Hickenlooper and Clinton on Fracking

Compiled by Lucy Warner, June 4, 2016, 5:09 PM


This bit about Hickenlooper drinking fracking fluid first came to my eyes in yesterday’s article “http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/06/03/sanders-clinton-yes-trumps-foreign-policy-ideas-are-scary-so-are-yours. The writer Nadia Prupis, of Common Dreams, spoke strongly in Sanders’ favor, ending with a scathing criticism of Hickenlooper’s cynical and flippant "proof" that fracking fluid is safe when it infiltrates the wells of private citizens in the countryside around fracking sites -- not to mention the earthquakes.

When I looked at that same article again this morning, the three -- apparently dangerous -- paragraphs against Clinton and Hickenlooper had been removed entirely. I don’t want to be paranoid, but the Huffington Post blocked me technologically from copying their article on the subject, unlike dozens of others in the past; and my good friend Facebook wouldn’t let me post the Colorado Independent article below on my personal site, again, as I have often done with other articles in the past.

In rebellion, I have dug up everything on the subject that is relevant to Hickenlooper’s fitness to be VP, and Hillary’s to be Prez, and given their possibly Koch tainted stance on a clearly dangerous practice. Democrats should be environmentally friendly, as one of their basic principles. They should be for the 90% and not for the Koch Brothers. But, after all, I’ve been reminded all my life that “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know,” and Hillary Clinton knows Big Energy -- personally, that is.



http://www.wnyc.org/story/gov-hickenloopers-clinton/

The Brian Lehrer ShowThe Brian Lehrer Show
Published in
The Brian Lehrer Show
CO Governor Hickenlooper Wouldn't Say No to Being Clinton's Veep
Jun 3, 2016

John Hickenlooper, governor of Colorado (D) and the author (with Maximillian Potter) of The Opposite of Woe: My Life in Beer and Politics (Penguin Press, 2016), talks about 2016 politics and his path to the governor's mansion. Hickenlooper, a Clinton superdelegate, has been mentioned on some lists as a potential Vice Presidential pick.

One topic he touched on: the legalization of marijuana in Colorado, which was passed about 3.5 years ago. He said he didn't support it then and would've probably reversed the vote if he was able to, but time will tell whether it's working. The tax revenue is not much and marijuana usage has increased slightly, but so far they're beginning to hear that there are less drug dealers on the streets, which he counts as a success.

When asked specifically about his interest in potentially being tapped as VEEP, the Governor confirmed that he has not been contacted by the Clinton campaign, but it would be hard to turn down an offer.


Brian Lehrer Show
✔ ‎@BrianLehrer

Unaffiliated voters should have a voice in primaries, says CO Governor @hickforco, a Clinton superdelegate who's appeared on VP shortlists.

11:41 AM - 3 Jun 2016


Brian Lehrer Show
✔ ‎@BrianLehrer

No one has contacted me, no one has asked to vet me. That shortlist is probably a lot longer than most people think. -@hickforco

11:45 AM - 3 Jun 2016



What Hickenlooper did to stop criticism of fracking


http://www.coloradoindependent.com/158605/joe-salazar-hickenlooper-swallowed-fracking-fluid-kool-aid

Joe Salazar: Hickenlooper swallowed ‘fracking fluid Kool Aid’
Marianne Goodland
April 01, 2016 Environment/Energy

Democratic State House Rep. Joe Salazar has been waging a 24-hour social media attack against those who back fellow Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper’s support of fracking.

Salazar threw his first punch Thursday, a few hours before the House debated the annual budget bill.

The Adams County representative announced via Facebook that he intended to ask for an amendment to hire more inspectors to investigate oil and gas operations.

He could have chosen thousands of areas to cover the $370,000 cost. But he went directly after Hickenlooper’s budget.

“I think the Governor has swallowed too much of the fracking fluid Kool Aid,” Salazar wrote. “I am prepared to send a message to the Governor that his comments are ill-founded and we are tired of his attempts to minimize what Coloradans are feeling about oil and gas operations.”

The post drew more than 150 positive responses and comments. It also drew a couple of criticisms, beginning with Butch Montoya, a former safety manager for the city of Denver.

That’s when things started to heat up.

