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Abstract
This article explores the potential human rights impacts of the ‘extreme energy’ process, specifically focussing on the production of shale gas, coal-bed methane (CBM) and ‘tight oil’, known colloquially as ‘fracking’. The article locates the discussion within a broader context of resource depletion, the ‘limits to growth' and the process of extreme energy itself. Utilising recent secondary data from the United States and Australia, combined with the preliminary findings of our ethnographic fieldwork in the United Kingdom, the article outlines a prima facie case for investigating ‘fracking’ development through a human rights lens. Indeed, based on considerable emerging evidence we argue that ‘fracking’ development poses a significant risk to a range of key human rights and should thus form the subject of a multitude of comprehensive, interdisciplinary human rights impact assessments (HRIAs) as a matter of urgency. Finally, given the close relationships between government and extractive industries, we argue that these impact assessments must do more than bolster corporate social responsibility (CSR) statements and should be truly independent of either government or industry influence.
Notes on contributors
Damien Short is Reader in Human Rights and Director of the Human Rights Consortium and the Extreme Energy Initiative (http://extremeenergy.org) at the School of Advanced Study, University of London. He has published extensively on indigenous peoples' rights, reconciliation projects, colonialism and genocide studies. His more recent work concerns the genocide ecocide nexus and the role of extreme energy. He can be contacted on [email protected].
Kadin Norder is a Research Associate at the Human Rights Consortium with interests in the connections between human rights, economics, governance, and the environment. She previously conducted research for the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative and the U.S. White House. She works for the Rights of Nature European Citizen's Initiative in Sweden.
Jess Elliot is a Research Associate of the Human Rights Consortium, and has co-authored articles with Damien Short for The Ecologist and The Conversation on the impact of fracking on civil and political rights. Her research interests lie primarily with the impact of extractive industries upon human rights and the environment. Jess currently works as part of the British Red Cross Refugee Support team.
Ed Lloyd-Davies is a Research Associate of the Human Rights Consortium. He trained as an astrophysicist at the University of Birmingham and has worked for over 10 years as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan and the University of Sussex. He has been involved in writing over 20 papers on extragalactic astrophysics and cosmology. He now works as a freelance researcher, focusing on environmental issues, particularly extreme energy.
Joanna Morley is a Research Associate at the Human Rights Consortium with interests in the connections between human rights, development, business and international governance. She is currently completing an MA in Understanding and Securing Human Rights at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies in London, England.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. Olivia Ball and Paul Gready, No-nonsense Guide to Human Rights (Oxford: New Internationalist, 2006); Upendra Baxi, The Future of Human Rights (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002); Rhonda L. Callaway and Julie Harrelson-Stephens, eds, Exploring International Human Rights: Essential Readings (London: Lynne Reiner, 2007); Marie-Bénédicte Dembour and Richard Wilson, eds, Culture and Rights: An Anthropological Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 1–26; Jack Donnelly, Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003); Michael Freeman, Human Rights: An Interdisciplinary Approach (Cambridge: Polity, 2002); Michael Goodhart, ed., Human Rights Politics and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010); Gerd Oberleitner, Global Human Rights Institutions (Cambridge: Polity, 2007); Rhona Smith and Christien van den Anker, The Essentials of Human Rights (London: Hodder Arnold, 2005).
2. ‘Minimalist’ in the sense that Nickel argues, correctly in our view, that human rights are not ideals of the good life for humans, they are rather concerned with ensuring conditions, negative and positive, of a ‘minimally good life’.
3. James Nickel, Making Sense of Human Rights, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2007), 138.
4. Ibid.
5. Martin Crook and Damien Short, ‘Marx, Lemkin and the Genocide-Ecocide Nexus', International Journal of Human Rights 18, no. 3 (2014): 298–319 (Special Issue: Climate Change, Environmental Violence and Genocide, ed. Jurgen Zimmerer).
6. Rhoda Howard-Hassmann, ‘The Second Great Transformation: Human Rights Leapfrogging in the Era of Globalization', Human Rights Quarterly 27, no. 1 (2005): 1–40; Adamantia Pollis, ‘Commentary on the Second Great Transformation', Human Rights Quarterly 27, no. 3 (2005): 1120–1; Rhoda Howard-Hassmann, ‘Reply to Adamantia Pollis', Human Rights Quarterly 28, no. 1 (2006): 277–8.
7. Donella H. Meadows et al., The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind (New York: Universe Books, 1972).
8. Graham Turner, A Comparison of the Limits to Growth with 30 Years of Reality, Socio-Economics and the Environment in Discussion CSIRO Working Paper Series 2008–09 (Canberra: CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems, 2007).
9. As oil and natural gas production peaks and declines, coal becomes increasingly pivotal in maintaining global energy consumption rates; however, this renewed focus on coal, seen in the ‘record rate' of coal gasification and coal-to-liquid plant construction of the last decade, will only further exacerbate strained coal resources. Indeed, world coal production continues to increase annually, with an overall increase of over 67% between 1990 and 2013. Even with more conservative estimates of coal production growth and the most opportunistic estimates of global coal reserves – relying on the World Coal Association's production growth rate of 0.4% between 2012 and 2013 remaining constant and the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources' estimate of 1052 billion tonnes of reserves – the world will ‘run out' of coal in just over a century. As that figure assumes no ‘updates' to reserve figures (despite nearly every state with ‘significant coal resources' reporting a ‘substantial downward revision' in reserve estimates made since 1986) or increase in production rate (despite the sharp decreases in available oil and natural gas during the upcoming decades), it is reasonable to conclude that the limits to coal-dependent growth will also soon be reached. Richard Heinberg, ‘Peak Coal: Sooner Than You Think', On Line Opinion, 21 May 2007, http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5869; World Coal Association, ‘Coal Statistics', http://www.worldcoal.org/resources/coal-statistics.
10. Richard Heinberg, Snake Oil: How Fracking's False Promises of Plenty Imperils Our Future (West Sussex: Clairview Books, 2014).
11. James Murray and Jim Hansen, ‘Peak Oil and Energy Independence: Myths and Reality', Eos 94, no. 28 (2013): 245–52.
12. Natural gas liquids (NGLs) are ‘hydrocarbons with longer molecular chains', such as propane and butane, within natural gas that are captured and used for heating and industrial purposes. Heinburg, Snake Oil, 25.
13. Paul Mobbs, ‘Sheet E1. Peak Energy: The Limits to Oil and Gas Production', Free Range ‘Energy Beyond Oil' Project, http://www.fraw.org.uk/publications/e-series/e01/e01-peak_energy.html; Heinberg, Snake Oil, 25.
14. Conventional natural gas production follows a similar peak and decline bell-curve and is expected to reach its plateau before the mid-twenty-first century. See: Mobbs, ‘Sheet E1'; Gaetano Maggio and Gaetano Cacciola, ‘When Will Oil, Natural Gas, and Coal Peak?', Fuel 98 (2012): 111–23.
15. We have in mind here both the Gulf War of 1990/1991 and the Iraq War of 2003–2011, though the UN Security Council sanctions against Iraq in the interim also indicate the willingness of Western states to take international action to gain control of oil exports when their native government is considered unreliable.
16. Jon Barnett, ‘Environmental Security and U.S. Foreign Policy', in The Environment, International Relations, and U.S. Foreign Policy, ed. P. G. Harris (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2001), 68–91.
