Soil pollution levels in parts of Basra are 1,200% to 3,300% higher than those typically measured in cities like Toronto or New York, according to new comparative soil data. It’s getting into water.

When ExxonMobil quietly returned to Iraq’s oil fields, signing new agreements tied to the Majnoon field and surrounding infrastructure in late 2025, it was framed as a story of stability. Security concerns once deemed too great were now manageable. Production would rise, pipelines would be upgraded, and jobs would follow.

While the US company promotes its renewed developments in Iraq to extract oil from a field known as “Majnoon”—Arabic for “crazy”—located roughly 50 miles from Basra, a city of five million people, no press release mentions what oil looks like when it enters a glass of water.

Within a five-mile radius of Basra city, oil operations are dominated by the Iraqi state-owned Basra Oil Company and international partners BP–PetroChina at Rumaila and Eni at Zubair. ExxonMobil’s former operations were located farther north and do not sit directly adjacent to the city itself.

“There is oil in the water, and it’s in the soil. Half of my mother’s brothers—six of them—have cancer, the youngest being 40, with leukemia. This has become normal now. We know that the oil fields just outside Basra are polluting our water and soil, but what can we do?” asks Sara (name changed), a young environmentalist I met in Istanbul.

She asked to remain anonymous, saying it would be dangerous to speak publicly. Pointing to a map, she showed where some of the world’s largest oil companies—such as BP and Eni—are drilling close to city limits in Basra, indicating areas where cancer rates are highest. She said no local researchers will touch the subject that children in these areas are dying from leukemia. She knows some of them.

“I sent my sisters to study in Istanbul so they can be far away from this pollution,” she told me, pointing to her sisters we are sitting with at the shisha cafe.

“We know that there are high levels of levels of cancer in Basra and it’s known that oil is in the tap water. Of course I don’t clean my dishes with the water but we do use it for clothes and showering. Farmers use the water even though it’s not safe. Don’t clean dishes. Children living next to the oilfield in the area of Rumalia, with estimates of cancer being 20% higher than the rest of the country. Some kids are living within a mile of the oil drills which is not normal.”

Rumaila is known locally as the “cemetery” for the high rates of cancer and disease among the population, left in the dark without resources despite supporting the lucrative oil fields nearby.

“Children living next to the Rumaila oil field get cancer,” says Sara. “There are babies being born with cancer. My friend works at the government owned chemical company that processes oil. Her 5 year-old sister died of cancer. She was playing outside and fell on her eyes when they found the tumor. She died a year later.”

How do people in Basra cope? It is a mix of avoiding drinking the water and giving up. The water is still used to wash clothes, clean dishes, shower, and water gardens.

Cancer is no longer whispered, it is assumed.

The BBC has reported extensively on soaring cancer rates in southern Iraq, particularly in Basra, where decades of oil extraction, gas flaring, industrial runoff, and war debris have combined into what doctors describe as an environmental health emergency. While doctors point to gas flaring, our source says oil contamination in water and soil may now be the greater concern. Flaring can be reduced around city centers (although data shows that is it only growing in Iraq), but oil that has entered soil and groundwater remains.

The BBC reported: “For health reasons Iraqi law prohibits flaring within six miles (10km) of people’s homes, but we found towns where gas was being burned less than 250m from people’s front doors. A leaked Iraq Health Ministry report, seen by BBC Arabic, blames air pollution for a 20% rise in cancer in Basra between 2015 and 2018.”

Sara says flaring and pollution continue despite the laws, while government agencies and universities turn a blind eye to the health impacts. She also says oil company employees sent to Basra are exposed to dangerous conditions, often late in their careers, and later receive large pensions due to prolonged environmental exposure.

Doctors interviewed by the BBC describe pediatric cancer wards overwhelmed. Leukemia, breast cancer, and rare tumors appear at rates far beyond global averages.

A 2025 study examining soil around Basra found pollution levels 1,200% to 3,300% higher than those typically measured in cities like Toronto or New York.

Average TPH levels ranged from 8 µg/g (dry weight) in agricultural areas to 265 µg/g along roads. During the wet season, levels reached as high as 340 µg/g, as rain drives oil residues deeper into the soil rather than removing them.