Montoya told Salazar he supported the governor’s position, and pointed out that a trillion cars and trucks on the roads won’t go away overnight, and that dependence on oil for heating won’t disappear for those who live on the East Coast.

Salazar responded in part that it’s “easy to be for fracking when it isn’t in your backyard.”

That wasn’t the end of it.

Alan Salazar, Hickenlooper’s chief strategist, got into the act, too.

During the debate on the budget bill, Rep. Salazar did indeed introduce an amendment to take $370,000 out of the governor’s budget to fund the four full-time oil and gas inspectors. And the amendment passed, with support from both sides of the aisle. Rep. Salazar danced a little, with a big grin on his face, as he walked away from the podium.

The amendment was challenged when the budget bill came up for its final action of the night, and just as quickly as it had been adopted, it was killed. Rep. Salazar admitted when the vote came up that he wasn’t serious — that the amendment was designed to send the governor a message.

The plan worked.

The governor’s strategist Alan Salazar sent this reporter a tweet swiping at Rep. Salazar’s amendment.

This morning, Alan Salazar responded directly to the representative via the Facebook post, calling the stunt unproductive and a “gratuitous and ungracious critique.”

Alan Salazar said the Governor had offered to sit down with the representative to work through the problems the Department of Natural Resources had with a bill Salazar offered that referred to earthquakes allegedly caused by fracking.

“Had you an interest in passing effective legislation, indeed, something that might solve a problem, instead of sending a vitriolic message, you would not have rebuffed the offer,” Alan Salazar wrote.

Rep. Salazar fired back shortly after 11 a.m. this morning. He admitted the tactic might have been unflattering, but he also finds it unflattering that the governor goes on public radio or other media to “minimize the concerns of Coloradans by using oil and gas talking points (i.e. Fracking is safe, there are no problems, it’s going to drive business away, we have the most stringent regulations, etc.).”

The Governor refuses to listen to his constituents, Joe Salazar continued, as evidenced by the nearly two dozen anti-fracking initiatives that were filed on the November ballot.

Eight of those measures still await petition approval.

Rep. Salazar also said his constituents worry about earthquakes, property value damage, air and water quality, accidents and explosions. He noted a report last week said there had been more than 600 spills, along with other safety problems, including loss of life for oil workers.

He finished by asking Hickenlooper to come to Adams County and talk to anxious residents about the impact of drilling. But he also said the Governor has refused to talk to him, pointing out that on other issues, Hickenlooper’s door has been open.

“On oil and gas issues, my concerns have fallen on deaf ears,” Rep. Salazar wrote.

“My actions, yesterday, as much as it makes you mad/disappointed got the attention of the Governor and we are now communicating. I am open to continued communication. Is the Governor?”

Clarification: comments from Alan Salazar clarified to reference a bill, not Rep. Salazar’s amendment.



“… the CleanStim fluid system should not be considered edible.” --


http://www.kunc.org/post/whats-fracking-fluid-hickenlooper-drank#stream/0

What's In The Fracking Fluid Hickenlooper Drank?
By Jim Hill • Feb 15, 2013

Photograph -- Cropped picture from a Halliburton promotional advertisment flier for CleanStim. Source: Halliburton.com

Governor Hickenlooper caused a minor stir nationally when he admitted to taking a swig of fracking fluid during a meeting with the U.S. Senate energy committee.

The Denver Post identified the particular fluid in question on Thursday via Hickenlooper spokesman Eric Brown. ‘CleanStim’ was the fluid quaffed by the Governor, it’s manufactured by Halliburton.

Curious as to the contents?

Colorado approved a fracking fluids disclosure law in 2011. In turn, Halliburton’s disclosures are available online, including the formulation for CleanStim. They tout the fluid as sourcing ingredients from the food industry [.pdf]. Let’s take a look at the ingredient label:

•Enzyme
•Exthoxylated Sugar-Based Fatty Acid Ester
•Inorganic Acid
•Inorganic Salt
•Maltodextrin
•Organic Acid
•Organic Ester
•Partially Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil
•Polysaccharide Polymer
•Sulfonated Alcohol

Halliburton’s formulation doesn’t include concentrations. It’s also interesting to note a minor disclaimer from Halliburton:

*Intended Use - The CleanStim formulation is designed for use in hydraulic fracturing. Even though all the ingredients are acquired from food suppliers, the CleanStim fluid system should not be considered edible.