17. See: US National Security Strategy, A National Security Strategy for a New Century (Washington, DC: The White House, 1998).
18. Exxon's revenue is greater than the gross domestic product of Thailand, for instance. Vincent Trivett, ‘25 US Mega Corporations: Where They Rank If They Were Countries', Business Insider, 27 June 2011, http://www.businessinsider.com/25-corporations-bigger-tan-countries-2011-6?op=1.
19. Jane Mayer, ‘Covert Operations: The Billionaire Brothers Who Are Waging a War Against Obama', The New Yorker, 30 August 2010, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/08/30/covert-operations.
20. Fred Bedell, ‘Economic Injustice as an Understanding of the Existence of Two Americas – Wealth and Poverty', Open Journal of Political Science 4, no. 3 (2014): 101–8.
21. Paul Mobbs, ‘Economically and Politically Fracked: “Behind Every Picture Lies a Story” – Statistical Reality versus PR-Hype within the Political Project of Unconventional Gas in Britain', Mobbsey's Musings, 25 July 2013, http://www.fraw.org.uk/mei/musings/2013/20130725-behind_every_picture_lies_a_story.html.
22. See the excellent work of investigative journalist Greg Palast on this point – Greg Palast, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: An Investigative Reporter Exposes the Truth About Globalization, Corporate Cons and High Finance Fraudsters (Pluto Press: London, 2002).
23. United States Congress, Energy Policy Act, Pub.L. 109–58 (2005).
24. BBC, ‘Lords: Fracking Should Be “Urgent Priority” for UK', BBC News: Business, 8 May 2014, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-27312796.
25. Damian Carrington, ‘UK Defeats European Bid for Fracking Regulations', The Guardian, 14 January 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/14/uk-defeats-european-bid-fracking-regulations.
26. Michael J. Lynch, Ronald G. Burns, and Paul B. Stretesky, ‘Global Warming and State-Corporate Crime: The Politicalization of Global Warming under the Bush Administration', Crime, Law and Social Change 54, nos 3–4 (2010): 213–39.
27. The Economist, ‘Energy Firms and Climate Change: Unburnable Fuel', The Economist, 4 May 2013, http://www.economist.com/news/business/21577097-either-governments-are-not-serious-about-climate-change-or-fossil-fuel-firms-are.
28. For more on corporate-state connections, see: Noam Chomsky, ‘Can Civilization Survive Capitalism?', AlterNet, 5 March 2013, http://www.alternet.org/noam-chomsky-can-civilization-survive-capitalism; Palast, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.
29. For example, the American Enterprise Institute, which receives funding from ExxonMobil and other companies in the energy sector, ‘offered a $10,000 incentive to scientists and economists to write papers challenging the IPCC findings' after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its fourth assessment report in 2007. Charles A. Jones and David L. Levy, ‘Business Strategies and Climate Change', in Changing Climates in North American Politics, ed. H. Selin and S.D. VanDeveer (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2009), 219–240.
30. IPCC, ‘Summary for Policymakers', in Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, ed. T.F. Stocker et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 3–29.
31. Bärbel Hönisch et al., ‘The Geological Record of Ocean Acidification Science', Science 335, no. 6072 (2012): 1058–63.
32. IPCC, Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).
33. IPCC, ‘Summary for Policymakers'.
34. Office of the Chief Economist, World Energy Outlook: 2011 (Paris: International Energy Agency, 2011).
35. Joel Bakan, The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power (London: Constable and Robinson, 2005).
36. Robert C. Hinkley, ‘How Corporate Law Inhibits Social Responsibility', Humanist 62, no. 2 (2002): 26. Also: Bakan, The Corporation. For further reading on the economic model and psychology under which corporations operate, see: Diane Elson, ‘Human Rights and Corporate Profits: The UN Global Compact – Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem?', in Global Tensions: Challenges and Opportunities in the Global Economy, ed. L. Bernia and S. Bisnath (London: Routledge, 2002); and Nicholas Connolly, ‘Corporate Social Responsibility: A Duplicitous Distraction?', International Journal of Human Rights 16, no. 8 (2012): 1228–49. Notably, even privately held companies, such as Koch Industries, have a monetary interest in maintaining global fossil fuel use, as long as non-renewable energy sources continue to generate profit.
37. US Energy Information Administration, ‘Renewable & Alternative Fuels', http://www.eia.gov/renewable/.
38. For example, in 2009 approximately $43–46 billion was provided to renewable and biofuel technologies, projects and companies by the governments of the world, compared with the $577 billion spent on fossil fuel subsidies in 2008. Bloomberg: New Energy Finance, ‘Subsidies for Renewables, Biofuels Dwarfed by Supports for Fossil Fuels', http://about.bnef.com/press-releases/subsidies-for-renewables-biofuels-dwarfed-by-supports-for-fossil-fuels/.
39. This concept is perhaps best illustrated by the insistence from both industry and governments that hydraulic fracturing will allow natural gas to replace the use of coal and thus reduce the emission of greenhouse gases, when in actuality the abundance of hydraulic fracturing in the US has simply lowered the price of US coal and driven up exports. Damian Carrington, ‘Fracking Boom Will Not Tackle Global Warming, Analysis Warns', The Guardian, 15 October 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/oct/15/gas-boom-from-unrestrained-fracking-linked-to-emissions-rise; Thoman K. Grose, ‘As U.S. Cleans Its Energy Mix, It Ships Coal Problems Abroad', National Geographic: News, 15 March 2013, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2013/03/130315-us-coal-exports/.
40. Ibid.
41. UNEP, ‘Athabasca Oil Sands, Require Massive Investments and Energy and Produce Massive Amounts of Oil and CO2 – Alberta (Canada)', United Nations Environment Programme 54, Global Environment Alert Service (2011): 1–5; UNEP, ‘Oil Palm Plantations: Threats and Opportunities for Tropical Ecosystems', United Nations Environment Programme 73, Global Environment Alert Service (2011): 1–10.
42. Michael Klare, ‘The Era of Extreme Energy: Life after the Age of Oil', The Huffington Post, 25 May 2011, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-t-klare/the-era-of-xtreme-energy_b_295304.html.
43. Edward Lloyd-Davies, ‘Defining Extreme Energy: A Process not a Category', Extreme Energy Initiative: Working Paper Series, 25 July 2013, http://extremeenergy.org/2013/07/25/defining-extreme-energy-a-process-not-a-category/.
44. Euran Mearns, ‘The Global Energy Crises and its Role in the Pending Collapse of the Global Economy' (Paper presented at the Royal Society of Chemists, Aberdeen, Scotland, 29 October 2008).
45. At the time of writing oil prices were in decline but the finite nature of the resource guarantees that prices will again rise.
46. David J. Murphy, ‘EROI, Insidious Feedbacks, and the End of Economic Growth' (Paper presented at the Sixth Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO), Washington, DC, 7–9 October 2010).
47. On this point see also Heinberg, Snake Oil.
48. Stephen J. Purdey, Economic Growth, the Environment and International Relations: The Growth Paradigm (Oxon: Routledge, 2010).
49. International Energy Agency, Key World Energy Statistics (Paris: International Energy Agency, 2013).
50. Lloyd-Davies, ‘Defining Extreme Energy'.
51. Notwithstanding the current, inevitably temporary, geo-politically induced price reduction, prices will undoubtedly rise over time as supply declines, see Mobbs, P. ‘Environmentalists' Oil Price Panic Reflects their Own Existential Crisis', The Ecologist, 8 January 2015, http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/2703420/environmentalists_oil_price_panic_reflects_their_own_existential_crisis.html.
