Amberzeise

Environmental Impact of Oil and Gas Production

Louisiana’s Terrebonne Parish, in which the Isle de Jean Charles is situated, has been and continues to be a prime location for oil extraction and production. (http://www.drillingedge.com/louisiana/terrebonne-parish)  Oil and gas production corporations have massive influence in the costal communities of Southern Louisiana, with around 90% of land in the Terrebonne Parish belonging to non-local manufacturing companies. (http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/blog/vol4.pdf)

In the late 1920s the Texas based Oil Corporation Texaco began to explore the bayous and marshlands of Louisiana in search of new sources of oil. (http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/blog/vol4.pdf) To facilitate this endeavor, land leases were negotiated between Texaco (and other oil extraction enterprises) and the Louisiana Land & Exploration Company and with the State of Louisiana as well. Oil was first discovered in the Terrebonne Parish in 1929.  Texaco and other groups quickly monopolized on this discovery. (http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/blog/vol4.pdf)

Oil and natural gas extraction and production rapidly expanded in the Terrebonne Parish and other coastal communities of Southern Lousiana, reaching an all-time high in the 1960s and 1970s. Peak production reached 31,520,394 Barrel units of oil and 550, 018, 432 million cubic feet of gas, respectively, in 1977. The OPEC Embargo of 1973 and 1974 greatly influenced this boom, as domestic sources of oil production were particularly desirable and extremely valuable. Oil and gas production levels have steadily fallen since their peak in the late 1970s. In 2014 3,260,362 Barrel units of oil and 31,100,655 million cubic feet of gas were produced in the Terrebonne Parish. (http://www.drillingedge.com/louisiana/terrebonne-parish)

In order to facilitate the extraction and transportation of oil and natural gas, the Houma Navigation Canal was built. This waterway connected the Terrebonne Parish’s largest and only city Houma to the Gulf of Mexico and was completed in 1962. This man-made waterway has been thought to have directly contributed to the degradation of the wetlands of southern Louisiana, especially those in the Terrebonne Parish. (https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2008/1127/pdf/OF08-1127_508.pdf)

Higher levels of water salinity from the adjacent bay and the increase of artificial waterways, pipelines, and other smaller navigation canals have seriously exacerbated the degradation of the wetlands east of the Houma Navigation Canal, where the Isle de Jean Charles is located. (https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2008/1127/pdf/OF08-1127_508.pdf) The island is itself entrenched in numerous oil fields that continue to be utilized by oil manufactures. Construction and development of oil-rigs and pipelines continue to disrupt the geography of the wetlands. (Movie and http://worldmap.harvard.edu/data/geonode:oil_and_gas_fields_in_louisiana_tqe)

Donald Trump and Climate Change

The new trump administration is focused on creating jobs as Trump himself has said and made that a top priority for his term. Since Mr.Trump began his campaign he has continued his skepticism and to speak out publicly that climate change is in fact not a real issue. He has disregarded most claims that many scientist around the world have agreed on about the recent phenomenon of "global warming (climate change)" and have proven that it has been in fact getting warmer every year for the past 100 years. Climate change as it has already began getting more and more intense will most likely get worse during the Trump administration era. according to recent studies climate change is one of the main reasons why sea levels continue to rise and many communities near the coast such as the Isle de Jean Charles in Louisiana are being affected and displaced from their lands. (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1046/j.1365-2486.2002.00451.x/full) (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/us/politics/trump-white-house-website.html)

Trump and his administration within only a few hours in office began to delete most of the environmental information that was available to the public from the official EPA website, along with some of the top priorities that the previous president Barack Obama has in his agenda.Many scientist and environmental advocates now fear that much of the data/info will or could most likely be deleted from the website during Trump's term. The EPA official website is one of the most important and has some of the most accurate data in the world of recent atmospheric temperature trends, sea level rising,and green house gas emissions. ( https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/us/politics/trump-white-house-website.html)

Trump has began dismantling the recent US environmental policies that were implemented for the past decades. One of Trumps goals is to successfully back out of the Paris Agreement, which would essentially impede Barack Obama's implementation to progress as a top priority to help the US and world live in a less polluted planet by the year 2050. The United States is the country and leader who proposed such an agreement, after all the US is 1 of 3 of the highest polluters in the globe following China and India. The Paris agreement consist of over 180 countries which have decided to become part of the agreement and follow in the footsteps of the US. According to many top scientist around the world they fear that Trump's actions could have serious catastrophic effects in the near future not only in the US, but around the world due to recent high levels of co2 in the atmosphere which are causing hotter years as we move forward. ( https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/11/us/politics/donald-trump-climate-change.html )

In January a few days after being in office, Donald Trump spoke about his plans to sign an executive order to rollback the Clean water rule, which essentially in the near future if passed will allow draining of of wetlands and streams into bigger bodies of water. this executive order can essentially in the near future further pollute large bodies of water and make it more difficult to access clean drinkable water to many people, especially people who are living in poverty. The people living near wetlands and the coastal lands will also be in danger of seeing water levels continue to rise and ultimately being wiped out from the country. (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/us/politics/trump-epa-clean-water-climate-change.html)