“The true measure of a person is how they treat someone who can and will do another and/or themself absolutely no good”
-Sammy J (modified Samuel Johnson to be more ~inclusive~)
Thus, the resolution is proudly affirmed:
(Resolved): The United States ought to prohibit the extraction of fossil fuels from federal public lands and waters.
Definitions:
Federal Public Lands– is usually deferred to the Bureau of Land Management via National Parks though there is a strong tandem relationship with the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).
There are more than 63,000 oil and gas wells on BLM public lands. Total energy leases generated approximately $5.4 billion in 2013, an amount divided among the Treasury, the states, and Native American groups”. Down to $1.3 Billion in 2021
Value: Integrity through the Rights of Nature
-the quality of honesty, wisdom, equity, breadth and depth
Criterion: First Nations Perspective (FNP)
In addition to Maslow’s Heirarchy of Needs, Safir ’14 explains that FNP provides community actualization and cultural perpetuity as a threshold for something upholding the value of integrity.
1. Inherency:
A. Attitudinal
Pew Report ’23 states that “2/3 of American Adults believe we should invest in renewable energy over fossil fuels” and is further exemplified that younger generations are even more in support of climate change initiatives.
Native sentiments are further reflected in their consistent efforts to fight against fossil fuel initiatives
Thankfully,
B. Structural
BIA ’23 indicates “The Indian Energy Service Center (IESC) serves as the BIA office that is responsible for coordinating Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) funding $150 million and program activities for Tribal orphaned well plugging and abandonment”.
Unfortunately,
C. Harms
EDF ’21 “shows the location of all nearly 16,000 currently documented orphan wells in the state of Oklahoma [that will cost] nearly $5 billion to plug to clean up these [wells] and more than 81,000 other documented orphan wells across the country”.
Claren ’18 further demonstrates the harms when “Capitol Operating Group which abandoned their project in 1976, has now jeopardized the tribal lands of the Navajo Nation which consists of nearly 400,000 people.” Not only this, Claren indicates that there are over 3.5 MILLION wells in existence as it stands. The math when using the total cost once we finally dry up?
$17.5 Trillion. Half of our current debt ceiling (34 Trillion).
Zhang et. all ’17 indicates that it takes “2 to 5 million gallons of water per well [to use]. It is [roughly the same amount used] to irrigate one quarter-section of most crops in a dry environment”. The USDA (Department of Agriculture) indicates there are over 900 million acres of farmland used across the US annually with a mean/median use of about 400-800 acres per farm. Using the figures above, we can see that the ratio of water usage to plugging all of the wells (3.5 Million x 150 acres) is roughly 500 MILLION acres (over 1/2 we use PER YEAR) worth of water utilized for extraction and plugging.
Holbrook ’20 indicates we are on track to achieve a Dust Bowl by 2025 which, according to Shapring ’21, would tank wheat, soy, and corn crops by THIRTY PERCENT.
-Impact-
Economic- $17.5 Trillion
Physical- HALF of all water viable supply
ONE THIRD of all crop yield
2. Native Land Autonomy and Solvency
Gover ’14 cites that there are over “350 active treaties with indigenous people upholding the rights of the territories” in addition to extra protections in the form of reparations (grants), exemptions (casinos), and protections (reservations) from further exploitation of land. Thus, upholding the aforementioned structural inherency in place.
Redfern ’21 furthers that “[o]n February 2019 … more than 1,400 barrels [59,000 gallons] of fracking slurry mixed with crude oil had drained off the wellsite owned by Enduring Resources and into a snow-filled wash … more than a mile downstream toward Chaco Culture national historical park before leaching into the stream bed”. Resulting in demonstrable harms indicated above due to the infringement of both Rights of Nature and the autonomy of federal lands.
Oh, and it killed a lot of people.
Majia ’21 furthers AGAIN the atrocities that were caused and will be caused by the Dakota Access Pipeline. “[From] January 2010 and November 2018. Their findings reported over 5,000 incidents, 596 injuries, 126 fatalities, over 29,000 evacuations, 808 fires, 219 explosions, and over $4 million in damages. In their report, they stated, “on average each day in the U.S. 1.7 pipeline incidents are reported requiring 9 people to be evacuated, and causing almost $1.3 million in property damage. A pipeline catches fire every 4 days and results in an explosion every 11 days. These incidents result in an injury every 5 days, on average, and a fatality every 26 days”.”
Reparations aside, we have an obligation to solve the problems created for a region that is not at fault for other’s actions. Uyeda ’22 highlights that the Rights of Nature extend to the land AND people and almost all corporations in association with fossil fuels are in direct violation of these ordinances.
3. Revisiting the Framework through the Ogallala Aquifer
Native Populations have managed to live off of the land with minimal to no lasting damage to the environment around them. Given how the culture has managed to thrive before colonization, it is fair to assert that the status quo would still be upheld given all of the above examples of where things such as fracking, which has decimated Oklahoma through the surge of ~earthquakes~, has resulted in irreparable damage to local reservations.
FNP ’13 asserts that “73% of the all viable drinking water- much of which is a part of the Ogallala Aquifer” which provides a majority of irrigation for crops.
Keenan ’23 continues that “According to researchers from Stanford University, West Texas A&M University, and others, up to 40% of Ogallala will be unable to support irrigated crop production within the next 80 years. Other studies have even more dire news, projecting that the entire aquifer will be 70% depleted within the next 50 years”.
To solidify the dire nature of this point, I’m going to revisit the simple concept of time. Time works in a weird way where our perspective largely distorts our perspective. I am almost 30 and a proud Zillenial. I am terrified for Gen Alpha as they start to enter the debate space with no real grounding in the physical world because they were raised on tech that didn’t exist when I was in college (re: Chat GPT). Some days I feel more like a Boomer than a Millennial because I talk about dial tones and wind-up windows nostalgically even though it was ~only~ 10 years ago (for me). I remember in grade school learning about the “far off year” of 2050 and the perils of irreversible climate change by 2020.
Remember that report about the spill in 1976 and how, almost FIFTY YEARS LATER, is still causing problems? I was born before the Valdez-Exon oil spill of 1989 but remember the BP spill of 2018. Watching the ocean be set on FIRE is something you don’t forget. 60 BILLION dollars is a lot of money to lose and we are STILL attempting to figure out the effects of the oil spill that is a defining moment for Gen Xers.
It is now 2023, and we have reached the breaking point of a 2.5° Celsius variant threshold given the fact that we went from 84 degrees to nearly 30 degrees in the matter of 24 hours which is unheard of for NOVEMBER in VIRGINIA. I remember when snow days were common and Fall meant a continuous 40-60 degree period at least until the solstice finally indicated winter was, in fact, coming. 2003 is 20 years ago where my brain is convinced 20 years ago should be 1984. Orwell would be pleasantly surprised and absolutely horrified. The idea that 2040 is closer to us than 9/11 is humbling especially when considering that we are running out of water at the same time the Maldives will be covered by it.
All of these reasons provide enough evidence that the indigenous people have their shit together enough are capable of solving this problem if given the adequate support owed to them give, y’know *gestures vaguely at everything*.
Thus, affirm.
Thank you 🙂