Groups Solicit UN to Recognize Fracking as a Human Rights Issue
[Note: This release is presented as an information item, and
is not endorsed by UMRA,]
Food & Water Watch Press Release
14 September 2011
CONTACT: Kate Fried, (202) 683-4905
US Grassroots Effort to Ban Fracking Ramps Up, as Groups Solicit
the UN to Recognize Fracking as a Human Rights Issue Over 5,000
Calls Made to the White House from Citizens Concerned About
Fracking
WASHINGTON / BRUSSELS - September 14 - On the heels of last week’s
demonstration in Philadelphia that attracted over a thousand
activists concerned about the public health and environmental
problems associated with hydraulic fracturing (fracking), over
5,000 Americans from all 50 states flooded White House phone lines
yesterday to tell President Obama to ban the polluting, dangerous
practice. Spearheaded by the national consumer advocacy group Food
& Water Watch, United for Action, and Center for Health,
Environment and Justice, nearly 50 organizations across the
country and individuals in every state called on Obama to ban
fracking.
“President Obama has got an energy problem on his hands,” says
Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food & Water Watch.
“Citizens, many of whom helped to get him elected, are becoming
increasingly worried about fracking and other dirty energy schemes
the administration is assessing, like the Keystone XL pipeline.
Our water resources should not be sacrificed for energy, and he’s
hearing this in no uncertain terms from people all over the
country.”
The calls to the White House come in the lead up to next month’s
critical vote by the Delaware River Basin Commission on whether or
not to open up the watershed to fracking. President Obama has one
of five votes on the Commission, along with the Governors of New
York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware. The Delaware River is
the drinking water source for 15.6 million people in New York,
Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
"Fracking is not clean, or green," says Lois Gibbs, Executive
Director of the Center for Health, Environment & Justice. "We
don't have to look any further than Dimock, Pennsylvania or Dish,
Texas to see the devastating effects of fracking, and we must ban
the practice to ensure that no other communities are made unsafe
or unlivable in its wake."
"There are hundreds of reasons not to frack, any one of which
provides sufficient reason to stop hydraulic fracturing,” says
David Braun, co-founder of United for Action and the National
Grassroots Coalition. “However, we don't just have one good
reason, we don't just have five, but we've got hundreds. So why
are we doing it?"
Food & Water Watch is also bringing fracking to the attention
of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva this week, where UN
observers are weighing in on Catarina De Albuquerque’s report on
the human right to water and sanitation. In her U.S. assessment,
De Albuquerque, the special rapporteur for the human right to
water and sanitation, reported on water contamination found in the
U.S. from fracking and recommended “a holistic consideration of
the right to water by factoring it into policies having an impact
on water quality, ranging from agriculture to chemical use in
products to energy production activities.”
“Now that the human right to water is legally binding and has been
officially recognized by the UN General Assembly, and De
Albuquerque has determined that fracking could further imperil the
human right to water in the U.S., we believe that the U.S. should
stand behind its commitment to safeguarding this precious right to
water and ban fracking,” said Darcey O’Callaghan, International
Policy Director at Food & Water Watch.
According to Food & Water Watch’s recent joint letter with
UNANIMA International to the UN Human Rights Commission, fracking
isn’t only a problem in the U.S. The oil and gas industry has its
sights set on fracking in Europe, with the U.S. energy information
administration forecasting 187 trillion cubic feet of gas
resources available in Poland, followed closely by France at 180
trillion cubic feet. France, however, following strong civil
society protests, currently has a moratorium against fracking.
“Poland is the Marcellus Shale of Europe,” said Gabriella
Zanzanaini, Director of European Affairs for Food & Water
Europe, the European program of Food & Water Watch. “Energy
security is a real concern for Poland, given its current reliance
on Russia, but the government and citizens should also be aware
that fracking can cause explosions, well contamination and public
health effects that could be devastating to rural communities—as
communities in the U.S. have experienced.”
The groups participating in the call-in day to President Obama
include:
- Advocates of Apple Valley NY
- Ashtabula County Farmers' Union
- Bakken Watch
- Catskill Citizens for Safe Energy
- Catskill Mountainkeeper
- CCARE
- Center for Health and Environmental Justice
- Citizens for Elbert County
- Climate Action Coalition of New Paltz
- Damascus Citizens for Sustainability
- Food & Water Watch
- Fort Worth Can Do
- Frack Action
- Frack-Free Catskills
- Gardendale Accountability Project
- Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition (GDAC)
- Grassroots Environmental Education
- Josh Fox and Gasland
- Marcellus Outreach Butler
- Marcellus Protest
- Moveon.org's Denver Council
- National Grassroots Coalition
- NEOGAP (Network for Oil and Gas Accountability and
Protection)
- New Yorkers for Clean Water
- No Frack NY Coalition
- Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York
- NY Residents Against Drilling (NYRAD)
- NYC Friends of Clearwater
- NYH20
- Ohio Alliance for People and Environment
- Peaceful Uprising
- Protect Idaho's Natural Resources
- Protecting Our Waters
- Russian Riverkeeper
- Sharon Springs Against Hydrofracking
- Stop Arkansas Fracking
- Students Against Fracking
- Sustainable Ostego
- T.A.S.K. (Take Action Spread Knowledge)
- Tribeca for Change
- Ulysses Gas Drilling Advisory Board
- United for Action
- Westchester for Change
- Western Colorado Congress
- Wharton Valley Alliance
- What the Frack
- Working Families Party
Food & Water Watch is a nonprofit consumer organization that
works to ensure clean water and safe food. We challenge the
corporate control and abuse of our food and water resources by
empowering people to take action and by transforming the public
consciousness about what we eat and drink.