Water is back in the headlines. This time we move from the Flint, Mich., lead contamination crisis to the small town of Cannon Ball, N.D., where thousands of protestors set up camp to oppose construction of an oil pipeline beneath the Missouri River and near a Native American reservation. The Standing Rock Sioux and their supporters argued that this 20-mile section of the 1,172-mile Dakota Access Pipeline would not only threaten sacred land, it also would threaten the tribe’s water supply.
After facing months of opposition, the Army Corps of Engineers announced Dec. 4 that construction would halt until an Environmental Impact Statement could help determine an alternate route. Environmental activists chalked this decision up as a major success. But despite this victory—and a recent blizzard—protestors remain camped out at the site.
Energy Transfer Partners, the company building the pipeline, has challenged Sunday’s announcement, stating that the Army Corps of Engineers already approved the crossing. The company has filed a lawsuit asking the Obama administration to approve the project’s completion. President-elect Donald Trump has voiced his support of the project’s completion and would likely overturn the decision to halt construction when he takes office in January.
Oil pipelines burst all the time, and leaks often aren’t easily detected. Oil is an important and necessary part of our economy, but so is water. The threat of pipeline bursts combined with the potential impact on drinking water should be enough to warrant an environmental study to determine a route with the least devastating effects should a leak—or worse—occur.