The Denver Business Journal inquired if CleanStim was in use in Colorado. They didn’t receive an answer, only a suggestion to ask Colorado energy companies directly. State Capitol Reporter Bente Birkeland reported Friday on Morning Edition that the fluid is an expensive prototype.

In a blog post at The Hill published on Thursday, Kristin Stephen of Fort Collins was critical of the Governor over CleanStim. Her contention is that the formula the Governor tried wasn’t a typical fracking fluid, something the Governor has also acknowledged.

Chemicals commonly used according to the FracFocus website include hydrochloric acid, methanol, sodium chloride, and others. A look at another Halliburton fluid formulation used in the Denver-Julesburg basin lists constituents such as the aforementioned three, plus crystalline silica among others. It’s also important to note that water makes up the bulk of fracturing fluid when it is used at a well site.

As for CleanStim, Hickenlooper did tell the Senate committee that “It was not particularly tasty, but I'm still alive to tell the story.”



“Halliburton’s formulation doesn’t include concentrations. It’s also interesting to note a minor disclaimer from Halliburton: *Intended Use - The CleanStim formulation is designed for use in hydraulic fracturing. Even though all the ingredients are acquired from food suppliers, the CleanStim fluid system should not be considered edible. …. In a blog post at The Hill published on Thursday, Kristin Stephen of Fort Collins was critical of the Governor over CleanStim. Her contention is that the formula the Governor tried wasn’t a typical fracking fluid, something the Governor has also acknowledged. Chemicals commonly used according to the FracFocus website include hydrochloric acid, methanol, sodium chloride, and others.”


I don’t like the look of hydrochloric acid and methanol as ingredients which could show up in my well water. Methanol is the deadly “wood alcohol” and it doesn’t even have to be in your mouth. It can be deadly if absorbed through the skin. Look at the symptoms below of methanol poisoning, and the history of poisonings. One article in the last six months or so stated that the actual chemical composition of fracking fluid is by no means uniform, so there’s no way to be sure that methanol and hydrochloric acid are not present. This biologycorner article makes methanol more understandable.


https://www.biologycorner.com/worksheets/articles/wood_alcohol.html

How Wood Alcohol Poisonings Advanced Toxicology

In the days before Prohibition, New York was trying to update it's [sic] coroner's office by improving laboratory practices and using science to determine the cause of death and solve crimes. Up until 1917, the coroner was an elected official, and one who had no science or medical background. Murders of all kinds were written off as suicides, or "acts of God." Poisons had become a popular way to rid oneself of a rival or family member because it was unlikely that its effects would be detected.

In 1918, Charles Norris was appointed as the Chief Medical Examiner and was a pioneer in forensic toxicology. He, in turn, hired a chemist named Alexander Gettler who was given the task of developing methods to determine if poisons were the cause of death. Gettler spent time grinding up livers and testing a variety of substances. In the years leading up to the Prohibition, Gettler noted a rise in the number of deaths attributed to wood alcohol poisoning.

------- Excerpt from the Poisoner's Handbook -------

Wood alcohol -- technically known as methyl alcohol, but also as wood spirit, hydroxymethane, carbino, colonial spirit, Columbian spirit, and, some years later, methanol -- was in itself nothing new. The ancient Egyptians had used it in their embalming processes. For centuries it had been the essential ingrediant [sic] in homemade whiskey. Its chemical formula had been identified in 1661 by a chemist who called it "spirit of box" because he'd made it by distilling boxwood. The term, methyl was derived from the Greek methy (meaning wine) and hyle (meaning wood, or more precisely, path of trees).

The chemical structure of wood alcohol is simple: three hydrogen atoms bonded to a single carbon atom (in a cluster known as a methyl group), with one oxygen atom and another hydrogen atom tagging along. It is also simple to make, as industrialists and moonshiners had realized, requiring little more than wood and heat. The process was called destructive distillation. Slabs and slices of wood went into a closed container and were heated to at least 400 degrees Fahrenheit (204 degrees Celsius). As the wood cooked into charcoal, its natural liquids vaporized. The vapor could be cooled, condensed, and distilled into a rather murky soup containing methyl alcohol, acetone, and acetic acid. A second distilling would separate out the pure methyl alcohol, a liquid as clear as glass and as odorless as ice, from the other ingredients.

