FORT YATES, N.D. – The Standing Rock Sioux, long opponents of the Dakota Access pipeline, take hope in President Biden’s pulling the plug on the Keystone XL pipeline project. Jan Hasselman, a tribe attorney, said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers could still shut down the pipeline at least until the environmental impact is assessed fully. Whether the Corps will take cues from the new Biden White House is the question. Hasselman noted that the White House has promised to comply with all legal obligations, including consulting with tribal nations. The pipeline company, Energy Transfer, wants to go ahead even before a decision is made on the legality of pending easements on tribal land. The pipeline begins in the Bakken oil fields of northwest North Dakota and proceeds 1,100 miles to an Illinois junction with other pipelines to Texas.
Earlier: Keystone backers seen backing off
Pipeline safety
The tribe objects to the Dakota Access line, which crosses beneath Lake Oahe on the Missouri Riv er, from which the tribe draws water. If the pipeline breaks, the water and land would be polluted. The Texas-based pipeline owner, Energy Transfer, claims there is no safety problem.
Bismarck incongruity
Originally the Dakota Access line was designed to cross the Missouri upriver from Bismarck, population 60,000, of whom fewer than 1% are Indian. After public concern was expressed, the pipeline was redesigned to be downriver.
Laramie Treaty
The standing Rock Sioux see the Dakota Access pipeline as a violation of the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty, which guaranteed the “undisturbed use and occupation” of reservation lands. The Tribe, operating as a sovereign nation, opposesthe pipeline as “a serious risk to the very survival of our tribe.”
Hasselman. Attorney with EarthJustice since 1998.