The Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) is threatening to change the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s way of life.
The new installment would transport 470,000 barrels of crude oil 1,168 miles every day from hydraulic fracturing sites in northwestern North Dakota down to Illinois if built.
The current route of the pipeline is less than half a mile from Sioux’s reservation border and comes close to areas of religious and cultural significance. The pipeline would cross the tribe’s traditional and ancestral lands and its construction jeopardizes many sacred places.
In late July the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe filed a complaint in a federal court that stated “the construction and operation of the pipeline…threatens the Tribe’s environmental and economic well-being, and would damage and destroy sites of significant historical, religious and cultural significance to the Tribe.”
The issues escalated in August when the pipeline construction was allowed because of a loophole known as Nationwide Permit 12, which does not require environmental review, tribal consultation or public input. By Sept. 3, construction had begun.
The DAPL came into the national spotlight when the protests started getting violent, with people breaking laws and the authorities reacting aggressively. An estimated 140 people were arrested Halloween weekend, while more than 400 people have been arrested since the protests began.
Protesters say security personnel unleashed attack dogs and pepper spray against nonviolent demonstrators, and law-enforcement personnel failed to protect the protesters. President Obama has said that the protestors have an obligation to be peaceful and the authorities have an obligation to restrain themselves. He wants both sides to refrain from situations where people will get hurt.
In April 2015, a Standing Sioux elder started a camp that saw the population of water protectors grow into the thousands. The numbers hold strong today, where not only Standing Rock Sioux people actively protest the pipeline, but many other indigenous people, climate activists and landowners.
The fight against the proposed Dakota Access Pipeline has since garnered the support of 300 Native American tribes. Activists who call themselves “Water Protectors” have raised over one million dollars to support the North Dakota protesters through online fundraising sites, CBS News reported.
This pipeline will cost $3.7 billion dollars to build, and will only make North Dakota $156 million dollars in sales and income taxes, about 40 permanent jobs, and roughly 8,000 to 12,000 temporary jobs. The Energy Transfer Partners, the company that owns the land where the pipeline is being built, is going to make a lot of money off of this, and it has hardly any benefits for anyone else.
The cons of the DAPL are outrageous. Not only will the DAPL destroy sacred lands of indigenous people, (haven’t they had enough?) it also has the very likely potential of contaminating the Missouri River, a river that spans the entire longitude of this country.
If this river is contaminated, it’ll affect millions of people. And pipeline oil spills are incredibly common. In January 2015, 10 millions gallons of brine leaked in North Dakota. A New York Times report found that more than 18.4 million gallons of oils and chemicals spilled, leaked or misted into the state’s air, land and waterways between 2006 and 2014.
And it’s not like we don’t have any other energy options. The money put into this crude oil pipeline could be put into building the wind or solar farms that wouldn’t destroy the environment, continue the cycle of reliance on crude oil, or put lives at risk.
Why is money more important to the Dakota Access Company than the planet or the people living there? When will the time come for the capitalist bull to fade away and for us to truly put our focus on bettering our lands and the people who first lived on them?
Currently, President Obama has put a stop to the pipeline but hasn’t rejected it like he has the Keystone XL pipeline of the past. He is looking at ways it can be rerouted and is monitoring the situation as of this week.
With this, I ask for your help. There are many things you, the average citizen, can do: sign the petition to tell President Obama to stop construction on the Dakota Access Pipeline permanently. Call the White House at (202) 456-1111 to tell President Obama to Stand with Standing Rock and “deny the easement to the Dakota Access Pipeline.”
You can also donate to Standing Rock Sioux to sustain the fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline. Protest in your local community, in your online spaces and in any way you can. Inform friends, family, classmates and strangers about why the DAPL sucks, and what we need to do to fix it! Your voice matters and your voice can add to the collective that can change this.
