A pipeline leak has spilled tens
of thousands of gallons of crude oil into a North Dakota creek roughly
two and a half hours from Cannon Ball, where protesters are camped out
in opposition to the Dakota Access pipeline.
Members of the Standing Rock Sioux and other tribes,
as well as environmentalists from around the country, have fought the
pipeline project on the grounds that it crosses beneath a lake that
provides drinking water to native Americans. They say the route beneath
Lake Oahe puts the water source in jeopardy and would destroy sacred
land.
North Dakota officials estimate more than 176,000
gallons of crude oil leaked from the Belle Fourche Pipeline into the Ash
Coulee Creek. State environmental scientist Bill Suess says a landowner
discovered the spill on Dec. 5 near the city of Belfield, which is
roughly 150 miles from the epicenter of the Dakota Access pipeline
protest camps.
The leak was contained within hours of the its
discovery, Wendy Owen, a spokeswoman for Casper, Wyoming-based True
Cos., which operates the Belle Fourche pipeline, told CNBC.
It's not yet clear why electronic monitoring equipment didn't detect the leak, Owen told the Asssociated Press.
Owen said the pipeline was shut down immediately
after the leak was discovered. The pipeline is buried on a hill near Ash
Coulee creek, and the "hillside sloughed," which may have ruptured the
line, she said.
"That is our number one theory, but nothing is
definitive," Owen said. "We have several working theories and the
investigation is ongoing."
Last week, the Army Corp of Engineers said it would deny Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners (ETP)
the easement it needs to complete the final stretch of the $3.7 billion
Dakota Access pipeline. United States Assistant Secretary of the Army
Jo-Ellen Darcy said the best path forward was to explore alternative
routes for the pipeline, something Energy Transfer Partners says it will
not do.
Energy Transfer Partners says the Dakota Access
pipeline would include safeguards such as leak detection equipment and
that workers monitoring the pipeline remotely in Texas could close
valves within three minutes if a breach is detected.
Republican President-elect Donald Trump
has voiced support for the Dakota Access Pipeline. About 5,000 people
are still occupying land near the planned construction site.
The 6-inch steel Belle Fourche pipeline is mostly
underground but was built above ground where it crosses Ash Coulee
Creek, Suess said. Owen said the pipeline was built in the 1980s and is
used to gather oil from nearby oil wells to a collection point.
Suess said the spill migrated almost 6 miles
from the spill site along Ash Coulee Creek, and it fouled an unknown
amount of private and U.S. Forest Service land along the waterway. The
creek feeds into the Little Missouri River, but Seuss said it appears no
oil got that far and that no drinking water sources were threatened.
The creek was free-flowing when the spill occurred but has since frozen
over.
About 60 workers were on site Monday, and
crews have been averaging about 100 yards daily in their cleanup
efforts, he said. Some of the oil remains trapped beneath the frozen
creek.
Suess says about 37,000 gallons of oil have been recovered.
"It's going to take some time," Suess said of
the cleanup. "Obviously there will be some component of the cleanup
that will go toward spring."
True Cos. has a history of oil field–related
spills in North Dakota and Montana, including a January 2015 pipeline
break into the Yellowstone River. The 32,000-gallon spill temporarily
shut down water supplies in the downstream community of Glendive,
Montana, after oil was detected in the city's water treatment system.
True
Cos. operates at least three pipeline companies with a combined 1,648
miles of line in Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming, according to
information the companies submitted to federal regulators. Since 2006,
the companies have reported 36 spills totaling 320,000 gallons of
petroleum products, most of which was never recovered.
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