By Frank Wickizer –
According to the U.S. Department of Energy the U.S. on average spills 1.3 millions gallons of oil a year.
To put that into perspective, according to Natural Gas Now, Niagara Falls’ 750,000 gallons of water flow through in one second, so just about double it and you get the amount of oil we spill a year.
Recently Energy Transfer Partners has been building the Dakota Access Pipeline, a massive oil line across most of the country through the states Illinois, Iowa, South Dakota, and North Dakota. The pipeline is now being built through land owned by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, in North Dakota.
The New York Times said there are roughly 2,000 representatives from different tribes engaged in a protest. The protest has been non-violent and very safe from the Native American side, but they have received a lot of outrage and threats.
An attack was reported from EcoWatch when the company sent dogs and attacked some of the Natives at the protest site. According to a post from Inforum, the Wyoming Police said that they would be ready to pool resources and give officers to support the officers in North Dakota.
The reason given is that they say the protest has gotten out of hand. National Guard has been sent by the government to stop the protests, but the Native people still stand strong and hope to push for the pipeline to stop.
Standing Rock has received much support from around the country, including famous celebrities such as Shailene Woodley, the lead actor in Insurgent and The Fault in Our Stars who was recently arrested for peacefully protesting. Standing Rock is hoping for more support.
Also, according to the Inforum, the DAPL was about 87% done by the time they had hit North Dakota. A good guess would be that DAPL would try to hold out until winter, but the protesters are getting ready for the cold weather and are ready to fight until they get what they want. They don’t want their water spoiled by a pipeline of oil that could break at any moment.
Not to mention where the Standing Rock Tribe gets their water from lake Oahe, where the pipeline could leak and ruin their water supply.
The U.S. Department of Justice has put a small halt on all of the construction for the pipeline. This does not guarantee that the pipeline will be stopped, but it is a very small victory for the massive battle that they are facing.
The Huffington Post interviewed a protester and he stated, “It’s not a win,” he said. “But it demonstrates that we are winning.”
