NMIPL IN THE NEWS

Sr. Joan Brown’s Op-Ed in Gallup Independent: Love or fear – our choice

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The following piece appeared in the Gallup Independent on the weekend of April 23-24, 2022

Love or fear – our choice

By Sr. Joan Brown, OSF, Executive Director, Interfaith Power and Light New Mexico & El Paso

Special to the Independent

These are rare days. We just finished celebrating Passover on Earth Day, April 22 and we continue the Easter season and also Ramadan. The confluence of these holy days happens only about every 30 years. To add to these holy days we have a convergence with Earth Day and this is Earth Sunday.

What an important time to renew loving commitments to one another for peace and to care for our Common Home. Somedays, however, I feel there is hardly enough energy just to get through the day.

Several weeks ago presented one of those days. Amidst a sick friend, too much work and many demands, we were surprised to get irrigation water. During our dire drought the water was so very precious for our fruit trees and gardens. I was excited and then very disheartened when a problem arose with an underground pipe leading to one area limiting water to a trickle. It became dark and I could not work any longer in the night to address the problem.

Almost in tears with weariness and yet another problem, I walked to the ditch to turn off the water. There, reflected in the water was a growing white moon and stars. I was stunned by the beauty. A sense of well-being flowed through me. It was a holy moment. I just let go of so many burdens.

The beauty of God awaits us in surprising ways in these dark night times. Hope surprises us with the unexpected if our hearts are open a crack. We did get our water problem fixed with some help. But there are always more challenges. The question we are posed in the Christian scripture this week after Easter is whether I am locked in a closed room or am I a channel of love and peace of God in our troubled world.   Read Full Article

An Invitation to Join Pentecost Pilgrimage with Ecumenical friends in Ukraine

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New Mexico Pilgrimage for Unity

announces:

3rd Annual Pentecost Pilgrimage-in-Place

with an emphasis on praying for and with ecumenical friends in Ukraine

PLEASE JOIN US: ALL ARE WELCOME

Activities beginning May 26, 2022, thru the fall 2022.

Attend one, some, or all.

7 days of praying in preparation
3 days of self designed pilgrimage
1 Pentecost Celebration
4 Months of Pilgrimage Community.
Zoom Opening to a week of prayer – Ascension Day, May 26
Initiation of Pilgrimage – Zoom Meeting, June 2
Pentecost Zoom Celebration – June 5
Zoom Pilgrims Gather, June – Sept. 2nd Thursdays
All Zoom gatherings at 7 pm MT, access info on website

Register Here

Learn More/Donate Institute for Ecumenical Studies, Ukrainian Catholic University

New Mexico Pilgrimage for Unity is a program of New Mexico Ecumenical Institute for Ministry

Report: Low-Producing Wells Account for Half of Methane Pollution

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A peer-reviewed study in Nature Communications provided the first nationwide look at how much methane low-producing wells are emitting. While these wells produce just 6% of U.S. oil and gas, they emit HALF of methane pollution from well sites nationwide. “Eighty percent of US oil and natural gas (O&G) production sites are low production well sites, with average site-level production ≤15 barrels of oil equivalent per day and producing only 6% of the nation’s O&G output in 2019,” said an abstract of the report.   Read full piece here
Here is another article in Reuters new service
Characteristics of US low production oil and gas well sites.
figure 1
a Spatial distribution of active onshore low production well sites (n = 565,000) color-coded by site-level O&G production in barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed) per site. The numbered boxes show a few of the major low production well site regions, including those for which site-level CH4 emissions data are available: (1)—Appalachian, (2)—Oklahoma/Kansas/Arkansas, (3)—Colorado/Utah/Wyoming, (4)—Permian Basin, and (5) Barnett Shale. b Distribution of the national number of well sites and O&G production, comparing low production sites with non-low production sites. c Box plots (centerline, median; box limits, upper and lower quartiles; whiskers, 1.5× interquartile range; points, outliers) showing the distribution of site-level O&G production in each of the five O&G production regions with large numbers of low production well sites shown on the map. The average gas-to-oil ratio (GOR, Mcf/barrel) is shown on the top x-axis. These five regions account for three-quarters (76%) and two-thirds (68%) of the total number and O&G production from all low production well sites, respectively. The horizontal lines within each box plot show the median production rate per site. On the right y-axis, the percentage of the total count of low production well sites and total O&G production from all low production well sites are shown in blue and red, respectively. d Cumulative distribution functions of site-level O&G production for all low production well sites (red line) and well sites in each of the regions shown on the map (blue line—Region 1, light green—Region 2, dark green—Region 3, orange—Region 4, purple—Region 5). e Cumulative distribution functions of low production well site age, representing the years in production as of December 31, 2019 and based on the reported first production date. Lines are color-coded as in d. Analysis based on data from Enverus Prism19 for 2019.

Carlsbad Current Argus. Sep. 3, 2020 New Mexico finalizes oil and gas wastewater regulations, lawmakers hear testimony (Rev. Nick King Quoted)

Las Cruces Sun-News,  Aug. 19, 2020, Report on solving climate crisis brings hope (Co-authored by Michael Sells, Clara Sims and Edith Yanez)

Santa Fe New Mexican, Aug. 15, 2020 Vote your values this November  (Commentary by Larry Rasmussen and Tabitha Arnold)