Josue Rivas
Four years ago, communities across the country protested in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux against the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) and the threat it posed to the Tribe’s drinking water supply.
Now, communities along the pipeline route through four states are under threat once again as Energy Transfer, the company behind DAPL, seeks to double the amount of oil running through the pipeline.
With additional pump stations in North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, and Illinois, DAPL would go from its current operating capacity of 570,000 barrels per day (one of the biggest pipelines in North Dakota) to 1.1 million barrels per day (one of the biggest pipeline capacities in the whole country!). Shockingly, this can be done without any need for federal approval.
We all know how much harm an oil pipeline spill can cause. After an Enbridge pipeline spill in Michigan, it took a decade and nearly $1 billion to clean up the Kalamazoo River. And a spill along the Keystone 1 pipeline last fall was revealed to have leaked more than 10 times as much oil on North Dakota farmland as originally reported. DAPL is no exception -- in just two years of operation, the pipeline has already experienced 12 spills of over 6,100 gallons of Bakken crude oil. It is egregious that a project that is moving so close to drinking water sources could be expanded to operate at a higher pressure, further increasing the risk of more spills.
Right now, this proposal is moving its way forward before state regulators. So far it’s been approved in both North and South Dakota -- in South Dakota it was rubber-stamped without even a basic review of the potential for a spill -- and approval is pending in Iowa and Illinois. The Sierra Club has joined local opposition in all four states.
In Illinois, we’ve joined the local group Save Our Illinois Land to intervene in the Illinois Commerce Commission process. The next legal hearing on the proposal will be in Chicago in early March.
In Iowa, the Iowa Utilities Board (IUB) has delayed this expansion proposal via requests for additional information on the project and its impacts. IUB recently requested that Energy Transfer Partners provide expert analysis to back up the company’s claim that doubling the line’s capacity won't increase the likelihood of a spill. The Sierra Club has intervened before the IUB and will continue to oppose this project expansion.
We will not give up the fight against this dangerous, dirty pipeline that threatens our communities, climate, our air, and our water.