The study concluded that oil refineries are the main source of soil contamination, with additional pollution from vehicles, fuel stations, power generation, and oil infrastructure.

For context, Canadian soil safety standards, used in cities like Toronto, set acceptable levels far below the hundreds of µg/g measured in Basra.

Another 2024 study found elevated TPH levels across Basra’s major oilfields, including Majnoon, Rumaila, West Qurna, and Al-Zubair, exceeding thresholds associated with human health risk

Iraq’s oil sector includes BP, Shell (formerly Basra Gas Company), TotalEnergies, ENI, Lukoil, CNPC, and PetroChina, many operating through state partnerships. Gas flaring remains widespread.

According to the World Bank, Iraq ranks among the world’s top gas-flaring countries. These emissions settle into lungs, groundwater, and the bodies of children.

“It’s not safe to grow up there anymore,” says Sara.

Government employees in Iraq are currently banned from speaking publicly about pollution from oil fields.

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Unlike most oil and gas companies, Italy’s Eni is walking the walk and aims to be carbon free by 2050. In a bold move Eni invested in an American fusion company, Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) and have recently announced a power offtake agreement worth more than $1 billion, expanding a longstanding strategic partnership between the companies to commercialize fusion power.

For a backgrounder on fusion and why it’s so hard, our writer Brian Nitz explains.

The power purchase agreement (PPA) concerns Eni’s acquisition of decarbonized power from CFS’s 400 MW Chesterfield County, Virginia, which is expected to connect to the grid in the early 2030s. Financial terms weren’t disclosed. This is the second offtake agreement that CFS has signed in three months for its first grid-scale fusion power plant.

“The agreement with Eni demonstrates the value of fusion energy on the grid. It is a big vote of confidence to have Eni, who has contributed to our execution since the beginning, buy the power we intend to make in Virginia,” said Bob Mumgaard, Co-founder and CEO of CFS. “Our fusion power attracts diverse customers across the world — from hyperscalers to traditional energy leaders — because of the promise of clean, almost limitless energy.”

“This strategic collaboration, with a tangible commitment to the purchase of fusion energy, marks a turning point in which fusion becomes a full industrial opportunity,” said Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi. “Eni has been strengthening its collaboration with CFS with its technological know-how since it first invested in the company in 2018. As energy demand grows, Eni supports the development of fusion power as a new energy paradigm capable of producing clean, safe, and virtually inexhaustible energy. This international partnership confirms our commitment to making fusion energy a reality, promoting its industrialization for a more sustainable energy future.”

Eni is a global energy tech company operating in 64 Countries, with about 32,500 employees. Originally an oil & gas company, it has evolved into an integrated energy company, playing a key role in ensuring energy security and leading the energy transition. Eni’s goal is to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 through the decarbonization of its processes and of the products it sells to its customers.

In line with this goal, Eni invests in the research and development of technologies that can accelerate the transition to increasingly sustainable energy. Renewable energy sources, bio-refining, carbon capture and storage are only some examples of Eni’s areas of activity and research.

In addition, the company is exploring game-changing technologies such as fusion energy – a technology based on the physical processes that power stars and that could generate safe, virtually limitless energy with zero emissions.

The PPA follows CFS’ $863 million Series B2 round in which Eni increased its investment in CFS. Eni, which was among the first to invest in CFS in 2018 and believe in fusion, is today a strategic shareholder.

In 2023 the two companies signed a collaboration agreement to accelerate fusion energy development. The collaboration between the companies includes operational and technological support; project execution through the sharing of methodologies learned from the energy industry; and relationships with stakeholders.

The PPA further validates that CFS is on the most promising path to deliver commercial fusion power in the coming years. The company has demonstrated its capabilities by developing key advances in high-temperature superconducting magnets and sustaining its execution velocity in the construction of the SPARC fusion demonstration machine in Devens, Massachusetts.

Eni, a global tech energy company based in San Donato Milanese, Italy, has been active in the US energy sector since 1968. The company’s operations include oil and natural gas production, renewables and biofuel. Eni also invests in innovative technologies for the energy transition through its Boston-based corporate venture capital division, Eni Next.

