but a gentleman remarked you could almost create universal clean energy just by paying every household $7000 to put solar panels on their roof.  This also included apartment buildings and the like.  And he said how absurd this was because it cost too much to implement.  But what he didn't ponder is the cost we are already paying because we have not converted to a clean energy society.

If anything, I believe everyone in the Gulf region would argue for a better way to find energy than what we are doing now.

I suppose this is all to say: I'm willing to pay to have clean air and clean water for myself and my future family.  And I believe others are willing to, as well.  Because I don't want to pay for my lifestyle the way our country currently is.

No comments:

Post a Comment

hit counter
hit counter