"Industrial" alcohol was basically grain alcohol (ethanol) with other chemicals mixed in to make it undrinkable, methanol was one of the common additives. The adding of these chemicals was required by law after Prohibition to prevent industrial alcohol from being used as a beverage. Basically, the government ordered the alcohol to be laced with chemicals that would make it undrinkable. As a result, there were many bootleggers who attempted to make industrial alcohol drinkable and less toxic by redistilling, diluting or mixing it with other chemicals. None of these procedures was particularly effective, and people who chose to drink alcohol illegally would be risking their lives.

Why is methyl alcohol so dangerous when other acoholic beverages are not? Liquors usually contain about 3% ethanol which is often produced from fermenting grains, fruits, and vegetables. In a way to replace now banned liquors during the era of Prohibition, people turned to questionable distillation methods and drinks that were a mixture of ethanol and methanol. Even small quantities of methanol can be fatal, but the risk did not deter some people.

Methanol is toxic when ingested, inhaled or even absorbed in the skin. Methanol , when ingested, breaks down into even more toxic substances, a process called toxification. Enzymes in the liver first convert methanol to formaldehyde which is then converted to formic acid. This process takes up to 30 hours from the initial exposure to methanol, and means that you might not die initially from its consumption, but may experience symptoms a day later. Usually the first sign of methanol poisoning is loss of vision. If the person recovers from the toxins, the blindness is permanent as formic acid actually damages the optic nerve.

As Gettler had predicted, the number of cases of poisoning increased. In 1926, in New York City alone, 1200 became sick by poisonous alcohol and 400 died. Bootlegging of alcohol, much of which contained methanol continued, poisonings became a public health issue. Gettler continued to work these cases, publicizing deaths by alcohol to raise awareness of the problem. In 1933, the 18th amendment was repealed and the program that required industrial alcohol to be made toxic was also ceased.



Hillary and shale oil – Bernie wasn’t exaggerating at all about her deep involvement with the fossil fuel energy lobby and Wall Street. I always thought she was more honest than the Republicans claimed, but now I’m not so sure. See the article below.

I won’t try to excerpt and discuss this Motherjones article because it is too long and detailed, but it is fascinating and shocking, like watching a spider kill its’ prey and wind a cocoon of silk around it to save for later! It also should be considered when deciding who is a better leader, Clinton or Sanders. I’m more or less sure now that I’m going to resign my Democratic membership after November and become an Independent.


http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2014/09/hillary-clinton-fracking-shale-state-department-chevron

How Hillary Clinton's State Department Sold Fracking to the World
A trove of secret documents details the US government's global push for shale gas.
MARIAH BLAKE
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

Photograph -- Hillary Clinton; Hillary Clinton is welcomed to Sofia by Bulgarian Foreign Affairs Minister Nikolay Mladenov, left. US Department of State/flickr
Photograph -- David Goldwyn
David Goldwyn at a 2006 NATO conference NATO photos


One icy morning in February 2012, Hillary Clinton's plane touched down in the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, which was just digging out from a fierce blizzard. Wrapped in a thick coat, the secretary of state descended the stairs to the snow-covered tarmac, where she and her aides piled into a motorcade bound for the presidential palace. That afternoon, they huddled with Bulgarian leaders, including Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, discussing everything from Syria's bloody civil war to their joint search for loose nukes. But the focus of the talks was fracking. The previous year, Bulgaria had signed a five-year, $68 million deal, granting US oil giant Chevron millions of acres in shale gas concessions. Bulgarians were outraged. Shortly before Clinton arrived, tens of thousands of protesters poured into the streets carrying placards that read "Stop fracking with our water" and "Chevron go home." Bulgaria's parliament responded by voting overwhelmingly for a fracking moratorium.