Commonwealth Fusion Systems is the world’s largest and leading private fusion company. The company’s marquee fusion project, SPARC, will generate net energy, paving the way for limitless carbon-free energy. The company has raised almost $3 billion in capital since it was founded in 2018.

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Even oil rich countries understand the importance of solar energy. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and now Iran in its declaration to install 550,00 rooftop solar installations, as it expands solar energy and renewable energy through the country.

In a report by the English news site in Iran Press TV, rooftop solar units in the country will expand quickly to over 100,000 in the calendar year to March 2023, and the rooftop panels will have a maximum electricity generation capacity of 5 kilowatts per hour.

Rarely would the terms “Iran” and “renewable energy” be considered as having any positive correlation. The Islamic Republic has some of the world’s largest reserves of fossil fuels and relies on their export for about half of its national revenue. Iran is also is the seventh largest carbon emitter in the world, with its population consuming energy at a rate more than four times the global average. 

Iran is a leading energy supplier to the world but in renewables it’s doing shabbily.  Renewables make up for less than one percent of a power generation capacity of 86 gigawatts (GW).

However, Iran’s leaders, particularly over the past five years, have been making considerable efforts to challenge the dominance of fossil fuels in the country’s energy mix. As part of the 2015 Paris Climate Accords, Iran pledged to reduce its greenhouse emissions by 4% by 2030 through expansion of renewable energy production and utilization.

The Iranian Energy Ministry is offering grants and 10-year loans as incentives to the applicants. The aim is to encourage poorer households to buy into the scheme in order to receive a feed-in tariff each month for the energy they generate. The energy generated will feed back into the grid and not be allocated to specific houses as one sees in off grid projects. 

The new government program for expansion of rooftop solar will increase the renewable capacity in the country by 2.75 GW, reports Press TV. We couldn’t find a press release to back up the report,

That comes as the government has announced broader plans for expansion of renewables by 10 GW until 2025.

Energy Minister Ali Akbar Mehrabian said in January that the government will allocate 30 trillion rials (over $115 million USD) to the sector in the calendar year to March 2023. 

Image above via The Tehran Times, lower image via US-Iran

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Oil and natural gas, as investment opportunities, have certainly had their share of publicity; both good and bad. This includes market analysis data to entice potential investors to consider investing or speculating in either oil and gas futures or in stocks and investment funds that include energy companies specializing in the exploration and production of oil and natural

Notwithstanding the environmental issues such as global warming and climate change being tied to the production and use of fossil fuels, gigantic oil spills such as the Exxon Valdez spill and Deepwater Horizon well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico have opened a “Pandora’s Box in regards to the downside of oil and natural gas. This is only part of the entire problem, however.

In many countries, particularly the USA, a controversial technique known as fracking is now being used extensively to bring oil and gas deposits out of shale and other underground geological formations. Fracking involves the use of inserting a high pressure mixture of water and chemicals into underground formations to free trapped oil and natural gas to the surface.

While more certain than “hit or miss” drilling into geological formations, fracking is much more environmentally damaging to underground, as it involves the use of large amounts of water that contributes to drought in the areas where the fracking is being done. The tremendous amount of pressure used as well as a continuous pounding force also results in disturbance of the subterranean formations,causing numerous “mini earthquakes”, as well as noise pollution above the surface. Fracking is also a costly production method involving the use of very specialized drilling rigs and equipment; and as a result is very much affected by the local and international market price of crude oil and natural gas.

Despite the costs and environmental concerns, fracking appears to be one of the most successful ways to bring up oil and natural gas deposits. Even oil producing countries in the Middle East have now begun to use this method  including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE. The UAE is becoming so interested in using fracking that Abu Dhabi’s national oil company ADNOC has taken the lead by embarking on a big fracking project to extract natural gas its subterranean shale deposits.

Fracking in previous oil rich Mid East countries may be an indicator that their oil reserves available to be extracted by simply drilling into the earth may be now at a much lower level. With underground water reserves being a record lows, the large amount of water required for fracking will most likely have to come from desalination plants; resulting in even more expense as well as environmental damage.

