Standing Rock (Sioux Reservation)
Straddling the border of North and South Dakota, a 2.3-million-acre reservation is home to and cared for by about 15,000. But this sacred land is being threatened, and it's because of the Dakota Access Pipeline or DAPL. The Dakota Access Pipeline is an underground pipeline, and it is used to carry crude oil from North Dakota to Illinois. This is where the controversy comes in. These pipelines not only pose a danger to the environment and the tribes living near them, but they also run through and disturb cultural burial sites of not only the Sioux Reservation but other tribe’s reservations too. The controversy surrounding this project has sparked an intense discussion about environmental safety, protection of sacred land that belongs to the Indigenous people, and holding big corporations accountable when it comes to putting others in danger.
Since its inception, the Dakota Access Pipeline has been fought against due to its harmful effects on the environment. When brought to a district court in 2020, they ruled that the project failed to complete NEPA requirements. The NEPA or the National Environmental Policy Act is a federal act requiring that companies take into account the environmental impacts of a project during the decision-making process. This is not only irresponsible, but this lack of information could really put people in danger.
It is estimated that each year the crude oil passing through the Dakota Access Pipeline could produce about 121 million metric tons of greenhouse gases. Along with its contribution to climate change, the Dakota Access Pipeline also poses a risk of oil spills. The pipeline spans a few thousands of miles, its connecting welds are more prone to leakage due to this. This could be a big issue for the Standing Rock Sioux tribe and others around them. If there are spills and leaks, there is a chance that the water quality will go down in that area, destroying drinking water compromising the health of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe and other tribes in the area.
Due to these concerns, the Indigenous people in the area have taken to protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline. In 2016, People from the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, Cheyenne River Lakota, and Rosebud Sioux tribes set up camps near the pipeline construction site. This overtime amassed into a big water protection cam and is seen as one of the largest demonstrations held by Indigenous people in decades. This protest, and many more help to highlight the corporations lack of empathy with the Indigenous people, and how they have ignored water rights laws and treaties. The Treaty of Fort Laramie signed in 1851 by the US Government and several tribes in the area created boundaries for Sioux territory. This was the first treaty signed but by the end of it the Sioux lost a good fraction of their historically owned territory. A second treaty was signed in 1868, which established what is the Great Sioux Reservation. Despite these two treaties, Congress still seized the reservation lands when gold was discovered by the US Cavalry in the Black Hills of South Dakota. This divided the Sioux into 5 separate reservations, one becoming Standing Rock. A larger project in 1944 caused the Sioux to lose even more land when 87.5 square miles were taken to build 5 dams and reservoirs along the line of Missouri.
This loss of land is not something that is uncommon to see when it comes to Indigenous reservations. Despite the existing treaties, the US government and big companies have found ways around them, allowing them to extend borders and take more land. This is not only legally and morally unfair, but it shows how reservations are just seen as extra land to take for commercial use. Pipelines like this pose a threat to cultural land and this does not only affect North Dakota. If corporations continue to convert reservations into these fossil fuel transportation areas, they are putting many at risk and are complicit to the decline of the health of the tribes and the environment they reside in.
The anti-Dakota Access Pipeline sheds light to the importance of coming together and questioning the intentions of companies. We should advocate for them to do more research on the effects these projects may have on the environment and on the people who survive off of the land. And it helps to show the shady ways companies take advantage of treaties and Indigenous reservations.
In conclusion, the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation cannot just be boiled down to a contested landscape, but it can also be a symbol for the environmental racism that the US is still grappling with today. It is a way to start a conversation about Indigenous rights and ways to atone and hopefully give back historical land. There is a beep and dark history between the US government and Indigenous people across the nation. It has devastated generations of Tribes, taken advantage and abused the system for money and land, and has cause many tribes to lose aspects of their culture like language due to scrutiny and forceful conversion. When we stand in solidarity with the Indigenous people and attempt to listen to their concerns and make plays to fix these issues, we can take the next steps to working towards a future of sustainability and equality.
2 comments:
Your blog was an eye opener because this is a serious issue that people who lives out side of the region would not know about. It is a common thing for governments to disregard treaties and sign agreements, and go ahead destroying historical and heritage sites because their goal is to get richer and not to serve the people.
This subject has incredibly important and powerful implications. As you mentioned, the U.S. government consistently shows a blatant disregard for the well-being and rights of indigenous people in the country. I think this essay does a really good job connecting the multiple layers of these issues. It's really impactful to see how not only are these corporations taking advantage of the land, but they also effect the local environment and the peoples' health and safety.
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