Clinton urged Bulgarian officials to give fracking another chance. According to Borissov, she agreed to help fly in the "best specialists on these new technologies to present the benefits to the Bulgarian people." But resistance only grew. The following month in neighboring Romania, thousands of people gathered to protest another Chevron fracking project, and Romania's parliament began weighing its own shale gas moratorium. Again Clinton intervened, dispatching her special envoy for energy in Eurasia, Richard Morningstar, to push back against the fracking bans. The State Depart­ment's lobbying effort culminated in late May 2012, when Morningstar held a series of meetings on fracking with top Bulgarian and Romanian officials. He also touted the technology in an interview on Bulgarian national radio, saying it could lead to a fivefold drop in the price of natural gas. A few weeks later, Romania's parliament voted down its proposed fracking ban and Bulgaria's eased its moratorium.

The episode sheds light on a crucial but little-known dimension of Clinton's diplomatic legacy. Under her leadership, the State Department worked closely with energy companies to spread fracking around the globe—part of a broader push to fight climate change, boost global energy supply, and undercut the power of adversaries such as Russia that use their energy resources as a cudgel. But environmental groups fear that exporting fracking, which has been linked to drinking-water contamination and earthquakes at home, could wreak havoc in countries with scant environmental regulation. And according to interviews, diplomatic cables, and other documents obtained by Mother Jones, American officials—some with deep ties to industry—also helped US firms clinch potentially lucrative shale concessions overseas, raising troubling questions about whose interests the program actually serves.

Geologists have long known that there were huge quantities of natural gas locked in shale rock. But tapping it wasn't economically viable until the late 1990s, when a Texas wildcatter named George Mitchell hit on a novel extraction method that involved drilling wells sideways from the initial borehole, then blasting them full of water, chemicals, and sand to break up the shale—a variation of a technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Besides dislodging a bounty of natural gas, Mitchell's breakthrough ignited an energy revolution. Between 2006 and 2008, domestic gas reserves jumped 35 percent. The United States later vaulted past Russia to become the world's largest natural gas producer. As a result, prices dropped to record lows, and America began to wean itself from coal, along with oil and gas imports, which lessened its dependence on the Middle East. The surging global gas supply also helped shrink Russia's economic clout: Profits for Russia's state-owned gas company, Gazprom, plummeted by more than 60 percent between 2008 and 2009 alone.

Clinton, who was sworn in as secretary of state in early 2009, believed that shale gas could help rewrite global energy politics. "This is a moment of profound change," she later told a crowd at Georgetown University. "Countries that used to depend on others for their energy are now producers. How will this shape world events? Who will benefit, and who will not?…The answers to these questions are being written right now, and we intend to play a major role." Clinton tapped a lawyer named David Goldwyn as her special envoy for international energy affairs; his charge was "to elevate energy diplomacy as a key function of US foreign policy."

"Countries that used to depend on others for their energy are now producers," said Clinton. "How will this shape world events? Who will benefit?…The answers to these questions are being written right now, and we intend to play a major role."

Goldwyn had a long history of promoting drilling overseas—both as a Department of Energy official under Bill Clinton and as a representative of the oil industry. From 2005 to 2009 he directed the US-Libya Business Association, an organization funded primarily by US oil companies—including Chevron, Exxon Mobil, and Marathon—clamoring to tap Libya's abundant supply. Goldwyn lobbied Congress for pro-Libyan policies and even battled legislation that would have allowed families of the Lockerbie bombing victims to sue the Libyan government for its alleged role in the attack.

According to diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks, one of Goldwyn's first acts at the State Department was gathering oil and gas industry executives "to discuss the potential international impact of shale gas." Clinton then sent a cable to US diplomats, asking them to collect information on the potential for fracking in their host countries. These efforts eventually gave rise to the Global Shale Gas Initiative, which aimed to help other nations develop their shale potential. Clinton promised it would do so "in a way that is as environmentally respectful as possible."

But environmental groups were barely consulted, while industry played a crucial role. When Goldwyn unveiled the initiative in April 2010, it was at a meeting of the United States Energy Association, a trade organization representing Chevron, Exxon Mobil, and ConocoPhillips, all of which were pursuing fracking overseas. Among their top targets was Poland, which preliminary studies suggested had abundant shale gas. The day after Goldwyn's announcement, the US Embassy in Warsaw helped organize a shale gas conference, underwritten by these same companies (plus the oil field services company Halliburton) and attended by officials from the departments of State and Energy.