With use of fossil fuels already top issues by environmentalists as being a prime cause of climate change and global warming, the added issues of fracking only confirms that investing in oil and even natural gas is not good for those really concerned with the future environment of planet earth.

More on oil and gas:

Should you consider investing in oil in 2019?

Golan Heights Slated for Oil and Gas Drilling…and Environmental Damage?

Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Opens Pandora’s Box at Alberta Tar Sands

The post Fracking – Oil’s downside: Should governments invest in it? appeared first on Green Prophet.

The World Energy Outlook 2012 released by the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) predicts that America will surpass Russia and Saudi Arabia as the world’s top oil producer by 2017, becoming a net oil exporter by around 2030. The US currently imports around 20 percent of its energy needs. The IEA Chief Economist Fatih Birol told a news conference in London that rising energy efficiency and increased production will enable the US to achieve previously unthinkable energy self-reliance by 2035, with increased reliance on natural gas as cheap domestic supplies boost demand.

According to CBS News,  the report says rebounding US oil and gas production and increasing light tight oil and shale gas resources are “steadily changing the role of North America in global energy trade,” speeding up redirection of international oil trade from the Middle East toward Asia.

Birol said he realized how optimistic the IEA forecasts were given that the shale oil boom was a relatively new phenomenon. “If no resources are discovered {after 2020}, then we may see Saudi Arabia coming back and being the first producer again,” he said.

A record amount of oil is flowing out of 200 new wells in western North Dakota: the state is producing 500,000 barrels of oil a day, moving them into second place behind Texas among oil-producing American states. Producers have invested $3 billion in natural gas pipelines, $1 billion in oil pipelines, and more than $1 billion a month drilling new oil wells in the past two years, according to North Dakota Petroleum Council President Ron Ness.  Environmentally controversial fracking is a critical part of recovering oil in North Dakota.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/l1mE32NU5jU[/youtube]

The forecasts by the energy watchdog are a reversal of its prior predictions of Saudi remaining top producer until 2035.

“Energy developments in the United States are profound and their effect will be felt well beyond North America – and the energy sector,” claimed the IEA annual report, giving one of the most optimistic forecasts for US energy production growth to date.

This could have significant geopolitical implications. Analysts ask whether an energy independent US would still undertake to safeguard major trade routes around the world, such as the Middle East’s Strait of Hormuz, where the US had deployed mine-detecting dolphins that we reported on earlier.

Not everyone is convinced that the future is rosy.  On his website Early Warning, Physicist Stuart Staniford blogged, “I am less persuaded myself that using a thousand oil rigs to generate an extra one million barrels per day of oil is necessarily a sign of a large and long-term sustainable increase in US oil production (as opposed to, say, frenzied scraping of the bottom of the barrel). But, still, I’m not certain beyond a reasonable doubt just how deep this particular barrel can be scraped.”

The report does emphasis that renewables will be an integral part of the global energy mix, accounting for nearly one third of electricity production by 2035.

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According to a 150-page report by Citigroup, Saudi Arabian oil could dry up as early as 2030 which is a lot sooner than previously thought

The high consumption of oil in the Gulf nations for air-conditioning and desalination means that oil wells are likely to run dry a lot sooner than expected. That’s the news coming from a report by Citigroup which states that Saudi Arabia could be an oil importer by 2030. Local Saudi consumption is skyrocketing with residential use making up 50 percent of demand and over two thirds of that goes to air-conditioning. Saudis are also consuming 250 litres of water per person per day – that makes them (rather shockingly) the world’s third largest water consumer – and most of that water is from energy intensive desalination plants.

Lavish fuel subsidies in the Gulf nation is also make matters worse as they discourage conservation or efficiency by keeping the prices artificially low at all times. Heidy Rehman from Citi summarises: “Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest oil producer (11.1mbpd) & exporter (7.7mbpd). It also consumes 25% of its production. Energy consumption per capita exceeds that of most industrial nations. Oil & its derivatives account for ~50% of Saudi’s electricity production, used mostly (>50%) for residential use. Peak power demand is growing by ~8%/yr. Our analysis shows that if nothing changes Saudi may have no available oil for export by 2030.”