52. Heinberg, Snake Oil.
53. Stephanie Malin, ‘There's No Real Choice but to Sign: Neoliberalization and Normalization of Hydraulic Fracturing on Pennsylvania Farmland', Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences 2014, no. 4 (2013): 17–27.
54. Lloyd-Davies, ‘Defining Extreme Energy'. See also: Jennifer Huseman and Damien Short, ‘A Slow Industrial Genocide: Tar Sands and the Indigenous Peoples of Northern Alberta’, The International Journal of Human Rights 16, no. 1 (2012): 216–37; Stephen Humphreys, Climate Change and Human Rights: A Rough Guide (Geneva: International Council on Human Rights Policy, 2008).
55. IPCC, ‘Summary for Policymakers', in Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, ed. S. Solomon et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 1–18.
56. Jonathan Patz et al., ‘Impact of Regional Climate Change on Human Health', Nature 438 (2005): 310–17.
57. Laboratory for Aviation and the Environment, ‘Air Pollution Causes 200,000 Early Deaths Each Year in the U.S.', Massachusetts Institute of Technology, http://lae.mit.edu/?p=2821.
58. Peter Stott, Dáithí Stone, and Myles Allen, ‘Human Contribution to the European Heatwave of 2003', Nature 432 (2004): 610–14.
59. Alok Jha, ‘Boiled Alive', The Guardian, 26 July 2006, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2006/jul/26/science.g2.
60. Meadows et al., The Limits to Growth.
61. IPCC, ‘Projections of Future Changes in Climate', in Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, ed. S. Solomon et al. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 12–18.
62. World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Office for Europe, Euroheat: Improving Public Health Responses to Extreme Weather Heat-Waves. Summary for Policy-Makers (Copenhagen: World Health Organization, 2009).
63. IPCC, ‘Projections of Future Changes in Climate'.
64. IPCC, Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Part A: Global and Sectoral Aspects. Contribution of Working Group II to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014).
65. See: John Barry and Kerri Woods, ‘The Environment', in Human Rights: Politics and Practice, ed. M. Goodhart (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 380–395; Nafeez Ahmed, ‘Are You Opposed to Fracking? Then You Might Just Be a Terrorist’, The Guardian, 21 January 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jan/21/fracking-activism-protest-terrorist-oil-corporate-spies; Human Rights Council, ‘Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Human Right to safe Drinking Water and Sanitation: Mission to the United States of America', A/HRC/18/33/Add.4, (2011): 10–11.
66. See Huseman and Short, ‘A Slow Industrial Genocide'.
67. S. Perry, ‘Development, Land Use, and Collective Trauma: The Marcellus Shale Gas Boom in Rural Pennsylvania’, Culture, Agriculture, Food and Environment 34, no. 1 (2012): 81–92, 81.
68. See Heinberg, Snake Oil.
69. Reports of considerable negative impacts go well beyond the anecdotal realm, see for example environmental and health studies such as V.J. Brown, ‘Radionuclides in Fracking Wastewater: Managing a Toxic Blend', Environmental Health Perspectives 122, no. 2 (2014): A50–A55; R. McDermott-Levy, N. Kaktins, and B. Sattler, ‘Fracking, the Environment, and Health: New Energy Practices May Threaten Public Health', American Journal of Nursing 113, no. 6 (2013): 45–51; C.W. Moore, B. Zielinska, G. Petron, and R.B. Jackson, ‘Air Impacts of Increased Natural Gas Acquisition, Processing, and Use: A Critical Review’, Environmental Science and Technology (2014), dx.doi.org/10.1021/es4053472; S. Osborn, A. Vengosh, N.R. Warner, and R.B. Jackson, ‘Methane Contamination of Drinking Water Accompanying Gas-well Drilling and Hydraulic Fracturing’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 108, no. 20 (2011), http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1100682108; and A. Vengosh, R.B. Jackson, N. Warner, T.H. Darrah, and A. Kondash, ‘A Critical Review of the Risks to Water Resources from Unconventional Shale Gas Development and Hydraulic Fracturing in the United States', Environmental Science and Technology (2014), dx.doi.org/10.1021/es405118y; and social scientific enquiries such as Perry, ‘Development, Land Use, and Collective Trauma'; B.J. Anderson and G.L. Theodori, ‘Local Leaders' Perceptions of Energy Development in the Barnett Shale', Southern Rural Sociology 24, no. 1 (2009): 113–29; B.E. Apple, ‘Mapping Fracking: An Analysis of Law, Power, and Regional Distribution in the United States', Harvard Environmental Law Review 38 (2014): 217–44; D. Beach, ‘How the Fracking Boom Impacts Rural Ohio’, EcoWatch: Transforming Green, 16 September 2013, http://ecowatch.com/2013/09/16/fracking-boom-impacting-rural-ohio/; R. Gramling and W. Freudenburg, ‘Opportunity-Threat, Development, and Adaptation: Toward a Comprehensive Framework for Social Impact Assessment', Rural Sociology 57, no. 2 (1992): 216–34; D.A. Fleming and T.G. Measham, ‘Local Economic Impacts of an Unconventional Energy Boom: The Coal Seam Gas Industry in Australia', Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics (2014), doi:10.1111/1467-8489.12043.
70. Environment and Human Rights Advisory, A Human Rights Assessment of Hydraulic Fracturing for Natural Gas (Oregon: EHRA, 2011), http://www.earthworksaction.org/files/publications/EHRA_Human-rights-fracking-FINAL.pdf.
71. See: Damien Short, Karen Hulme, and Steffen Bohm, ‘Don't Let Human Rights Fall to Wayside in Fracking Debate’, The Conversation, 24 March 2014, http://theconversation.com/dont-let-human-rights-fall-to-wayside-in-fracking-debate-24652; Jess Elliot and Damien Short, ‘Fracking is Driving UK Civil and Political Rights Violations', The Ecologist (2014); Anna Grear ‘Fracking – Human Rights Must Not be Ignored!’ The Ecologist, 30 October 2014; Anna Grear, Tom Kerns, Evadne Grant, Karen Morrow, and Damien Short, ‘A Human Rights Assessment of Hydraulic Fracturing and Other Unconventional Gas Development in the United Kingdom', Extreme Energy Initiative Report Commissioned by The Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation,
http://www.sas.ac.uk/sites/default/files/files/UK%20HRIA%20w%20appdx-hi%20res.pdf.
72. UNEP, ‘Gas Fracking: Can We Safely Squeeze the Rocks?’, United Nations Environment Programme, Global Environment Alert Service (2012).
73. Ibid., 6–7.
74. Ibid., 7–9, 12.
75. Robert Howarth, Renee Santoro, and Anthony Ingraffea, ‘Methane and the Greenhouse-gas Footprint of Natural Gas from Shale Formations', Climatic Change 106, no. 4 (2011): 679–90; Robert Howarth et al., Methane Emissions from Natural Gas Systems: Background Paper for the National Climate Assessment (2012), http://www.eeb.cornell.edu/howarth/publications/Howarth_et_al_2012_National_Climate_Assessment.pdf; Robert A. Howarth, ‘A Bridge to Nowhere: Methane Emissions and the Greenhouse Gas Footprint of Natural Gas', Energy Science and Engineering 2, no. 2 (2014): 47–60.
