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In honor of the Oil CEOs who are going to the White House to beg Trump for corporate bailouts, here's a running list of terrible things the fossil fuel industry has been doing during the #COVID19Pandemic
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The National Mining Association is lobbying to get out of paying into the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund that provides healthcare for 20,000 sick coal miners. https://www.nationofchange.org/2020/03/21/coal-industry-group-asks-federal-lawmakers-to-cut-funding-for-black-lung-program-citing-covid-19/
Senate Republicans are proposing that oil and gas companies no longer have to make royalty payments (even though you still have to pay your rent). http://priceofoil.org/content/uploads/2020/04/senate_royalty_letter.pdf
The American Petroleum Institute got the Environmental Protection Agency to stop enforcing environmental and public health protections indefinitely. https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/489753-epa-suspends-enforcement-of-environmental-laws-amid-coronavirus
The fossil fuel industry is lobbying the government to spend $3 billion that could go to coronavirus relief on buying a bunch of oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. https://apnews.com/54cd988eea89176a3cb3329e258ac8ad
Fossil fuel companies are continuing pipeline construction even though it could spread the coronavirus, threatening the health and safety of workers and communities. https://www.eenews.net/stories/1062702737
The Trump Administration, Big Oil, and the auto industry are rolling back CAFE standards, the fuel efficiency rules that prevent pollution and save lives. https://www.desmogblog.com/2020/03/31/trump-safe-cafe-rule-health-climate-oil
Harold Hamm and other Oil CEOs are pushing the Trump Administration to intervene in the Saudi-Russian price war to increase oil prices. https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/oil-us-shale-targets-saudi-arabia-russia-harold-hamm
The Bureau of Land Management is continuing to issue new oil and gas leases at ridiculously low prices, selling off our public lands to the fossil fuel industry. https://www.eenews.net/stories/1062629183
Right-wing state legislators are partnering with the fossil fuel industry to pass a wave of anti-protest bills so they can ram forward new pipeline projects. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/pipeline-protest-laws-coronavirus_n_5e7e7570c5b6256a7a2aab41
The Alberta Government just provided a $1 billion loan and over $4 billion in loan guarantees to TC Energy to build the Keystone XL pipeline. This came just days after the province laid off over 20,000 education workers amid claims of being cash-strapped. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/funding-reduction-alberta-k-12-covid-1.5513803
TC Energy and other pipeline companies are building “man-camps” to house workers to build new pipeline projects. Man camps are already connected to the rise in Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women; now they could become hot zones for the coronavirus. https://earther.gizmodo.com/it-s-like-bringing-smallpox-blankets-in-tribes-fight-k-1842528344
TC Energy is moving the Coastal Gas Link Pipeline forward through Wet’suwet’en land despite Tribal concerns about how construction could spread COVID-19. https://globalnews.ca/news/6750920/first-nation-coastal-gaslink-pipeline-coronavirus/
Oil and gas companies are engaged in lots of financial fuckery to try and make themselves eligible for CARES Act stimulus money, such as hiring new advisors to ensure they can take maximum advantage. https://www.ft.com/content/116fe93a-6fe7-400a-aedf-840ba9738743
Oil and gas companies are lining up to get billions of dollars from the Trump Slush Fund that Mnuchin is going to be dolling out to major corporations. https://earther.gizmodo.com/how-fossil-fuel-companies-could-profit-from-the-covid-1-1842510430
The Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) bailed out Capital One Bank after they made a bunch of super risky commodities trades in the oil and gas sector. https://stopthemoneypipeline.com/capital-one-bailout/
The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Association (PHMSA) has stopped enforcing compliance with its regulations. It has also encouraged state pipeline safety organizations to suspend enforcement of regulations. https://compressortech2.com/phmsa-temporarily-relaxes-compliance-enforcement-for-pipeline-operators/
Trump’s EPA is allowing the sale of dirtier “winter fuel” gasoline during COVID-19, worsening air quality in the midst of a respiratory virus pandemic. https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/489923-epa-extends-time-for-winter-gasoline-sales
Whiting Petroleum Corp, the first major fracking company to go bust during the crisis, provided $14.6 million in cash bonuses for top executives, including $6.4 million for CEO Brad Holly, just days before filing for bankruptcy. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/whiting-executives-got-14-6-million-bonuses-before-bankruptcy
Ohio-based Murray Energy, the largest private coal miner in the U.S., is asking the judge overseeing its Chapter 11 bankruptcy to let it shed certain health-care obligations. https://www.post-gazette.com/business/powersource/2020/04/01/Murray-Energy-faces-liquidation-coal-giant-cash-strapped/stories/202004010059
The coronavirus doesn't harm the Sage Grouse (that we know of), but the Trump Administration sure does: on behalf of the oil and gas industry, they're appealing a federal ruling that canceled a $125 million lease sale on public lands. https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2020/04/01/stories/1062760509
Trump's Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved Pembina's Jordan Cove Energy Project in Coos Bay, Oregon that, if completed, will be the biggest carbon producer in the state. https://www.opb.org/news/article/jordan-cove-energy-project-federal-approval-state-permit-denials/
Fossil fuel companies are also big petrochemical producers -- they're now looking to build a giant plastics plant in the most polluted part of America, putting local residents at risk. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/01/cancer-town-chemical-plant-plastics-louisiana-toxic-pollution-greenhouse-gas
The industry has unleashed an army of lobbyists to take advantage of stimulus funding in response to the coronavirus. @InfluenceMap has pulled together a report that lays it all out in gory detail. https://influencemap.org/report/The-Coronavirus-Crisis-and-Climate-Lobbying-23249d39450ff19b441090a6a50174eb
The team at @greenpeaceusa has put together a dossier on the 7 Oily Henchman of the Climate Apocalypse who are visiting the White House tomorrow. You know they're going to be up to some terrible things. https://twitter.com/Ryschlee/status/1245780348874571777
Need some good news? There's an incredible movement of people and organizations who are fighting back against Big Oil. Check out some of the quotes in this press release bashing tomorrow's Oil CEO event at the White House. https://stopthemoneypipeline.com/oil-ceos-white-house/
After Indigenous leaders compared building Keystone XL during #COVID19 to “bringing smallpox blankets to the reservation,” @Chase and @Citi decided to underwrite $1.25 billion in bonds for @TCEnergy, the company behind the project. https://www.ran.org/press-releases/reckless-keystone-xl-decision-backed-by-chase-citi-and-banks/
The BLM is looking to lease 100,000 acres near Arches and Canyonlands National Parks for oil and gas drilling -- public lands are closed to you and me during the pandemic, but clearly still open for destruction. https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2020/04/05/industry-seeks-lease/
The fossil fuel industry created a secret backchannel with the Trump Administration where they discussed exactly how to dismantle environmental protections during the #coronavirus pandemic. https://news.bloomberglaw.com/environment-and-energy/alleged-industry-back-channel-blasted-by-environmental-groups
