Self Reliance News

RUSSIA - Russian Forces Kill 2 Suspected Militants In Dagestan Raid

Sunday, 20 May 2012 07:07 |

Written by Global Incident Map |

Media Monitoring And Incident Mapping By

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SOURCE http://www.globalincidentmap.com/eventdetail.php?ID=75540

Category: Terrorism / globalincidentmap.com

How the fracking mess is about to make the mortgage mess worse

Sunday, 20 May 2012 06:38 |

Written by Resource Insights |

One fact ought to tell you all you need to know about the risks faced by homeowners signing leases for natural gas drilling on their property: Wells Fargo & Company, both the largest home mortgage lender in the United States and a major lender to the country's second largest producer of natural gas, Chesapeake Energy Corp. , refuses to make home loans for properties encumbered with natural gas drilling leases.

This salient fact comes from an article (PDF) written for the New York State Bar Association Journal by attorney Elisabeth N. Radow. Written in the form of an even-tempered legal brief, Radow relates one astounding finding after another. Perhaps most relevant to homeowners who either have signed drilling leases or who may be asked to sign them in the future is this: "Signing a gas lease without lender consent is likely to constitute a mortgage default." You read that right. Default.

Her conclusion stems from something which most homeowners probably don't even realize: Standard residential mortgages prohibit:

the use, disposal, storage, or release of any hazardous substances on, under or about the mortgaged property. In mortgages, hazardous substances include gasoline, kerosene, other flammable or toxic petroleum products, volatile solvents, toxic pesticides and herbicides, materials containing asbestos or formaldehyde and radioactive materials.

Of course, homeowners often have and use some of the above-mentioned materials. But the lenders may invoke their rights should industrial-sized activities such as hydraulic fracturing or fracking occur. Fracking, a process often associated with natural gas drilling, utilizes a cocktail of hazardous chemicals mixed with water. Millions of gallons of the mixture are pumped under high pressure into each well to fracture deep shale formations and thereby release the embedded natural gas found there. Beyond this, homeowners with mortgages are prohibited from violating any environmental laws, federal, state or local. Can they always count on drillers to observe those laws?

Now, here's how the fracking mess intersects with the ongoing mortgage mess. Most mortgages are sold into the secondary market to federal lenders such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and some are packaged in groups as mortgaged-back...

Category: Peak Oil / resourceinsights.blogspot.com

Care Under Fire

Sunday, 20 May 2012 02:00 |

Written by Richard |

Getting shot is likely one of the most life-threatening things that can happen to you while on the street. If you are shot, stabbed or suffer any injury causing massive bleeding, do you know what to do to stay alive until help can get to you? A person can bleed out in less than five [...]...

Category: Crime and Law Enforcement / bluesheepdog.com