76. Stephen Osborn, Avner Vengosh, Nathaniel R. Warner, Robert B. Jackson, ‘Methane Contamination of Drinking Water Accompanying Gas-well Drilling and Hydraulic Fracturing’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 108, no. 20 (2011): 8172–6. See also: Isaac Santos and Damien Maher, Fugitive Emissions from Coal Seam Gas, Centre for Coastal Biogeochemistry Research Submission to Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency (2012), http://www.scu.edu.au/coastal-biogeochemistry/index.php/70/.
77. Walter Brasch, Fracking Pennsylvania: Flirting with Disaster (Sacramento, CA: Greeley and Stone, 2012).
78. Environment and Human Rights Advisory, ‘A Human Rights Assessment’.
79. For example, Gasland, directed by Josh Fox (New York: HBO Productions, 2012); Drill Baby Drill, directed by Lech Kowalski (France: Kowalski Productions, 2013).
80. Kim de Rijke, ‘Hydraulically Fractured: Unconventional Gas and Anthropology', Anthropology Today 29, no. 2 (2013): 13–17; Kim de Rijke, ‘Coal Seam Gas and Social Impact Assessment: An Anthropological Contribution to Current Debates and Practices', Journal of Economic and Social Policy 15, no. 3 (2013): 3; Kim de Rijke, ‘The Agri-Gas Fields of Australia: Black Soil, Food, and Unconventional Gas', Culture, Agriculture, Food and Environment 35, no. 1 (2013): 41–53.
81. Anderson and Theodori, ‘Local Leaders' Perceptions of Energy Development in the Barnett Shale'; Kai Schafft, Yetkin Borlu, and Leland Glenna, ‘The Relationship between Marcellus Shale Gas Development in Pennsylvania and Local Perceptions of Risk and Opportunity', Rural Sociology 78, no. 2 (2013): 143–66; Kai A. Schafft, Leland L. Glenna, Brandn Green, and Yetkin Borlu, ‘Local Impacts of Unconventional Gas Development within Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale Region: Gauging Boomtown Development through the Perspectives of Educational Administrators', Society & Natural Resources: An International Journal 27, no. 4 (2014): 389–404.
82. Matthew Cotton, Imogen Rattle, and James Van Alstine, ‘Shale Gas Policy in the United Kingdom: An Argumentative Discourse Analysis', Energy Policy 73 (2014): 427–38.
83. Malin, ‘There's No Real Choice but to Sign'.
84. Paul B. Stretesky, Michael A. Long, and Michael J. Lynch, ‘Does Environmental Enforcement Slow the Treadmill of Production? The Relationship between Large Monetary Penalties, Ecological Disorganization and Toxic Releases within Offending Corporations', Journal of Crime and Justice 36, no. 2: (2013): 233–47.
85. Tara Shelley and Tara Opsal, ‘Energy Crime, Harm, and Problematic State Response in Colorado: A Case of the Fox Guarding the Hen House?’, Critical Criminology 22, no. 4 (2014): 561–77.
86. de Rijke, ‘Hydraulically Fractured'.
87. Ibid., 17.
88. S. Bakker, M. Van Den Berg, D. Düzenli, and M. Radstaake, ‘Human Rights Impact Assessment in Practice: The Case of the Health Rights of Women Assessment Instrument (HeRWAI)’, Journal of Human Rights Practice 1, no. 3 (2009): 436–58; G. De Beco, ‘Human Rights Impact Assessments', Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights 27, no. 2 (2009): 139–66. J. Harrison, ‘Human Rights Measurement: Reflections on the Current Practice and Future Potential of Human Rights Impact Assessment', Journal of Human Rights Practice 3, no. 2 (2011): 162–87; P. Hunt and G. MacNaughton, ‘Impact Assessments, Poverty, and Human Rights: A Case Study Using the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health', Submitted to UNESCO (2006), http://www.who.int/hhr/Series_6_Impact%20Assessments_Hunt_MacNaughton1.pdf; G. MacNaughton and P. Hunt, ‘A Human Rights-based Approach to Social Impact Assessment', in New Directions In Social Impact Assessment: Conceptual and Methodological Advances, ed. F. Vanclay and A.M. Esteves (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011), 355–69.
89. John Ruggie, ‘Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations “Protect, Respect and Remedy Framework”’ (2011),
http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Publications/GuidingPrinciplesBusinessHR_EN.pdf.
90. Simon Walker, The Future of Human Rights Impact Assessments of Trade Agreements (Brussels: Intersentia, 2009), 43; and Simon Walker, ‘The United States–Dominican Republic–Central American Free Trade Agreement and Access to Medicines in Costa Rica: A Human Rights Impact Assessment', Journal of Human Rights Practice 3, no. 2 (2011): 188–213.
91. Harrison, ‘Human Rights Measurement', 167; G. De Beco, ‘Human Rights Impact Assessments', Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights 27, no. 2 (2009): 139–66, 147.
92. MacNaughton and Hunt, ‘A Human Rights-based Approach to Social Impact Assessment’, 361.
93. Ibid., 355.
94. Anderson and Theodori, ‘Local Leaders' Perceptions of Energy Development in the Barnett Shale.
95. Average figures obtained from the US-based www.fracfocus.org website. FracFocus is the national hydraulic fracturing chemical registry. FracFocus is managed by the Ground Water Protection Council and Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, two organisations whose missions both revolve around conservation and environmental protection. FracFocus, ‘FracFocus 2.0: Hundreds of Companies. Thousands of Wells', FracFocus, http://www.fracfocus.org.
96. Melissa Stark et al., ‘Water and Shale Gas Development: Leveraging the US Experience in New Shale Developments', Accenture (December 2012).
97. Queensland Water Commission, Underground Water Impact Report for the Surat Cumulative Management Area (Queensland: Queensland Water Commission, 2012), http://www.dnrm.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0016/31327/underground-water-impact-report.pdf.
98. See for example: Sandra Postel, ‘As Oil and Gas Drilling Competes for Water, One New Mexico County Says No', National Geographic, 3 May 2013, http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2013/05/02/as-oil-and-gas-drilling-competes-for-water-one-new-mexico-county-says-no/.
99. Mark Fischetti, ‘Groundwater Contamination May End the Gas-Fracking Boom’, Scientific American, 20 August 2013, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/groundwater-contamination-may-end-the-gas-fracking-boom/.
100. Anthony Ingraffea et al., ‘Assessment and Risk Analysis of Casing and Cement Impairment in Oil and Gas Wells in Pennsylvania, 2000–2012', Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences 111, no. 30 (2014): 10955–60.
101. Sheila M. Olmstead et al., ‘Shale Gas Development Impacts on Surface Water Quality in Pennsylvania', Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences 110, no. 13 (2013): 4962–7.
102. Paul Mobbs, ‘An Abuse of Science – Concealing Fracking's Radioactive Footprint', The Ecologist, 8 July 2014, http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2469495/an_abuse_of_science_concealing_frackings_radioactive_footprint.html.
103. Nathaniel R. Warner et al., ‘Impacts of Shale Gas Wastewater Disposal on Water Quality in Western Pennsylvania', Environmental Science & Technology 47 no. 20 (2013): 11849–57.
