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paperbackwriter
Edward Lear


Registered: 03/31/14
Posts: 1,888
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North Dakota oil boom
#22392378 - 10/17/15 09:19 AM (8 years, 3 months ago) |
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Was watching John Oliver last night and it was pretty sad to hear about what's happening in North Dakota. I grew up in Colorado and saw a lot of oil booms and busts in the eastern and western parts of the state and along with the long term environmental and economical effects.
For those that don't know North Dakota is going through an oil boom that's really helped us be less reliant on foreign oil and brought lots of jobs to the state. That's the good news. The bad news is that due to deregulation on the environmental end and some really strange fucking regulation on the liability end, neither the environment or the workers are being protected.
Here's some highlights.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/apr/29/north-dakota-deadliest-state-workers-third-year-running
Quote:
For the third year in a row, North Dakota was the deadliest state to work in the US.
“The state’s job fatality rate of 14.9 per 100,000 was more than four times the national average,” according to the report. North Dakota’s fatality rate has more than doubled since 2007, with 56 workers killed on the job in 2013.
“The fatality rate in the mining and oil and gas extraction sector in North Dakota was an alarming 84.7 per 100,000, nearly seven times the national fatality rate of 12.4 per 100,000 in this industry; and the construction sector fatality rate in North Dakota was 44.1 per 100,000, more than four times the national fatality rate of 9.7 per 100,000 for construction.”
http://www.propublica.org/article/the-other-fracking-north-dakotas-oil-boom-brings-damage-along-with-prosperi
Quote:
According to data obtained by ProPublica, oil companies in North Dakota reported more than 1,000 accidental releases of oil, drilling wastewater or other fluids in 2011, about as many as in the previous two years combined. Many more illicit releases went unreported, state regulators acknowledge, when companies dumped truckloads of toxic fluid along the road or drained waste pits illegally.
State officials say most of the releases are small. But in several cases, spills turned out to be far larger than initially thought, totaling millions of gallons. Releases of brine, which is often laced with carcinogenic chemicals and heavy metals, have wiped out aquatic life in streams and wetlands and sterilized farmland. The effects on land can last for years, or even decades.
Compounding such problems, state regulators have often been unable — or unwilling — to compel energy companies to clean up their mess, our reporting showed.
Under North Dakota regulations, the agencies that oversee drilling and water safety can sanction companies that dump or spill waste, but they seldom do: They have issued fewer than 50 disciplinary actions for all types of drilling violations, including spills, over the past three years.
Interactive Spill data.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/11/23/us/north-dakota-spill-database.html
An article explaining how North Dakota environmental regulation is enforced (or rather, not enforced) and the impact it's having on agriculture as well as standard of living in North Dakota.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/11/23/us/north-dakota-oil-boom-downside.html
Anyway here's the clip I watched. It's about 20 minutes long.
-------------------- Why should we strive with cynic frown To knock their fairy castles down? ~ Eliza Cook It's rather embarrassing to have given one's entire life to pondering the human predicament and to find that in the end one has little more to say than, 'Try to be a little kinder.' ~Aldous Huxley
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azur
God of Fuck



Registered: 04/21/12
Posts: 28,103
Loc: Daid
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It's all so gross. Nature is God. Yet, man chose to worship paper instead. I hate it to the point i try to not think about it. I'd like to line up all the greedy money hungry fucks and kill em with one bullet.
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twotries
Stranger

Registered: 10/16/15
Posts: 1
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This is my first post here, I like the wide range of opinions on all the forums here it's really great.
I have a few friends from ND and it's been crazy to see the ups and downs there. People move there from all over the country because you can make ~30 an hour just delivering pizza to oil workers who tip huge because they themselves are making a killing for the first time. I've known people to move there, get an entry level position on a rig, live with 5 other dudes in a tiny trailer for a few months until you can afford your own place then bam you're set up and good to go.
I had a flat tire on the way through ND a few years ago, and got in an argument with a Walmart employee who refused to put a new tire on 15 minutes before close. Eventually he gave in and took the 5 minutes to help a paying customer, but with ire he spat at me: "this is the highest paying Walmart in the country!". Not sure how that helped him it actually made him look more dickish. Point is the wealth seems to change people somehow...maybe it's the underlying fear that it will all end as quickly as it began?
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paperbackwriter
Edward Lear


Registered: 03/31/14
Posts: 1,888
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Re: North Dakota oil boom [Re: twotries] 1
#22392723 - 10/17/15 10:40 AM (8 years, 3 months ago) |
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Welcome to the shroomery twotries! Great first post.
My personal opinion on your question ties into what azure said. We worship money, not for what it can do to improve the human condition but for how it improves our social status and standing. In other words we value ourselves and others based on their income and wealth.
The Wal-Mart worker needed you to know that he was more elite than any other Wal-Mart worker in the country, not because he was better at his job, but because he was paid more for it.
-------------------- Why should we strive with cynic frown To knock their fairy castles down? ~ Eliza Cook It's rather embarrassing to have given one's entire life to pondering the human predicament and to find that in the end one has little more to say than, 'Try to be a little kinder.' ~Aldous Huxley
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