According to the Daily Telegraph, the report should make for sober reading for those who think that shale oil and gas have solved our global energy crunch. As it stands, Saudi consumes all of its gas production domestically and the report adds that “Saudi Arabia will need to find new sources to meet residential and industrial demand.” Saudi Arabia is currently planning a 80GW nuclear plant and details have also emerged of its $109 billion solar plan. The first signs of what an energy shortfall could lead to came this Ramadan when there were protests following power outages in Jeddah.

: Image of old oil drill head via David C Foster/Flickr.

:: Daily Telegraph

For more on Saudi and oil see:

Are Renewables Just Freeing Up Oil For Export?

Saudi Peak Oil Could Affect World in 2012

Subsidies Jeopardise Renewable Energy Projects In The Middle East

The post Saudi Oil Wells May Run Dry By 2030 appeared first on Green Prophet.

Ever since the news broke a few years back that natural gas exploration companies, headed by entrepreneurs like Yitzhak Tshuva had located large deposits of natural gas in the eastern Mediterranean, the race has been on to finally bring this “less polluting” energy source to the Israel mainland. This continuing effort was spurred even more by the continued sabotage of the natural gas pipeline from Egypt to both Israel and Jordan; upon which both countries, especially Israel, have depended on to supply a portion of vital energy needs.

In addition to all the issues involved in both drilling and extracting natural gas from deposits underneath the Mediterranean sea bed, including environmental reservations by neighboring countries such as Cyprus, bringing the extracted gas to Israel’s mainland includes building a special undersea pipeline to convey the gas to the mainland despite the dangers of both sabotage and terrorism by group like Hezbollah, Hamas and even Al Qaeda.

More recent news regarding these gas issues includes an estimation reported in Bloomberg Businessweek that the amount of natural gas deposits in these submerged gas fields as enough to satisfy Israel’s energy needs for at least 150 years.

But finding the gas deposits is one thing; extracting it and bringing it ashore is something else altogether. Gas exploration and drilling companies, such as Houston, Texas based Noble Energy Company, have not found it easy to deal with both the Israeli government’s extensive bureaucracy (including demanding a large share of potential profits in the form of taxes) as well as finding ways to sell amounts of gas not needed by Israel to foreign buyers.

Another important issue involves the logistical aspects of conveying some of the gas after it has been converted to liquified natural gas (LNG) that can then be conveyed in specially designed ocean tankers.

LNG has already proven itself to be capable of being an important fuel for both cars and other vehicles and is now being used as such in the USA and other countries. Floating LNG storage tanks as well as marine vessels carrying the highly flammable  fuel are high risk targets for terrorism groups such as the ones previously mentioned.

The gas drilling platforms themselves are also high risk terror targets; and due to the extreme drilling depth required to reach the gas deposits, memories of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico are still very fresh on many peoples minds.

::Haaretz/AP

More articles on  natural gas issues in the eastern Mediterranean:
An Israel Alone Dependent on Natural Gas
Israel Readies Offshore Natural Gas Pipeline
Greek Cyprus Fearful Over Offshore Gas Well Drilling
Sabotaged Egyptian Gas Pipeline to Israel Shifts Attention Offshore
Tshuva’s Yam Tethy’s Gas Company Wins Big in Natural Gas, But the Environment Loses

Image of natural gas burner from Shutterstock

The post Israel’s Offshore Natural Gas Good to Burn for 150 Years – If Handled Wisely appeared first on Green Prophet.

Scientist Harold Vinegar says there is a huge quantity of oil shale in Israel and, despite protests and risks, he still wants to extract it

A project to explore the Elah Valley of Israel (pictured above) for oil shale has been underway since 2008 and despite protests from locals and environmental campaigners, those behind the project state that they are optimistic and will continue to work towards extracting the oil shale.

In an extensive interview with the Jerusalem Post, ex-Shell scientist Harold Vinegar who is part of the Israel Energy Initiatives (IEI) behind the oil shale venture, insists that Israel has the potential to extract “250 billion barrels of oil and perhaps more” using cleaner and cheaper techniques.

Cleaner and Cheaper Method of Oil Shale Extraction?

