Oil and Gas Accountability Toolkit
oil

The Public Lab non-profit hosts the **Oil and Gas Accountability Toolkit**, a collection of resources and a coalition of people working around the world on oil and gas issues. This toolkit goes beyond just "tools" to include: * peer support networks * [stories](/blog) of change and of challenges * ways to [build a community of practice](/facilitation) for sustained collaboration on a problem To see a full list of monitoring methods related to oil and gas, [click here](https://publiclab.org/methods#oil-and-gas). ### Coalitions What follows are a range of different topic-specific coalitions we've helped to bring together around a range of oil and gas related issues. We’ve learned more than ever to rely on the creativity and diverse skill-sets of contributors to develop new and unexpected ways of achieving goals. The thousands of people around the world who make up the Public Lab network **bring incredible expertise and a willingness to plug in and tackle problems** and continue to inspire us in their power and capacity. It’s our continuing responsibility to help them recognize and form alliances, and to solve problems together. ### Frac sand mining These resources are built around work supported by the [11th Hour Project](https://11thhourproject.org) which [focused on the issue of frac sand mining](/frac-sand). Since then, a range of projects have evolved to address different aspects of the issue. **** ## Air Monitoring ![microscope](https://publiclab.org/system/images/photos/000/022/880/large/OI000139_2.jpg) ### Microscope The Basic Microscope project on Public Lab was born from people’s interest in being able to visualize particulate matter that is known to be harmful for human and livestock health. Several local community members recognized the challenges in advocating with purely numerical data; when people can’t visualize and directly see threats, it can be easier to ignore. [wikis:microscopes] ### Air sampling Building on work by the Bucket Brigade, we've documented and collected several different techniques for collecting air samples for processing at a lab. [wikis:air-sampling] ### Measuring particles There are many different ways to measure particulate pollution. Read below to find out more. [wikis:particulate-sensing-overview] ### Visual emission monitoring Using your eyes or a camera to monitor emissions is a powerful type of monitoring which has several EPA methods associated with it. [wikis:visual-monitoring] ![Screen_Shot_2018-04-16_at_2.57.43_PM.png](https://publiclab.org/system/images/photos/000/024/620/large/Screen_Shot_2018-04-16_at_2.57.43_PM.png) ### Hydrogen Sulfide (above image by @ErikHanley11) [wikis:h2s-overview] ### Odor Reporting [wikis:odor] **** ![stormwater](/system/images/photos/000/024/626/large/Screen_Shot_2018-04-16_at_3.42.04_PM.png) ## Water Monitoring A wide range of sample-based, electronic, and other methods of monitoring water quality have been compiled on Public Lab, reflecting a range of efforts across our community. [wikis:water-monitoring] ![timelapse](/system/images/photos/000/018/073/large/Screenshot_2016-09-19_at_2.32.15_PM.png) ### Photo documentation Public Lab work began with photographic monitoring using [balloons and kites](/balloon-mapping). We've grown our coalition around a number of other ways that powerful visual evidence can be produced through photography. [wikis:photo-monitoring] ### Turbidity A range of techniques has been compiled around turbidity monitoring: [wikis:turbidity] ![datalogger](/system/images/photos/000/020/770/large/Screenshot_2017-06-12_at_3.06.25_PM.png) ### Datalogging A surprisingly broad coalition of projects has developed around Public Lab for logging data from different sources. See the main [Data Logging page](/data-logging) for more. [wikis:datalogger] **** ![soil sampling](/system/images/photos/000/024/627/large/Screen_Shot_2018-04-16_at_3.44.24_PM.png) ## Soil Monitoring We're developing initial soil sampling and monitoring techniques and resources under the "soil testing" topic: [wikis:soil-testing] **** ## Questions [questions:oil-and-gas]...


Author Comment Last activity Moderation
warren "Awesome, thanks! yes, alcohol is surprising! " | Read more » about 6 years ago
dcanprdn "I do not know, but anything would be an improvement; just apply the oil (a bubble connecting slide through air to lens surface) and check the detai..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Wow, thanks! So how close is actually helpful? I found a list of household oils and refractive indices and mineral oil is around 1.47-1.48 -- would..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
dcanprdn "Glass apparently has a refractive index of ~ 1.5 while air is 1.0. This means that light velocity is slower in glass. When light from a sample s..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "@partsandcrafts -- is the oil absolutely required? Like, is it possible to skip this if you don't need the extra... awesomeness? @wmacfarl @kgradow..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Lots of dense info on this here, but I'm not sure for a given lens if you can just add oil or not? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_immersion " | Read more » about 6 years ago
gretchengehrke "Here's another resource for soil sampling procedures: https://archive.epa.gov/region9/toxic/web/pdf/ee-soilsampling-sop-env-3-13.pdf. " | Read more » about 6 years ago
kayaerbil "https://geosciencealliance.wordpress.com/ I am going to reach out to the geoscience alliance about this. It's something my friend suggested. Als..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
kayaerbil "I am in touch with someone who lives in Standing Rock who used to work for the EPA and left because of corruption. She's talking about getting a j..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
nshapiro "Interesting question! if you'd like to elaborate a bit more on your thoughts or talk about how the photo spectroscopy kit could be of help, please..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Also, we're very interested in turbidity measurements -- there's a lot coming together here: https://publiclab.org/wiki/turbidity and this seems li..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Wow, just going through this, it's amazing. Would you be willing to repost your blog in full so folks could reproduce the steps on the site here? L..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "If you're in touch with water protectors, maybe there is already some documentation we can help compile based on their workflow? Thanks for posting! " | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Hi, I was thinking that one thing that might really help to: enable different testing approaches make it easier to run a "standard" test in compa..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
eustatic "algae blooms? woah. thanks! " | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "I wonder if NOAA will be posting imagery for Hurricane Maria in coming days -- perhaps @jasonwool or @willowbl00 can chime in on this? Thanks! " | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "@eustatic shared this link! JOB AID https://response.restoration.noaa.gov/sites/default/files/OWJA_2016.pdf " | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Re: responses written with @gretchengehrke and others as part of DIY Oil Testing Questions: According to the Surfrider group, which sent many oil ..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Re: responses written with @gretchengehrke and others as part of DIY Oil Testing Questions: This is a complex question. Oil pollution can have a v..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Some questions I have: How important (and for what types of sampling) is refrigeration? How quickly do different types of samples have to be shipp..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
cfastie "There was a spam comment on this note which I deleted today. This is note number 7? " | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Whoa, this lead image is wrong. Hmm. " | Read more » over 6 years ago
phil3D "@phil3D awards a barnstar to mathew for their awesome contribution! " | Read more » over 7 years ago
jakemartin "A L2F is a light to frequency converter. This would work for any fluorescing oils such as crude oil. To distinguish them you would need to look a..." | Read more » almost 8 years ago