The Fight Is Not Over: Dakota Access Pipeline
UPDATE: The Army Corp of Engineers announced that it will look for an alternate route for the Dakota Access Pipeline, still allowing it to cross under Lake Oahe in North Dakota. Although many of the protestors have gained a sense of victory due to this major change in the construction, their victory is not guaranteed in the next administration with Donald Trump as president (Blau, Hanna, & Sidner). The fight is not over for the protesters, as they continue to work until they reach, in their eyes, complete victory.
The Dakota Access Pipeline Project is a newly introduced, 1,172-mile, thirty-inch diameter pipeline that will connect the Bakken and Three Forks production areas in North Dakota to Patoka, Illinois. The pipeline would allow 100 percent of domestically produced light sweet crude oil from North Dakota to reach crucial refining markets in a more effective manner, serving as a major positive to this project. Furthermore, the enterprise will cause the current utilization of rail and truck transportation to decrease in order to move Bakken crude oil to major U.S. markets, coinciding with American energy needs. Pipelines are claimed to be “the safest mode of transporting crude oil,” making the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline justified, according to officials (The Dakota Access Pipeline Is the Best Way to Move Bakken Crude Oil to Market).
The economic benefits that would arise from this project, however, need to be weighed against the negative impacts the pipeline would have by running only a half-mile away from the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota. As claimed by tribal leaders and other protestors, the design of the pipeline would threaten the drinking water for local Native Americans. More importantly, it would threaten their religion and thus their land. According to Stephen Pevar, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), “Religion to many Native tribes is very land-based” (Bailey). He then goes on to report, “To the Indians, this is both water and its religion, whereas many white people seem to be pretty dismissive about the religious aspect and view it as more environmental … They don’t realize the religious significance of these locations” (Bailey). Moreover, the pipeline project goes against the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978, requiring the federal government to “protect and preserve for American Indians their inherent right of freedom to believe, express, and exercise traditional religions … including but not limited to access to sites, use and possession of sacred objects, and the freedom to worship through ceremonials and traditional rites” (Bailey). Consequently, many see the concept of the pipeline to be disruptive in multiple ways to the prerogatives promised to the American Indians through the 1978 Act, causing quarrel within the construction.
Although provoking controversy, the Dakota Access Pipeline has unified people who mutually oppose the construction. Beginning as a small protest camp in April on the Standing Rock Reservation, it has now evolved into “an encampment with over 1,000 people” (Sidder). Now known as the Sacred Stone Camp, it has been the place where numerous antagonistic contretemps between protesters and the oil company took place (Sidder). A diverse range of groups have come together in the latest wave of activism, such as representatives from religious communities ranging from the United Methodist Church to the Nation of Islam, who have visited the camps and/or have spoken out against the pipeline project for environmental and religious reasons (Bailey). Recently, as many as 2,000 veterans gathered at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota to serve as “human shields” for protesters who have fought with the police over the creation of the pipeline, the activists gratefully welcoming the new developments (Mele). Evidently, the pipeline does not only concern localists, but people across the globe as well, showing the true impact on society that it has.
Already at around eighty-five percent completion, protestors and activists still continue to fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline. This is not only a matter of the environment, but also of sacred religion and spirituality, making it an endless fight.
Works Cited
Bailey, Sarah Pulliam. "The Dakota Access Pipeline Isn’t Just about the Environment. It’s about Religion."
The Washington Post. WP Company, 5 Dec. 2016. Web. 19 Jan. 2017.
Hanna, Jason, Max Blau, and Sara Sidner. "Dakota Access Pipeline Could Be Rerouted."CNN. Cable News
Network, 5 Dec. 2016. Web. 19 Jan. 2017.
Mele, Christopher. "Veterans to Serve as ‘Human Shields’ for Dakota Pipeline Protesters."The New York
Times. The New York Times Company, 29 Nov. 2016. Web. 19 Jan. 2017.
Sidder, Aaron. “Understanding the Controversy Behind the Dakota Access Pipeline.” Smithsonian.com.
Smithsonian Institution, 14 Sept. 2016. Web. 19 Jan. 2017.
"The Dakota Access Pipeline Is the Best Way to Move Bakken Crude Oil to Market." Dakota Access Pipeline
Facts. Web. 19 Jan. 2017.
Nancy Fortin is a member of the Class of 2019 and is a writer for Lamplighter