Refining Nature

Refining Nature PDF

Author: Jon Wlasiuk

Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press

Published: 2018-03-07

Total Pages: 260

ISBN-13: 0822983249

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The Standard Oil Company emerged out of obscurity in the 1860s to capture 90 percent of the petroleum refining industry in the United States during the Gilded Age. John D. Rockefeller, the company’s founder, organized the company around an almost religious dedication to principles of efficiency. Economic success masked the dark side of efficiency as Standard Oil dumped oil waste into public waterways, filled the urban atmosphere with acrid smoke, and created a consumer safety crisis by selling kerosene below congressional standards. Local governments, guided by a desire to favor the interests of business, deployed elaborate engineering solutions to tackle petroleum pollution at taxpayer expense rather than heed public calls to abate waste streams at their source. Only when refinery pollutants threatened the health of the Great Lakes in the twentieth century did the federal government respond to a nascent environmental movement. Organized around the four classical elements at the core of Standard Oil’s success (earth, air, fire, and water), Refining Nature provides an ecological context for the rise of one of the most important corporations in American history.

No Standard Oil

No Standard Oil PDF

Author: Deborah Gordon

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2021-11

Total Pages: 369

ISBN-13: 0190069473

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In No Standard Oil, environmental policy expert Deborah Gordon examines the widely varying climate impacts of global oils and gases, and proposes solutions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in this sector while making sustainable progress in transitioning to a carbon-free energy future. The next decade will be decisive in the fight against climate change. It will be impossible to hold the planet to a 1.5o C temperature rise without controlling methane and CO2 emissions from the oil and gas sector. Contrary to popular belief, the world will not run out of these resources anytime soon. Consumers will continue to demand these abundant resources to fuel their cars, heat their homes, and produce everyday goods like shampoo, pajamas, and paint. But it is becoming more environmentally damaging to supply energy using technologies like fracking oil and liquefying gas. Policymakers, financial investors, environmental advocates, and citizens need to understand what oil and gas are doing to our climate to inform decision-making. In No Standard Oil, Deborah Gordon shows that no two oils or gases are environmentally alike. Each has a distinct, quantifiable climate impact. While all oils and gases pollute, some are much worse for the climate than others. In clear, accessible language, Gordon explains the results of the Oil Climate Index Plus Gas (OCI+), an innovative, open source model that estimates global oil and gas emissions. Gordon identifies the oils and gases from every region of the globe-along with the specific production, processing, and refining activities-that are the most harmful to the planet, and proposes innovative solutions to reduce their climate footprints. Global climate stabilization cannot afford to wait for oil and gas to run out. No Standard Oil shows how we can take immediate, practical steps to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the crucial oil and gas sector while making sustainable progress in transitioning to a carbon-free energy future.

The History of the Standard Oil Company

The History of the Standard Oil Company PDF

Author: Ida M. Tarbell

Publisher: Cosimo, Inc.

Published: 2009-01-01

Total Pages: 458

ISBN-13: 1605207632

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IDA MINERVA TARBELL (1857-1944) is remembered today as a muckraking journalist, thanks to this 1904 blockbuster expos. Originally published as a series of articles in *McClure's* magazine, this groundbreaking work highlighted the dangers of business monopolies and contributed to the eventual breakup of Standard Oil. "In this era of financial crisis compounded, and even perhaps enabled, by a dearth of investigative reporting, it is valuable to go back in time to learn from the work of great journalists with the courage to have taken on avaricious corporations and irresponsible business practices. "Perhaps no book demands our attention and respect as much as the one now in your hands. The unabridged edition, long out of print, of Ida Tarbell's study/expose of the history of the Standard Oil Company is an American classic, a model of careful research, detailed analysis, clear expository writing, and social mission. It has been hailed as one of the top ten of journalism's greatest hits." In Volume II, Tarbell explores: [ battles over oil pipelines [ the marketing of oil [ the political response to Standard's domination [ breaking up the oil trust [ competition in the oil industry [ and more. Investigative journalist DANNY SCHECHTER is editor of Mediachannel.org and author of numerous books on the media, including *Plunder: Investigating Our Economic Calamity and the Subprime Scandal* (Cosimo). For more, see www.newsdissector.com/plunder. He writes in his new introduction, exclusive to this Cosimo Classics edition:

Plunder

Plunder PDF

Author: Danny Schechter

Publisher: Cosimo, Inc.

Published: 2008-01-01

Total Pages: 242

ISBN-13: 1605203157

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Schechter calls for an investigation of those behind the engineered subprime scheme and indicts the regulators who enabled the crisis and the media that missed it. He advocates a debt-relief movement in America and argues that such a movement would resonate across the political spectrum.

Pure America

Pure America PDF

Author: Elizabeth Catte

Publisher: Arcadia Publishing

Published: 2021-02-02

Total Pages: 151

ISBN-13: 1953368050

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Longlisted for the 2022 PEN America John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction, a "riveting and tightly argued" history of eugenics and its ripple effects, by acclaimed historian Elizabeth Catte. Between 1927 and 1979