"CARLSBAD, N.M. -- Just after the local water board announced this month that its farmers would get only one-tenth of their normal water allotment this year, Ronnie Walterscheid, 53, stood up and called on his elected representatives to declare a water war on their upstream neighbors."
Jerry Redfern has worked as a professional photojournalist for 20 years. He began his career as a staff photographer at newspapers in Montana and Wyoming, at a time when papers still had darkrooms and photographers still processed their own film. In 2012, Jerry became the first winner in the new SEJ Awards category, Outstanding Photography. Image: A mother paddles her children down the Sepon River in a canoe made from fuel tanks dropped by US bombers during the Vietnam War. © Jerry Redfern.
"When Uranium Energy Corp. sought permission to launch a large-scale mining project in Goliad County, Texas, it seemed as if the Environmental Protection Agency would stand in its way. To get the ore out of the ground, the company needed a permit to pollute a pristine supply of underground drinking water in an area already parched by drought."
"Texas was ordered to temporarily stop issuing new water permits for a river system that supplies dozens of Central Texas cities, power generators and petrochemical plants to ensure enough water reaches the last migratory flock of endangered whooping cranes."
"CARRIZO SPRINGS, Tex. -- In this South Texas stretch of mesquite trees and cactus, where the land is sometimes too dry to grow crops, the local aquifer is being strained in the search for oil. The reason is hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a drilling process that requires massive amounts of water."
"PLAINVIEW, Tex. — After two years of drought, people are starting to leave this parched West Texas town."
"The former U.S. EPA official who tangled with Texas officials in a drilling contamination case outside Fort Worth said the state's oil and gas regulators were more interested in promoting the industry than policing it."
"A former Texas state oil and gas regulator outlined in 2011 how two Range Resources Corp. wells outside Fort Worth could have leaked natural gas into the water supply of nearby homes."
A Texas company quit plans to build a coal-fired power plant -- blaming President Obama's environmental rules, but admitting the low price of natural gas was a key reason.
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