Connie and Leon Weichman had just finished branding some calves Monday when Connie's niece texted her the news: TransCanada, the Alberta-based company that wants to build an oil pipeline through the middle of the United States, had finally agreed to reroute it away from the Nebraska Sandhills where the Weichmans live and ranch.
The couple had been looking forward to this moment for almost four years, but the victory was less than they'd hoped for.TransCanada's agreement with the Nebraska state legislature would keep the pipeline out of the Sandhills, an ecologically sensitive prairie that overlies the Ogallala aquifer. But it wouldn't do anything to prevent the next route from swinging close enough to the Weichmans' property to endanger their land. And it wouldn't protect Nebraska ranchers outside the Sandhills, who are equally dependent on regional groundwater.
Connie Weichman, a middle-aged woman with graying hair and silver-rimmed glasses, doesn't consider herself an environmentalist and had never before participated in local politics. But along with a steadily growing group of Nebraskans—most of them also first-time activists—she and her husband played a key role in moving the pipeline route out of the Sandhills. Last week the State Department extended the pipeline review process by a year to study alternative routes through Nebraska. Four days later, TransCanada announced it would forgo the Sandhills route.
Environmental groups throughout the nation have celebrated these events as a significant achievement in their battle to stop the pipeline, which would funnel up to 830,000 barrels of tar sands oil per day from Alberta to the Gulf Coast. But they also agree that the unlikely activists from Nebraska helped turn the tide.
Ken Winston, a policy advocate in Nebraska's chapter of the Sierra Club, said the Nebraska coalition included concerned citizens from throughout the state.
"This is a movement that has come from Nebraskans, and it's large spread," Winston said. "Their involvement cut across the political spectrum…. Even if they reject the label, they are truly environmentalists in the best sense of the word."
The Weichmans' entry to activism began in 2008, when TransCanada offered to pay them for a two-mile easement on their property. At first they said no, fearing that diluted bitumen—a special kind of heavy crude produced from tar sands oil—might leak from the pipeline into their groundwater. When the company threatened to take their land using eminent domain, they finally accepted the offer. But by then they also were ready to join the fight against the Sandhills route.... (emphasis added)
Read the rest at Inside Climate News
Nebraska Ranchers Who Turned the Tide in Pipeline Fight Say They're Not Done Yet: Landowners explain why—and how—they became activists.
by Lisa Song
Radicalizing Nebraska?
4 comments:
"Environmental groups throughout the nation have celebrated these events as a significant achievement."
I'm curious what the cost/benefit analysis on this action would be. I was thinking the pipeline would offset a tanker or two a week arriving from Africa/Alaska-Canada/Middle East. Perhaps stopping the pipeline shifts the costs to foreigners and that gave cause to celebrate for our domestic environmentalists so we don't have to endure the risks and pollution of the oil consumption. A bit short sighted but anywhere you can get a free-bee in life, why the heck not?
@ TomatoBasil
The most powerful kind of environmentalism is "not in my backyard." If around the world we were all saying, "not in my backyard," there would be no environmental problems.
The problem so far is that it is the influential alone that can get away with saying, "not in my backyard." That may be changing.
I read somewhere that the pipe is made by foreign companies in India and the metallurgy reports showed substandard steel which can fail.
The Indian companies also sell pipe to Iran so TransCanada is buying from someone who does business with Iran. Illegal for everyone else but not TransCanada perhaps.
Goog, that is more of the mis-information. Arcellor Mittal Steel has two plants in Canada and one in Indiana, all staffed by union workers. They are based out of luxumberg and partially owned by an Indian man, Mittal, who is the CEO. I've read the same thing on these blogs and repeated by the main stream media restating claims that because the CEO is Indian, the steel must be poor quality.
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