104. Ibid.
105. Sean Nicholls, ‘Santos Coal Seam Gas Project Contaminates Aquifer', Sydney Morning Herald, 8 March 2014, http://www.smh.com.au/environment/santos-coal-seam-gas-project-contaminates-aquifer-20140307-34csb.html.
106. Read some examples of such in Matthew Currell, ‘Coal Seam Gas Water Leaks Could be a Problem for Decades', The Conversation, 24 March 2014,
http://theconversation.com/coal-seam-gas-water-leaks-could-be-a-problem-for-decades-24718; and see farmer Brian Monk's experiences here: https://frackinginkent.wordpress.com/2014/02/01/the-ugly-truth-in-queensland-australia/.
107. Avner Vengosh et al., ‘A Critical Review of the Risks to Water Resources from Unconventional Shale Gas Development and Hydraulic Fracturing in the United States', Environmental Science and Technology 48, no. 15 (2014): 8334–48.
108. United Nations Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, Realization of the Right to Drinking Water and Sanitation, Report of the Special Rapporteur, El Hadji Guissé, E/CN.4/Sub.2/2005/25 (2005).
109. United Nations Human Rights Council, Human Rights and Access to Water, A/HRC/2/104 (2006).
110. United Nations Human Rights Council, Annual Report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on the Scope and Content of the Relevant Human Rights Obligations Related to Equitable Access to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation under International Human Rights Instruments, A/HRC/6/3 (2007).
111. United Nations Human Rights Council, Human Rights and Access to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation Resolution 7/22, A/HR/RES/722 (2008).
112. United Nations Human Rights Council, The Human Right to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation, A/HRC/RES/16/2 (2011).
113. United Nations Human Rights Council, Human Rights and Access to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation, A/HRC/RES/15/9 (2010).
114. United Nations, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, (1979) Article 14(2).
115. International Labour Organization, Occupational Health Services Convention C161, (1985) Article 5.
116. United Nations, The Convention on the Rights of the Child, (1989) Article 24.
117. African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, (1990) Article 14; African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, Additional Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, (2003) Article 15.
118. United Nations, Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, (2006) Article 28.
119. United Nations Human Rights Council, Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Human Right to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation, Catarina de Albuquerque: Mission to the United States of America, A/HRC/18/33/Add.4 (2011).
120. See: US Environmental Protection Agency, Plan to Study the Potential Impacts of Hydraulic Fracturing on Drinking Water Resources, (Washington, DC: US Environmental Protection Agency, 2011), http://www2.epa.gov/hfstudy; and their study plan, http://water.epa.gov/type/groundwater/uic/class2/hydraulicfracturing/upload/hf_study_plan_110211_final_508.pdf.
121. Ingraffea et al., ‘Assessment and Risk Analysis'.
122. Vengosh et al., ‘A Critical Review'.
123. Shelley and Opsal, ‘Energy Crime, Harm, and Problematic State Response'.
124. Wall Street Journal, ‘Online List IDs Water Wells Harmed by Drilling', Wall Street Journal, 28 August 2014, http://online.wsj.com/article/AP16a162b66b5946d0837c7395cab7a5f4.html (accessed 5 September 2014).
125. Larysa Dyrszka, Kathleen Nolan, and Sandra Steingraber, ‘Statement on Preliminary Findings from the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project Study', Concerned Health Professionals of New York, 27 August 2013, http://concernedhealthny.org/statement-on-preliminary-findings-from-the-southwest-pennsylvania-environmental-health-project-study/.
126. Dustin Bleizeffer, ‘Pristine to Polluted: More Drilling Proposed near Pinedale Despite Ozone Spikes', WyoFile, 17 May 2011, http://wyofile.com/dustin/pristine-to-polluted/.
127. A dangerously toxic substance, see National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), ‘Emergency Preparedness and Response: Facts about Benzene', Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 14 February 2013, http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/benzene/basics/facts.asp.
128. Mariann Lloyd-Smith, ‘License to Drill? Is Australia's Present Britain's Future?’ (Presentation, School of Advanced Study, London, 20 May 2013), http://www.sas.ac.uk/sites/default/files/files/events/london%20uni%20talk%20Impacts%20of%20UG.pdf.
129. Dave Fehling, ‘State Impact, Like Working in a Refinery: Fracking's New Chemical Hazards for Workers', State Impact, 24 July 2012, http://stateimpact.npr.org/texas/2012/07/24/like-working-in-a-refinery-frackings-new-chemical-hazards-for-workers/.
130. Physicians for Social Responsibility, Hydraulic Fracturing and Your Health: Air Contamination (Washington, DC: PSR, 2014), http://www.psr.org/assets/pdfs/fracking-and-air-pollution.pdf.
131. Theo Colborn et al., ‘Natural Gas Operations from a Public Health Perspective', International Journal of Human and Ecological Risk Assessment 17, no. 5 (2011): 1039–56. For an analysis of chemicals found in wastewater pits, see: The Endocrine Disruption Exchange, Potential Health Effects of Residues in 6 New Mexico Oil and Gas Drilling Reserve Pits Based on Compounds Detected in at Least One Sample: Revised November 15, 2007 (Paonia, Colorado: TEDX, 2007), http://endocrinedisruption.org/assets/media/documents/summary_of_pit_chemicals_revised_2-1-08.pdf.
132. Jessica B. Gilman et al., ‘Source Signature of Volatile Organic Compounds from Oil and Natural Gas Operations in Northeastern Colorado', Environmental Science & Technology 47, no. 3 (2013): 1297–305.
133. Wendy Koch, ‘Wyoming's Smog Exceeds Los Angeles' due to Gas Drilling', USA Today, 9 March 2011, http://content.usatoday.com/communities/greenhouse/post/2011/03/wyomings-smog-exceeds-los-angeles-due-to-gas-drilling/1; Detlev Helmig, ‘Highly Elevated Atmospheric Levels of Volatile Organic Compounds in the Uintah Basin, Utah', Environmental Science & Technology 48, (2014): 4707−15.
134. Helmig, ‘Highly Elevated Atmospheric Levels'. See also: American Lung Association, ‘State of the Air 2014', American Lung Association, http://www.stateoftheair.org/.
135. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), ‘Emergency Preparedness and Response: Facts about Benzene', Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 14 February 2013, http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/benzene/basics/facts.asp.
136. Lisa M. McKenzie et al., ‘Human Health Risk Assessment of Air Emissions from Development of Unconventional natural Gas Resources', Science of the Total Environment 424 (2012): 79–87.
137. Wolf Eagle Environmental, Town of DISH, Texas, Ambient Air Monitoring Analysis (Flower Mound, TX: Wolf Eagle Environmental, 2009), http://townofdish.com/objects/DISH_-_final_report_revised.pdf.
138. Ibid., 5.
139. Ibid., 6.
140. Theo Colborn et al., ‘An Exploratory Study of Air Quality Near Natural Gas Operations', Human and Ecological Risk Assessment 20, no. 1 (2014): 86–105.
141. David Brown et al., ‘Understanding Exposure from Natural Gas Drilling Puts Current Air Standards to the Test', Reviews Environmental Health (March 2014), http://www.degruyter.com/view/j/reveh.2014.29.issue-1-2/issue-files/reveh.2014.29.issue-1-2.xml.