In some cases, Clinton personally promoted shale gas. During a 2010 gathering of foreign ministers in Washington, DC, she spoke about America's plans to help spread fracking abroad. "I know that in some places [it] is controversial," she said, "but natural gas is the cleanest fossil fuel available for power generation today." She later traveled to Poland for a series of meetings with officials, after which she announced that the country had joined the Global Shale Gas Initiative.

"We are very firm on this," insists the State Department's Paul Hueper. "We do not shill for industry."

That August, delegates from 17 countries descended on Washington for the State Depart­ment's first shale gas conference. The media was barred from attending, and officials refused to reveal basic information, including which countries took part. When Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) inquired about industry involvement, the department would say only that there had been "a limited industry presence." (State Department officials have since been more forthcoming with Mother Jones: In addition to a number of US government agencies, they say attendees heard from energy firms, including Devon, Chesapeake, and Halliburton.)

During the cursory press conference that followed, Goldwyn, a short, bespectacled man with a shock of dark hair, argued that other nations could avoid the environmental damage sometimes associated with fracking by following America's lead and adopting "an umbrella of laws and regulations." A reporter suggested that US production had actually "outpaced the ability to effectively oversee the safety" and asked how we could be sure the same wouldn't happen elsewhere. Goldwyn replied that attendees had heard about safety issues from energy companies and the Groundwater Protection Council, a nonprofit organization that receives industry funding and opposes federal regulation of fracking wastewater disposal.

Goldwyn and the delegates then boarded a bus to Pennsylvania for an industry-sponsored luncheon and tour of some shale fields. Paul Hueper, director of energy programs at the State Department's Bureau of Energy Resources, says the tour was organized independently and that energy firms were only invited to the conference itself to share best practices. "We are very firm on this," he insisted. "We do not shill for industry."

While the meeting helped stir up interest, it wasn't until 2011 that global fracking fever set in for real. That spring, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its initial estimate of global shale gas, which found that 32 countries had viable shale basins and put global recoverable shale gas at 6,600 trillion cubic feet—enough to supply the world for more than 50 years at current rates of consumption. This was a rich opportunity for big oil and gas companies, which had largely missed out on the US fracking boom and were under pressure from Wall Street to shore up their dwindling reserves. "They're desperate," says Antoine Simon, who coordinates the shale gas campaign at Friends of the Earth Europe. "It's the last push to continue their fossil fuel development."

The industry began fighting hard for access to shale fields abroad, and promoting gas as the fuel of choice for slashing carbon emissions. In Europe, lobbyists circulated a report claiming that the European Union could save 900 billion euros if it invested in gas rather than renewable energy to meet its 2050 climate targets. This rankled environmentalists, who argue fracking may do little to ease global warming, given that wells and pipelines leak large quantities of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. They also fear it could crowd out investment in renewables.

By early 2011, the State Department was laying plans to launch a new bureau to integrate energy into every aspect of foreign policy—an idea Goldwyn had long been advocating. In 2005, he and a Chevron executive named Jan Kalicki had published a book called Energy and Security: Toward a New Foreign Policy Strategy, which argued that energy independence was unattainable in the near term and urged Washington to shift its focus to energy security—by boosting global fossil fuel production and stifling unrest that might upset energy markets. Goldwyn and his ideas had played a key role in shaping the bureau, so some observers were surprised when he quietly stepped down just before its launch.

When I approached Goldwyn following a recent speaking engagement in Washington, DC, to ask about his time at the State Department and why he left, he ducked out a side door, and Kalicki blocked the corridor to keep me from following. Goldwyn later said via email that he had simply chosen "to return to the private sector."

Around the time of his departure, WikiLeaks released a slew of diplomatic cables, including one describing a 2009 meeting during which Goldwyn and Canadian officials discussed development of the Alberta oil sands—a project benefiting some of the same firms behind the US-Libya Business Association. The cable said that Goldwyn had coached his Canadian counterparts on improving "oil sands messaging" and helped alleviate their concerns about getting oil sands crude to US markets. This embarrassed the State Department, which is reviewing the controversial Keystone XL pipeline proposal to transport crude oil from Canada and is under fire from environmentalists.

