SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
In a Corner of Old Sicily, a Battle To Keep Out Texas Oil Men
Jun 08, 2007
Sicily's remote south-eastern corner, where small baroque towns nestle among sun-baked vineyards, hardly seems the place to find Texas oil men on the prowl, looking to strike it rich. But if early soundings by a US company, Panther Resources, pan out, the area could be sitting on natural gas reserves of 50bn cubic metres, enough to keep the Mediterranean island self sufficient for years.
The findings have not impressed a growing army of politicians, bishops, writers and residents who are fighting a fierce campaign to safeguard an area that includes eight Unesco-protected towns.
"What would the residents of Rome say if we started digging for oil between the Forum and the Colosseum?" said the Sicilian writer Andrea Camilleri on the front page of yesterday's La Repubblica.
"It seems you can still do what you want in Sicily," added Fabio Granata, who fought against the exploration licence given to Panther in 2004 while he served as Sicily's foremost cultural official.
In March, the bishop of the town of Noto, Giuseppe Malandrino, joined 2,000 anti-drilling demonstrators who accused Sicily's regional government of ignoring a Unesco edict insisting that zones around its sites should be free from development.
According to the surveyors, the opposition is unwarranted. "The closest we come to a Unesco site is 10 kilometres and the gas is 1,500 metres down," said Giuseppe Salme, a spokesman for Panther Eureka, an Italian firm controlled by Panther Resources. "Gas extraction has been going on for years in central Sicily and the facilities we would build in the event of extraction would be no bigger than garages. This would not create any problems for the historic sites." He added that Panther was applying to extend its surveying activity before possibly seeking permission to extract gas.
Opponents also fear that any drilling will hurt the nascent tourism industry.
"This area has benefited from up to AC/aEURsA!400m [PS270m] in EU cultural funding, so why should we be giving out permits for drilling?" said Mr Granata.
(c) 2007 The Guardian
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Sicily's remote south-eastern corner, where small baroque towns nestle among sun-baked vineyards, hardly seems the place to find Texas oil men on the prowl, looking to strike it rich. But if early soundings by a US company, Panther Resources, pan out, the area could be sitting on natural gas reserves of 50bn cubic metres, enough to keep the Mediterranean island self sufficient for years.
The findings have not impressed a growing army of politicians, bishops, writers and residents who are fighting a fierce campaign to safeguard an area that includes eight Unesco-protected towns.
"What would the residents of Rome say if we started digging for oil between the Forum and the Colosseum?" said the Sicilian writer Andrea Camilleri on the front page of yesterday's La Repubblica.
"It seems you can still do what you want in Sicily," added Fabio Granata, who fought against the exploration licence given to Panther in 2004 while he served as Sicily's foremost cultural official.
In March, the bishop of the town of Noto, Giuseppe Malandrino, joined 2,000 anti-drilling demonstrators who accused Sicily's regional government of ignoring a Unesco edict insisting that zones around its sites should be free from development.
According to the surveyors, the opposition is unwarranted. "The closest we come to a Unesco site is 10 kilometres and the gas is 1,500 metres down," said Giuseppe Salme, a spokesman for Panther Eureka, an Italian firm controlled by Panther Resources. "Gas extraction has been going on for years in central Sicily and the facilities we would build in the event of extraction would be no bigger than garages. This would not create any problems for the historic sites." He added that Panther was applying to extend its surveying activity before possibly seeking permission to extract gas.
Opponents also fear that any drilling will hurt the nascent tourism industry.
"This area has benefited from up to AC/aEURsA!400m [PS270m] in EU cultural funding, so why should we be giving out permits for drilling?" said Mr Granata.
(c) 2007 The Guardian
Sicily's remote south-eastern corner, where small baroque towns nestle among sun-baked vineyards, hardly seems the place to find Texas oil men on the prowl, looking to strike it rich. But if early soundings by a US company, Panther Resources, pan out, the area could be sitting on natural gas reserves of 50bn cubic metres, enough to keep the Mediterranean island self sufficient for years.
The findings have not impressed a growing army of politicians, bishops, writers and residents who are fighting a fierce campaign to safeguard an area that includes eight Unesco-protected towns.
"What would the residents of Rome say if we started digging for oil between the Forum and the Colosseum?" said the Sicilian writer Andrea Camilleri on the front page of yesterday's La Repubblica.
"It seems you can still do what you want in Sicily," added Fabio Granata, who fought against the exploration licence given to Panther in 2004 while he served as Sicily's foremost cultural official.
In March, the bishop of the town of Noto, Giuseppe Malandrino, joined 2,000 anti-drilling demonstrators who accused Sicily's regional government of ignoring a Unesco edict insisting that zones around its sites should be free from development.
According to the surveyors, the opposition is unwarranted. "The closest we come to a Unesco site is 10 kilometres and the gas is 1,500 metres down," said Giuseppe Salme, a spokesman for Panther Eureka, an Italian firm controlled by Panther Resources. "Gas extraction has been going on for years in central Sicily and the facilities we would build in the event of extraction would be no bigger than garages. This would not create any problems for the historic sites." He added that Panther was applying to extend its surveying activity before possibly seeking permission to extract gas.
Opponents also fear that any drilling will hurt the nascent tourism industry.
"This area has benefited from up to AC/aEURsA!400m [PS270m] in EU cultural funding, so why should we be giving out permits for drilling?" said Mr Granata.
(c) 2007 The Guardian
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.