142. Physicians for Social Responsibility, Hydraulic Fracturing.
143. G.P. Macey, R. Breech, M. Chernaik, C. Cox, D. Larson, D. Thomas, and D.O. Carpenter, ‘Air Concentrations of Volatile Compounds Near Oil and Gas Production: A Community-based Exploratory Study’, Environmental Health 13, no. 82 (2014), doi:10.1186/1476-069X-13-82
144. Ibid.
145. Quoted in Alan Neuhauser, ‘Toxic Chemicals, Carcinogens Skyrocket Near Fracking Sites', 30 October 2014, http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/10/30/toxic-chemicals-and-carcinogens-skyrocket-near-fracking-sites-study-says.
146. Surya Deva, ‘Submission to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Relation to Equitable Access to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation', 15 April 2007, http://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/water/contributions/universities/CityUniversityHongKong.pdf, 2.
147. Subhash Kumar v. State of Bihar and Ors, Supreme Court of India, 1991 AIR 420.
148. Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions, ‘Human Rights and the Environment: Final Report and Recommendations' (Final report, Asia Pacific Forum of National Human Rights Institutions, Sydney, 24–27 September, 2007), 39, http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/ClimateChange/Submissions/Asia_Pacific_Forum_of_NHRIs_1_HR_and_Environment_ACJ_Report_Recommendations.pdf. Though as this statement comes from an organisation established by the state government – and not the government itself – implementation and acceptance of such an obligation is not as assured as in the Indian context. However, as this assertion is based on numerous examples of Malaysian national and case law upholding the right of its population to a clean environment, it is relevant to include it in a discussion of the national government recognition of the right to clean air.
149. David R. Boyd, ‘The Constitutional Right to a Healthy Environment', Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development 54, no. 4 (2012): 3–15.
150. Organization of Africa Unity, African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights (1981).
151. Organization of American States, Additional Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights in the Area of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights ‘Protocol of San Salvador' (1988).
152. Lopez Ostra v. Spain, European Court of Human Rights, 16798 ECtHR 90 (1994). The court made a similar ruling in: Giacomelli v. Italy, European Court of Human Rights, 59909 ECtHR 00 (2006).
153. See: Novoselov v. Russia, European Court of Human Rights, 66460 ECtHR 01 (2005); Khudoyorov v. Russia, European Court of Human Rights, 6847 ECtHR 02 (2005); Ananyev and others v. Russia, European Court of Human Rights, 42525 ECtHR 07 (2012); and Arutyunyan v. Russia, European Court of Human Rights, 48977 ECtHR 09 (2012).
154. Öneryildiz v. Turkey, European Court of Human Rights, 48939 ECtHR 99 (2004).
155. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Right, ‘Independent Expert on Human Rights and the Environment', United Nations, http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Environment/IEEnvironment/Pages/IEenvironmentIndex.aspx.
156. Human Rights Council, Human Rights and the Environment, A/HRC/25/L.31 (2014).
157. Sub-Committee on Poverty Eradication, NGO Consultation on the Draft Guiding Principles on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights (New York: Sub-Committee on Poverty Eradication, 2011), http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Poverty/ConsultationDGP/NGO/SubcommitteeonPovertyEradication31May2011.pdf.
158. David R. Boyd, ‘The Constitutional Right to a Healthy Environment', Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development 54, no. 4 (2012): 3–15.
159. See George Jucha, ‘Google Earth Tour of Oil & Gas Wells, Pads and Impoundments' (2013), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jN6TSSPZwU; and Food and Water Watch, ‘Fracking Infrastructure is Carving Up Pennsylvania’, Food and Water Watch: Fact Sheet (December 2013), http://documents.foodandwaterwatch.org/doc/fracking_infrastructure_pennsylvania.pdf.
160. See: Michelle Bamberger and Robert E. Oswald, ‘Impacts of Gas Drilling on Human and Animal Health', New Solutions 22, no. 1 (2012): 51–77; Judith Kohler, ‘Report Says Drilling Threatens Colorado Wildlife', Aspen Times, 20 January 2010, http://www.aspentimes.com/news/1426301-113/regional-leadstories-regionalivg-leadstoriesivg.
161. Paresh Dave, ‘Ohio Finds Link between Fracking and Sudden Burst of Earthquakes', Los Angeles Times, 12 April 2014, http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-ohio-finds-link-fracking-earthquakes-20140411,0,570007.story#ixzz30C04ddBj.
162. Fiona Harvey, Damian Carrington, and Terry McCallilster, ‘Fracking Company Cuadrilla Halts Operations at Lancashire Drilling Site', The Guardian, 13 March 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/mar/13/fracking-cuadrilla-halts-operations-lancashire.
163. Shelley and Opsal, ‘Energy Crime, Harm, and Problematic State Response'.
164. Heinberg, Snake Oil, 88.
165. Ibid., 89.
166. Ibid., 88.
167. Ibid.
168. Ibid.
169. United Nations, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, (1966) Article 17.
170. Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, (1950) Article 8.
171. Organization of American States, American Convention on Human Rights, (1969) Article 11.
172. League of Arab States, Arab Charter on Human Rights, (2004) Article 21.
173. Kyrtatos v. Greece, European Court of Human Rights, 41666 ECtHR 98 (2003).
174. Dubetska and Others v. Ukraine, European Court of Human Rights, 30499 ECtHR 03 (2011). In this case the court did rule in favour of the complainants that a mine and factory near their homes had caused damage to their houses and therefore violated their right to respect for their private and family life and home.
175. Martinez Martinez and María Pino Manzano v. Spain, European Court of Human Rights, 61654 ECtHR 08 (2012).
176. Council of Europe, Protocol to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, (1950) Article 1.
177. Organization of American States, American Convention on Human Rights, (1969) Article 21.
178. Organization of Africa Unity, African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, (1981) Article 14.
179. League of Arab States, Arab Charter on Human Rights, (2004) Article 31.
180. See the US and South African constitutions, as examples.
181. Flamenbaum and Others v. France, European Court of Human Rights, 23264 ECtHR 04 (2012).
182. The court also references property value in relation to environmental degradation in: Dubetska and Others v. Ukraine, European Court of Human Rights, 30499 ECtHR 03 (2011).
183. Sheila Bushkin-Bedient, Larysa Dyrszka, Yuri Gorby, and Mary Menapace, ‘Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking (Unconventional Gas and Oil Extraction)’, Concerned Health Professionals of New York, 2nd ed. (December 2014), http://concernedhealthny.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/CHPNY-Fracking-Compendium.pdf. For a report on the uncertain effects of fracking on health in Australia, see: Alicia Coram, Jeremy Moss, and Grant Blashki, ‘Harms Unknown: Health Uncertainties Cast Doubt on the Role of Unconventional Gas in Australia's Energy Future', The Medical Journal of Australia 200, no. 4 (2014): 210–13.
184. Jason Morris, ‘Texas Family Plagued with Ailments Gets $3M in 1st-of-its-kind Fracking Judgment', CNN, 26 April 2014, http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/25/justice/texas-family-wins-fracking-lawsuit/.
185. Shelley and Opsal, ‘Energy Crime, Harm, and Problematic State Response'.
186. Nadia Steinzor, Wilma Subra, and Lisa Sumi, ‘Investigating Links between Shale Gas Development and Health Impacts through a Community Survey Project in Pennsylvania', New Solutions 23, no. 1 (2013): 55–83.
