"I had no idea that there was a pipeline out here;
I mean literally, right at the corner of the
subdivision...supposed to be a 20-inch
pipeline runs from Illinois to Texas.
I don't know. "
This comment captures what most exasperates me about how the oil and gas industries do business. More often than not, We the People have no say about decisions made in quiet rooms, precisely because we're kept in the dark; even when our very lives are at stake.
The families who once lived in this Mayflower, Arkansas subdivision never knew their children played atop a pipeline bearing a toxic soup of oil sands and chemicals compounds. Without doubt, they never would have known if the 30 year old pipeline had not ruptured--spilling its Canadian Wabasca Heavy Crude; coating backyards, drive ways, and streets in oil, and worse.
ExxonMobil probably did there, what it's trying to do here: it put an old pipeline to new uses and didn't ask about potential consequences.
It's time We ask what pipelines are coursing through our communities? And what are they carrying?
Most people I've talked to didn't know ExxonMobil is moving towards piping Canadian heavy crude (aka "tar sands") through New England as well.
Many of us are mobilizing to keep New England tar sands free. Visit 350MA.org or 350NE to find an action near you.
At minimum, We can demand a Presidential permit be required as is the case with the KeystoneXL pipeline. This would trigger the State Department's involvement and an environmental impact study before ExxonMobil could use this pipeline to ship tar sands. It's the least We can do.
