As work crews struggle to contain the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Mose Buchele of KUT News reports how others are already looking ahead at what lessons might be learned from this environmental disaster.
Environment
Coverage of climate, conservation, natural resources, and environmental policy shaping the state, from The Texas Tribune.
Posted in
Environment
A Bonanza for Cleanup Firms
An oil spill of historic proportions like the one spreading through the Gulf of Mexico is bad news for most everybody, but it’s also a boon for those in the environmental cleanup business. Mose Buchele of KUT News caught up with some big winners at an industry convention in Austin.
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Environment
Oil Spill: How Will It Affect Shrimping and Fishing?
People who catch shrimp and fish along the Texas Gulf Coast are waiting to see if the oil spill drifts closer and taints the water they depend on to make a living. Fritz Jaenike, the General Manager of Harlingen Shrimp Farms in the Rio Grande Valley, the oldest shrimp farm in Texas, talks to Jennifer Stayton of KUT News.
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Environment
Oil Spill: AGs Look for Legal Remedies
Texas Attorney General Abbott and his colleagues in other Gulf Coast states are casting their legal eyes on the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Erika Aguilar of KUT News reports.
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Energy
Spill, Baby, Spill
A trio of pieces from our partners at public radio station KUT in Austin examines the potential impact on Texas of the disastrous oil spill off the Louisiana coast. Ericka Aguilar reports on Attorney General Greg Abbott’s meetings with other Gulf Coast states on potential legal action against British Petroleum, Nathan Bernier asks whether the oil might make its way to Texas — possibly driven by a hurricane, and Jennifer Stayton looks at the effects on fisheries.
Posted in
Environment
Oil Spill: Texas Considers the Worst Case
Crude oil is still gushing into the Gulf of Mexico and threatening a growing environmental catastrophe. Texas is expected to avoid the brunt of the spill, but that doesn’t mean it’s not affected. Nathan Bernier of KUT News looks at the worst-case scenario.
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Energy
TribBlog: AG Takes Action on Oil Spill
The Gulf oil spill that currently spans almost 50 miles wide and 80 miles long is “growing worse by the day“ with “no end in legitimate sight,” Attorney General Greg Abbott said at a press conference this morning.
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Energy
Is Claytie Williams All Wet?
Allies of the billionaire oilman are brandishing a study purporting to show that his proposed pumping of the Edwards-Trinity Aquifer will do no harm. Environmentalists and elected officials in the Rio Grande Valley still think he’s a water profiteer with their worst interests at heart.
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Environment
Burn It Before It Spreads
Crews set fire to an oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday in a last ditch effort to keep the spill from the eaching the coast. Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson has dispatched response teams and a special fire boom to help corral the mess, which resulted from the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon rig. David Brown of KUT News talked to Patterson about the clean-up efforts.
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Criminal Justice
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
E. Smith interviews Gov. Rick Perry for the Trib and Newsweek, Philpott dissects the state’s budget mess in a weeklong series, Hamilton looks at whether Bill White is or was a trial lawyer, M. Smith finds experts all over the state anxiously watching a court case over who owns the water under our feet, Aguilar reports on the battle between Fort Stockton and Clayton Williams Jr. over water in West Texas, Ramshaw finds a population too disabled to get on by itself but not disabled enough to get state help and Miller spends a day with a young man and his mother coping with that situation, Ramsey peeks in on software that lets the government know whether its e-mail messages are getting read and who’s reading what, a highway commissioner reveals just how big a hole Texas has in its road budget, Grissom does the math on the state’s border cameras and learns they cost Texans about $153,800 per arrest, and E. Smith interviews Karen Hughes on the difference between corporate and political P.R. — and whether there’s such a thing as “Obama Derangement Syndrome.” The best of our best from April 19 to April 23, 2010.