187. For a general discussion of the chemicals released by fracking and their associated potential health effects, see: John L. Adgate, Bernard D. Goldstein, and Lisa M. McKenzie, ‘Potential Public Health Hazards, Exposures and Health Effects from Unconventional Natural Gas Development', Environmental Science & Technology 48, no. 15 (2014): 8307–20.
188. Ibid.
189. Steinzor, Subra, and Sumi, ‘Investigating Links'.
190. Sharon Wilson et al., Reckless Endangerment While Fracking the Eagle Ford (Washington, DC: Earthworks, 2013), http://www.earthworksaction.org/files/publications/FULL-RecklessEndangerment-sm.pdf.
191. Geralyn McCarron, Symptomatology of a Gas Field: An Independent Health Survey in the Tara Rural Residential Estates and Environs (2013), http://www.gabpg.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/2013-04-symptomatology_of_a_gas_field_Geralyn_McCarron.pdf.
192. Paul Mobbs, ‘Shale Gas and Public Health – The Whitewash Exposed', The Ecologist, 6 May 2014. And for a detailed critique of Public Health England's methods and conclusions see Paul Mobbs, ‘A Critical Review of Public Health England's Report – “Review of the Potential Public Health Impacts of Exposures to Chemical and Radioactive Pollutants as a Result of Shale Gas Extraction – Draft for Comment”’, http://www.fraw.org.uk/mei/archive/phe_shale_gas_and_health_report-critical_analysis.pdf.
193. Adam Law, ‘Public Health England's Draft Report on Shale Gas Extraction: Mistaking Best Practices for Actual Practices' (2014); Adam Law et al., British Medical Journal 348, 17 April 2014, http://www.bmj.com/content/348/bmj.g2728; and Mobbs, ‘Shale Gas and Public Health’.
194. New York State Department of Health, ‘A Public Health Review of High Volume Hydraulic Fracturing for Shale Gas Development’, https://www.health.ny.gov/press/reports/docs/high_volume_hydraulic_fracturing.pdf.
195. See: UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, General Comment No. 14: The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health, E/C.12/2000/4 (2000). Also important to note is that a right to health is not found in the European Convention on Human Rights, and thus the European Court often finds violations of the right to privacy in cases involving health defects from environmental degradation. See, for example: Tatar v. Romania, European Court of Human Rights, 67021 ECtHR 01 (2009).
196. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, ‘Special Rapporteur on the Right of Everyone to the Enjoyment of the Highest Attainable Standard of Physical and Mental Health', United Nations, http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Health/Pages/SRRightHealthIndex.aspx.
197. Anna Grear et al., A Human Rights Assessment of Hydraulic Fracturing and Other Unconventional Gas Development in the United Kingdom (London: The Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation, 2014), http://extremeenergy.org/category/eeiresearch/.
198. See: Ӧneryildiz v. Turkey, ECtHR.
199. Paul Ekins, ‘The UK's New Dash for Gas is a Dangerous Gamble’, The New Scientist, 6 December 2012, http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22594-the-uks-new-dash-for-gas-is-a-dangerous-gamble.html#.VMjJI8Yl2dM.
200. It is often suggested that Balcombe had little to do with fracking as it did not happen there, but in 2010 the company Cuadrilla were granted temporary planning permission by West Sussex County Council to do exactly that. ‘WSCC notes that under planning permission WSCC/027/10/BA Cuadrilla can use hydraulic fracturing at this site.' In effect, Cuadrilla were a permit away from fracking. Furthermore, in 2011 Cuadrilla sent a letter to DECC, discovered through the court process, stating ‘In order for Bolney to be successful in its Weald Basin Kimmeridge Oil Shale Project (KOSP), Bolney will need to rely, to a significant degree, on being able to undertake hydraulic fracture stimulation(s) of this unconventional reservoir.’ Bolney Resources Ltd became Cuadrilla Balcombe Ltd in April 2013. (Copies of the above are held on file by the authors.)
201. For basic site information see Richard Wheatstone, ‘Environmental Groups Voice Fracking Fears After “Encouraging Results” From Barton Moss Drilling', Manchester Evening News, 4 November 2014, http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/environmental-groups-voice-fears-over-8049913; and for the view of the company involved see http://www.igas-engage.co.uk/our-work-in-barton-moss/
202. HMSO, Human Rights Act, (1998) Article 11.
203. Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, Article 11.
204. United Nations, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 21.
205. Interview with protestor, 18 July 2014. This and the following interviews were conducted confidentially, and as such the interviewees' names have been withheld by mutual agreement.
206. Interview, 21 July 2014.
207. Interview, 18 July 2014.
208. Ibid.
209. Ibid.
210. Interview, 21 July 2014.
211. Interview, 19 July 2014.
212. Interview, 21 July 2014.
213. Ibid.
214. Interview, 19 July 2014.
215. Interview, 21 July 2014.
216. Ibid.
217. Ibid.
218. Interview, 19 July 2014.
219. Interview, 18 July 2014.
220. Chief Superintendent Paul Morrison of Sussex police quoted in: Sandra Laville, ‘Sussex Police Under Fire for “Criminalising” Fracking Protests', The Guardian, 15 May 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/may/15/sussex-police-criminalising-fracking-protest-acquittals-balcombe.
221. BBC, ‘Balcombe Anti-fracking Camp Moves to Council HQ', BBC News: Sussex, 17 November 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-24978363. A legal challenge, brought by the Frack Free Balcombe Residents Association against the decision of the West Sussex council to permit tests for oil after polling showed 60% of responding residents were against it, further highlights possible collusion between the council and the fracking firm Cuadrilla. Emily Gosden, ‘Legal Challenge Over Plans for Fracking Firm Cuadrilla to Return to Balcombe', The Telegraph, 1 August 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/11006938/Legal-challenge-over-plans-for-fracking-firm-Cuadrilla-to-return-to-Balcombe.html.
222. Salford Star, ‘Salford Council Daily Barton Moss Intelligence Meetings with IGas, GMP and Peel Holdings', Salford Star, 6 August 2014, http://www.salfordstar.com/article.asp?id=2358.
223. Paul Slomp, ‘Hey CSIS, Farmers Are Not Terrorists', The Star, 5 March 2013, http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2013/03/05/hey_csis_farmers_are_not_terrorists.html.
224. Robert Johnson, ‘Fracking Insiders Admit To Employing Military “Psychological Operations” On American Citizens', Business Insider, 9 November 2011, http://www.businessinsider.com/the-fracking-industry-admits-to-employing-military-psychologial-operations-on-american-citizens-2011-11.
225. Sunshine Coast Daily, ‘Gas Protestors Stand Their Ground Despite Shots Being Fired', Sunshine Coast Daily, 24 May 2013, http://www.sunshinecoastdaily.com.au/news/shots-fired-coal-seam-gas-protest-tara/1880952/.
226. Sarah Lazare, ‘Protests Sweep Canada Following Paramilitary Assault on Indigenous Fracking Blockade', Common Dreams, 18 October 2013, http://www.commondreams.org/news/2013/10/18/protests-sweep-canada-following-paramilitary-assault-indigenous-fracking-blockade.
227. HMSO, Human Rights Act, Article 10.
228. Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, Article 10.
229. United Nations, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 19.
230. Conor Gearty, Civil Liberties (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 31.
231. Interview, 21 July 2014.
232. HMSO, Human Rights Act, Article 5.
233. Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, Article 5.
