Blackfeet oil drilling raises questions
The National Park Service recently requested that the Bureau of Indian Affairs conduct a comprehensive environmental impact statement to address the growing number of oil drilling rigs on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, instead of less comprehensive environmental assessments for individual well sites.
The Park Service is concerned about the impacts of the drilling on Glacier National Park resources, including visual landscapes, night skies, air quality, wildlife habitat, invasive plants and water quality.
Reading Glacier Park superintendent Chas Cartwright's Dec. 6 letter to the Blackfeet Agency in Browning got me to wondering what would have happened if the Blackfeet Nation had asked for a full-blown EIS when the Great Northern Railroad announced plans to build roads, trails and lodges inside Glacier Park and to promote the area as major tourist attraction.
And what would have happened if they asked for a full-blown EIS when the Park Service announced plans to build the Going-to-the-Sun Road through the middle of the Park, up and over the Continental Divide at Logan Pass?
The visual landscape certainly changed from all that development in the Park, albeit the Blackfeet enjoy some of the benefits of tourism. But one has to wonder if a lot of the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons that Cartwright expresses concerns about might come from the motor vehicles transporting the 2 million visitors the Park hosts each year. Many of them putter up the Sun Road, idling at each vista point or construction site.
Depending on one's viewpoint - and one's reaction to the "Drill, baby, drill" refrain from the 2008 Presidential election - drilling rigs might be either a sore point or a reason for optimism about the economy. But what if instead the Blackfeet Reservation was dotted with windmills producing alternative energy? Wouldn't that be a negative impact to the Park's visual resources?
The Park's desire to keep the reservation dark so tourists can enjoy stargazing also poses questions. Here's a hypothetical - imagine a high-tech company announcing plans to build a clean, nonpolluting manufacturing plant in Browning and employing 2,000 local workers.
The long-term impact of the plant would be a doubling of the local economy and a tripling of the local per capita income. It would also result in growth - new homes, more cars and a lot more lights. Would the Park request an EIS because of concerns the Blackfeet want to enjoy the benefits of economic development?
The reality of increased oil drilling on the Blackfeet Reservation is that exploratory wells will need miles of new roads and hundreds of large ponds to hold used fracking fluids. Production wells won't stand 100 feet tall in the open prairie land, but the roads will remain, and pipelines or trucks will be used to move the oil to refineries. The landscape will change.
Cartwright says in his letter that he "understands and appreciates the economic opportunities that oil and gas development may bring," and certain compromises might be reached without nullifying the entire oil drilling program.
Cartwright notes that previous environmental assessments by oil companies addressed invasive plants, so perhaps the companies might be willing to use Dark Skies-compliant lights, use bear-proof garbage and food containers, and take extra efforts to protect water quality. Dealing with unsightly roads and ponds is more difficult.
The big difference between efforts by environmental groups to shut down drilling along the Rocky Front west of Choteau and shutting down drilling on the Blackfeet Reservation, it should be noted, is the number of people living there who need an economic boost. I'd ask them what they want to do.
Richard Hanners is the editor of the Hungry Horse News.