North Dakota oil pipeline construction stopped amid protests, lawsuit

The construction of an oil pipeline in North Dakota in the US has been temporarily halted by US officials after protests and lawsuit led by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe have raised concerns that the pipeline will disturb culturally significant sites and threaten water supplies.

“All pipelines leak eventually,” says Wayde Schafer of the North Dakota branch of environmental organization the Sierra Club. “We want to leave clean water for our great-great-grandchildren.”

If completed, the Dakota Access pipeline would link an existing pipeline in Illinois to the oil fields of North Dakota. At nearly 1,900 km, one crucial section of the pipeline would snake underneath a dammed portion of the Missouri River called Lake Oahe, less than a kilometre  from the Standing Rock Sioux reservation.

Several federal departments recently announced in a joint statement that they would not permit construction of that segment, at least for now.

Also according to the statement, the halt will give the government a chance to determine whether it will need to reconsider any of its previous decisions regarding environmental permits for this part of the pipeline.

Energy Transfer Partners, the company building the pipeline, was also urged by the government to voluntarily postpone construction within about 30 km of the lake.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe said in late July that the construction of the pipeline would disturb sacred sites and burial grounds, the tribe said, and a spill at the Lake Oahe crossing could contaminate the water that the tribe relies on for drinking, irrigation, and cultural and religious practices.

A large enough spill could have even more far-reaching consequences, says Schafer. “Once it’s in the Missouri River system, that goes all the way to the Gulf of Mexico,” he says.

The announcement of the halt came just minutes after a federal judge had ruled that development could continue while the lawsuit winds its way through the courts.In addition to the pause in construction, the federal announcement also called for formal meetings with tribal governments to discuss how future decisions that affect tribal lands will be made.