Harold Vinegar, 63, who was chief scientist at Royal Dutch Shell until 2008 explains that he has helped develop a cleaner method of extracting oil shale that is less polluting. This method consists of extracting the oil shale using heat rather than huge quantities of water and chemical which is involved in ‘fracking’. The company hopes to start a pilot by the end of the year to demonstrate that Vinegar’s heating method works and has ‘no negative effects on the environment’. The article adds that the ‘process is not supposed to release any poisonous gases, and the oil produced will be very easy to refine.’

Unknown Risks and Environmental Protests

Local residents, however, insists that the IEI’s technology is unproven and involves various environmental risks- some known and others unknown. Rachel Jacobson who is fighting the oil shale project spoke to Green Prophet back in April and said, “It’s hard to narrow down our list of concerns, there are so many unknowns! Among our largest is that this technique has never been implemented on the industrial scale being proposed here.

“Israel is an extremely small country, with a very small margin of error. In the United States, a site like the one being proposed here would have to be located about 50 km from the nearest town, while here, the nearest residential area is barely two kilometers away. Additional concerns for the immediate area include the potential risk of increased local air and ground (soil) pollution, increased noise and oil factory pollution, and other potential hazards.”

Threat to Shared Water Supplies

Concerns have also been raised over the fact that the site is near an underground water aquifer which is shared between Israel and Palestinians in the West Bank. Although the company has insisted that the risk of contamination is small, Mihkel Harm from the World Energy Council told the BBC that the process being proposing to extract the oil shale “is hard to control and might pose a risk for groundwater.”

Vinegar however insists that the issue and its dangers have been “blown up out of all proportion.” He also added that he remains very optimistic about the project and was sure that the pilot would succeed: “One of our jobs is to demonstrate that this venture caries no dangers, and we will do that in the pilot.”

:: Jerusalem Post.

:: Image via Save Adullum Facebook page.

For more on oil shale exploration in Israel see:

Israelis Fight Oil Shale

Israeli Black Globe Awards Went to IEI For Oil Shale Agenda

Oil & Wine Don’t Mix: Over 1,000 Israelis Protest Oil Shale In Adulum

Open Letter To David de Rothschild: Stop Your Family’s Oil Shale Exploration

The post Ex-Shell Scientist Insists Israeli Oil Shale Is Still A Possibility appeared first on Green Prophet.

BrightSource Energy, the California based solar thermal energy company whose technology as innovated in Israel, and whose solar “star” was even touted by US President Barack Obama, is now in financial hot water again as its joint oil recovery project with giant energy company Chevron, appears to have incurred “significant cost overruns”, according to Reuters.

The oil recovery project, in which BrightSource’s patented solar thermal technology would be used to inject high pressure steam into oil wells to help Chevron soften the oil, would help pull out deeply embedded “heavy oil”. The company is incurring heavy financial losses of about $40.2 million, which company officials claim is $29.7 million more than “originally anticipated”.

BrightSouce, which in the past had its mega solar energy projects in California even shelved at one point due to environmental and other issues, seemed to be improving its energy image, following the US president’s endorsement, and the promise of over $1 billion in loan guarantees from the US government.

But the company may now have gotten itself into both financial and environmental trouble again by becoming involved in a project that smacks of similarity with the Alberta Tar Sands  project in which another Israeli founded company, Ormat Industries is involved in.

In filing the operating loss statement, BrightSource still believes that its solar generated steam technology can significantly help Enhanced Oil Recovery projects (EOR) like the one with Chevron. The companies were to extract the sticky black substance that many environmentalist attribute to the sad state of global warming and climate change that the plant earth is presently in. The EOR project was expected to go live this year, but unforeseeable engineering costs, and weather related events has seriously affected the financial forecast of the company.

For its part, BrightSource might better consider improving its solar thermal technology to create energy from solar sources instead to helping to extract more fossil based energy from the ground.

Read more on BrightSource  company projects:
Obama touts Israel developed Solar Company Bright Source
Bright Source Expands on Coyote Land in Nevada
Bright Source Gets a Billion
BrightSource Solar Energy Project in Mojave Desert Shelved

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