After leaving State, Goldwyn took a job with Sutherland, a law and lobbying firm that touts his "deep understanding" of pipeline issues, and launched his own company, Goldwyn Global Strategies.

In late 2011, Clinton finally unveiled the new Bureau of Energy Resources, with 63 employees and a multimillion-dollar budget. She also promised to instruct US embassies around the globe to step up their work on energy issues and "pursue more outreach to private-sector energy" firms, some of which had generously supported both her and President Barack Obama's political campaigns. (One Chevron executive bundled large sums for Clinton's 2008 presidential bid, for example.)

As part of its expanded energy mandate, the State Department hosted conferences on fracking from Thailand to Botswana. It sent US experts to work alongside foreign officials as they developed shale gas programs. And it arranged for dozens of foreign delegations to visit the United States to attend workshops and meet with industry consultants—as well as with environmental groups, in some cases.

US oil giants, meanwhile, were snapping up natural gas leases in far-flung places. By 2012, Chevron had large shale concessions in Argentina, Australia, Canada, China, and South Africa, as well as in Eastern Europe, which was in the midst of a claim-staking spree; Poland alone had granted more than 100 shale concessions covering nearly a third of its territory. When the nation lit its first shale gas flare atop a Halliburton-drilled well that fall, the state-owned gas company ran full-page ads in the country's largest newspapers showing a spindly rig rising above the hills in the tiny village of Lubocino, alongside the tagline: "Don't put out the flame of hope." Politicians promised that Poland would soon break free of its nemesis, Russia, which supplies the lion's share of its gas. "After years of dependence on our large neighbor, today we can say that my generation will see the day when we will be independent in the area of natural gas," Prime Minister Donald Tusk declared. "And we will be setting terms."

But shale was not the godsend that industry leaders and foreign governments had hoped it would be. For one, new research from the US Geological Survey suggested that the EIA assessments had grossly overestimated shale deposits: The recoverable shale gas estimate for Poland shrank from 187 trillion cubic feet to 1.3 trillion cubic feet, a 99 percent drop. Geological conditions and other factors in Europe and Asia also made fracking more arduous and expensive; one industry study estimated that drilling shale gas in Poland would cost three times what it does in the United States.

By 2013, US oil giants were abandoning their Polish shale plays. "The expectations for global shale gas were extremely high," says the State Department's Hueper. "But the geological limitations and aboveground challenges are immense. A handful of countries have the potential for a boom, but there may never be a global shale gas revolution."

"They're desperate," says Antoine Simon of Friends of the Earth Europe. "It's the last push to continue their fossil fuel development."

The politics of fracking overseas were also fraught. According to Susan Sakmar, a visiting law professor at the University of Houston who has studied fracking regulation, the United States is one of the only nations where individual landowners own the mineral rights. "In most, perhaps all, other countries of the world, the underground resources belong to the crown or the government," she explains. The fact that property owners didn't stand to profit from drilling on their land ignited public outrage in some parts of the world, especially Eastern Europe. US officials speculate that Russia also had a hand in fomenting protests there. "The perception among diplomats in the region was that Russia was protecting its interests," says Mark Gitenstein, the former US ambassador to Romania. "It didn't want shale gas for obvious reasons."

Faced with these obstacles, US and European energy companies launched a lobbying blitz targeting the European Union. They formed faux grassroots organizations, plied lawmakers with industry-funded studies, and hosted lavish dinners and conferences for regulators. The website for one industry confab—which, according to Friends of the Earth Europe, featured presentations from Exxon Mobil, Total, and Halliburton—warned that failure to develop shale gas "will have damaging consequences on European energy security and prosperity" and urged European governments to "allow shale gas exploration to advance" so they could "fully understand the scale of the opportunity."

US lobbying shops also jumped into the fray. Covington & Burling, a major Washington firm, hired several former senior EU policymakers—including a top energy official who, according to the New York Times, arrived with a not-yet-public draft of the European Commission's fracking regulations.

In June 2013, Covington staffer Jean De Ruyt, a former Belgian diplomat and adviser to the European Commission, hosted an event at the firm's Brussels office. Executives from Chevron and other oil and gas behemoths attended, as did Kurt Vandenberghe, then one of the commission's top environmental regulators. These strategies appeared to pay off: The commission's recently released framework for regulating fracking includes recommendations for governments but not firm requirements. "They chose the weakest option they had," says Simon of Friends of the Earth Europe. "People at the highest level of the commission are in the industry's pocket."