234. United Nations, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 9.
235. Interview, 18 July 2014.
236. Ibid.
237. Ibid.
238. A total of 120 people were arrested by the GMP during protests in Barton Moss (with most cleared of wrongdoing as of June 2014), while 126 were arrested by Sussex police in Balcombe (with only 29 convictions resulting). Dan Thompson, ‘Most Barton Moss Protesters Cleared after Arrests', Manchester Evening News, 28 June 2014, http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/most-barton-moss-protesters-cleared-7339995; Laville, ‘Sussex Police under Fire'.
239. Interview with protestor, 21 July 2014.
240. Ibid.
241. Interview, 18 July 2014.
242. Ibid.
243. Interview, 21 July 2014.
244. As of April 2014 – see Drill or Drop?, ‘Update on Balcombe Anti-fracking Court Cases', Drill or Drop?, 8 April 2014, http://drillordrop.com/2014/04/08/update-on-balcombe-anti-fracking-court-cases/#more-1879.
245. Interview, 18 July 2014.
246. Ibid.
247. Ibid.
248. Ibid.
249. Ibid.
250. Interview, 21 July 2014.
251. HMSO, Human Rights Act, Article 6.
252. Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, Article 6.
253. United Nations, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 14.
254. Interviews, 21 July 2014.
255. Ibid.
256. HMSO, Human Rights Act, Article 8.
257. Council of Europe, European Convention on Human Rights, Article 8.
258. Interview, 18 July 2014.
259. Ibid.
260. Interview, 21 July 2014.
261. Interview, 19 July 2014.
262. Ibid.
263. Interview, 18 July 2014.
264. Rob Evans, ‘Police Asked University for List of Attendees at Fracking Debate’, The Guardian, 15 December 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/dec/15/police-university-list-fracking-debate.
265. Rob Evans, ‘Police Under Scrutiny After Seeking to Obtain Names of People Who Wanted to Attend University Debate’, The Guardian, 5 February 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/undercover-with-paul-lewis-and-rob-evans/2015/feb/05/police-under-scrutiny-after-seeking-to-obtain-names-of-people-who-wanted-to-attend-a-debate-organised-by-academics.
266. Murray Edelman, Constructing the Political Spectacle (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1998).
267. See James Perkins, ‘Biggest Weekly Oil Rig Decline since 1987’, The Shale Energy Insider, 2 February 2015, http://www.shaleenergyinsider.com/2015/02/02/biggest-weekly-oil-rig-decline-since-1987/; and for a UK perspective Anthony Hilton, ‘Fracking Just Doesn't Pay So Why Bother?’ The Evening Standard, 3 February 2015, http://www.standard.co.uk/business/markets/anthony-hilton-fracking-just-doesnt-pay-so-why-bother-10020898.html.
268. Paul Mobbs, ‘With Sub-$60 Oil, Fracking and Tar Sands Losses Threaten the Whole Financial System’. The Ecologist, 17 December 2014, http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2679765/with_sub60_oil_fracking_and_tar_sands_losses_threaten_the_whole_financial_system.html.
269. Noam Chomsky, Profit over People: Neoliberalism and the Global Order (New York: Seven Stories Press, 1999), 96.
270. de Rijke, ‘Hydraulically Fractured', 15.
271. Damian Carrington, ‘Owen Paterson Held Urgent Meeting for Fracking Boss, Documents Show’, The Guardian, 21 March 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/21/owen-paterson-urgent-meeting-fracking-cuadrilla-lord-browne; and ‘Emails Reveal UK Helped Shale Gas Industry Manage Fracking Opposition’, The Guardian, 17 January 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/17/emails-uk-shale-gas-fracking-opposition; and ‘George Osborne Urges Ministers to Fast-track Fracking Measures in Leaked Letter’, The Guardian, 26 January 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jan/26/george-osborne-ministers-fast-track-fracking.
272. Paul Mobbs, ‘Economically & Politically Fracked: “Behind Every Picture Lies a Story” – Statistical Reality Versus PR-hype Within the Political Project of Unconventional Gas in Britain’, Extreme Energy Initiative, Working Papers Series (2013), http://extremeenergy.org/2013/07/25/economically-and-politically-fracked-behind-every-picture-lies-a-story-statistical-reality-versus-pr-hype-within-the-political-project-of-unconventional-gas-in-britain/.
273. David Cameron, ‘We Cannot Afford to Miss Out on Shale Gas', The Telegraph, 11 August 2013, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10236664/We-cannot-afford-to-miss-out-on-shale-gas.html.
274. Paul Mobbs, ‘Fracking Policy and the Pollution of British Democracy’, The Ecologist, 20 January 2015, http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2721027/frackingnbsppolicy_and_the_pollution_of_british_democracy.html.
275. International Energy Agency, Word Energy Outlook 2012 (2012), Executive Summary, 3, http://www.iea.org/publications/freepublications/publication/English.pdf.
276. Christophe McGlade and Paul Ekins ‘The Geographical Distribution of Fossil Fuels Unused When Limiting Global Warming to 2 °C’, Nature 517 (2015): 187–90.
277. James Hansen, Storms of my Grandchildren: The Truth about the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity (London: Bloomsbury, 2009), 289.
278. Yale Environment 360, ‘Forum: Just How Safe Is “Fracking” of Natural Gas?', Yale Environment 360, http://e360.yale.edu/feature/forum_just_how_safe__is_fracking_of_natural_gas/2417/. See also http://kevinanderson.info/blog/uk-international-commitments-on-climate-change-are-incompatible-with-the-development-of-a-national-shale-gas-industry/.
279. Shelia Watt-Cloutier, Petition to the Inter American Commission on Human Rights Seeking Relief from Violations Resulting from Global Warming Caused by Acts and Omissions of the United States (Nunavut, Canada: Inuit Circumpolar Conference, 2005), http://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/library/legal_docs/petition-to-the-inter-american-commission-on-human-rights-on-behalf-of-the-inuit-circumpolar-conference.pdf.
280. Ariel E. Dulitaky to Paul Crowley, Inadmissibility of Watt-Cloutier Petition, Washington, DC, 16 November 2006, http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/science/16commissionletter.pdf.
281. Humphreys, Climate Change and Human Rights.
282. United Nations Human Rights Council, Resolution 7/23 (2008).
283. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on the Relationship between Climate Change and Human Rights, A/HRC/10/61 (2009).
284. United Nations Human Rights Council, Resolution 10/4 (2009).
285. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Human Rights Council Panel Discussion on the Relationship between Climate Change and Human Rights (Geneva: Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 2009).
286. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, ‘Human Rights and Climate Change: Overview', United Nations, http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/HRAndClimateChange/Pages/HRClimateChangeIndex.aspx.
287. The recent vote in Denton, Texas to ban fracking highlights the sentiments of residents who are no stranger to the fossil fuel industry. Suzanne Goldenberg, ‘Texas Oil Town Makes History as Residents Say No to Fracking', The Guardian, 5 November 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/nov/05/birthplace-frackingboom-votes-ban-denton-texas.
288. Mobbs, ‘Shale Gas and Public Health'.
289. Zachary Boren, ‘Energy Files: Social impacts of fracking REDACTED’, Greenpeace Energy Desk, 11 August 2014, http://energydesk.greenpeace.org/2014/08/11/energy-files-social-impacts-fracking-redacted/.