How a grassroots groundswell, legal challenges and political and technological sea changes combined to force Virginia’s most powerful company to abandon the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, pivot from natural gas and onto a cleaner energy path. “Hung up in the mountains” Tom Hadwin took a sip
As the pandemic sends shock waves through the energy industry, investors are rethinking their bets on America’s decade-long natural gas boom. On June 28th, Chesapeake Energy filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. It was a long-expected announcement. The hydraulic fracturing pioneer – launched by a young
With its permitting authority over natural gas infrastructure, the little-known Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has sweeping power over individual citizens’ property and our collective climate trajectory. Critics say that reforming its pipeline review process should be high on President Joe Biden’s agenda.
West Virginia State University, a 125-year-old historically black university, rested for decades on the fence line of a pesticide manufacturer, a stone’s throw from tanks holding lethal amounts of one of the world’s most dangerous and infamous chemicals, methyl isocyanate.The chemical, known as MIC, was
Tammy Miser got the call late at night from a family friend. Her brother Shawn may have been injured in a work accident and it might be serious. Shawn Boone was a maintenance man at the Hayes Lemmerz plant in Huntington, Ind., a manufacturer of
U.S. regulators knew they had to act fast. A train hauling 2 million gallons of crude oil from North Dakota had exploded in the Canadian town of Lac-Megantic, killing 47 people. Now they had to assure Americans a similar disaster wouldn’t happen south of the border, where the U.S. oil boom is sending
TRINIDAD, Colorado – When the New Elk mine reopened amid windblown prairies last winter, it attracted little attention. But the mine – a long shaft boring through some of the world’s most valuable coal – strikes at the heart of a growing debate about the future of American coal.
PAVILLION, WY—Jeff and Rhonda Locker’s water changed abruptly one day in the mid-1990s while Rhonda was doing the laundry. A Denver-based gas company was working over an old well in back of their house. Suddenly, the wash water turned black. “It happened just like that,”
BLANCO, New Mexico—Chris Velasquez sees the impacts of gas development in the San Juan Basin of northern New Mexico through the eyes of a rancher. He and his dad ran cattle, until recently, on a grazing allotment called the Rosa, rolling high desert lands punctuated
“As much money as they take out of here, this place should look like New York,” Ken Wiwa says, gesturing at the passing landscape as his car, chauffeured by his father’s driver, Sonny, speeds southeast from Port Harcourt towards Ogoniland along the area’s only major