Goldwyn was also busy promoting fracking overseas—this time on behalf of industry. Between January and October 2012, his firm organized a series of workshops on fracking for officials in Bulgaria, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Ukraine, all of them funded by Chevron. The events were closed to the public—when Romanian journalist Vlad Ursulean tried to attend the Romanian gathering, he says Goldwyn personally saw to it that he was escorted out.

Goldwyn told Mother Jones that the workshops featured presentations on technical aspects of fracking by academics from the Colorado School of Mines and Penn State University. Chevron, he maintains, had "no editorial input." But all of these countries—except Bulgaria, which was in the midst of anti-fracking protests—would later grant Chevron major shale concessions.

In some cases, the State Department had a direct hand in negotiating the deals. Gitenstein, then the ambassador to Romania, met with Chevron executives and Romanian officials and pressed them to hand over millions of acres of shale concessions. "The Romanians were just sitting on the leases, and Chevron was upset. So I intervened," says Gitenstein, whose State Department tenure has been bookended by stints at Mayer Brown, a law and lobbying firm that has represented Chevron. "This is traditionally what ambassadors do on behalf of American companies." In the end, Romania signed a 30-year deal with Chevron, which helped set off massive, nationwide protests.

When the government began weighing a fracking ban, it didn't sit well with Gitenstein, who went on Romanian television and warned that, without fracking, the nation could be stuck paying five times what America does for natural gas. He added that US shale prospectors had "obtained great successes—without consequences for the environment, I dare say." The proposed moratorium soon died.

A few weeks later, Chevron was preparing to build its first fracking rig near Pungesti, a tiny farming village in northeastern Romania. According to a memo from the prime minister's office, a Romanian official met with Chevron executives and an embassy-based US Commerce Department employee to craft a PR strategy for the project. They agreed to organize a kickoff event at Victoria Palace in Bucharest. As a spokesman, they would tap Damian Draghici, a charismatic Romanian lawmaker who was a "recognized personality among the Roma minority," which had a "considerable presence" around Chevron's planned drilling sites. "It was really extraordinary—the level of collaboration between these players," says Ursulean, who has written extensively about Chevron's activities in Romania. "It was as if they were all branches of the same company."

"The Romanians were just sitting on the leases, and Chevron was upset," says former US ambassador to Romania Mark Gitenstein. "So I intervened."

The strategy did little to soothe the public's ire. When Chevron finally did attempt to install the rig in late 2013, residents—including elderly villagers who arrived in horse-drawn carts—blockaded the planned drilling sites. The Romanian Orthodox Church rallied behind them, with one local priest likening Chevron to enemy "invaders." Soon, anti-fracking protests were cropping up from Poland to the United Kingdom. But Chevron didn't back down. Along with other American energy firms, it lobbied to insert language in a proposed US-EU trade agreement allowing US companies to haul European governments before international arbitration panels for any actions threatening their investments. Chevron argued this was necessary to protect shareholders against "arbitrary" and "unfair" treatment by local authorities. But environmental groups say it would stymie fracking regulation and point to a $250 million lawsuit Delaware-based Lone Pine Resources has filed against the Canadian province of Quebec for temporarily banning fracking near a key source of drinking water. The case hinges on a similar trade provision.

Despite the public outcry in Europe, the State Department has stayed the course. Clinton's successor as secretary of state, John Kerry, views natural gas as a key part of his push against climate change. Under Kerry, State has ramped up investment in its shale gas initiative and is planning to expand it to 30 more countries, from Cambodia to Papua New Guinea.

Following the Crimea crisis, the Obama administration has also been pressing Eastern European countries to fast-track their fracking initiatives so as to be less dependent on Russia. During an April visit to Ukraine, which has granted concessions to Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell, Vice President Joe Biden announced that the United States would bring in technical experts to speed up its shale gas development. "We stand ready to assist you," promised Biden, whose son Hunter has since joined the board of a Ukrainian energy company. "Imagine where you'd be today if you were able to tell Russia: 'Keep your gas.' It would be a very different world."

This story was supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism.