At the behest of oil and gas industry lobbyists, some members of Congress are trying to permanently eliminate the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Methane Waste Rule. The BLM Methane Waste Rule reduces the amount of natural gas that is wasted via flaring, venting, and leaking. In the end, the rule brings in more money via royalties benefiting taxpayers and has the added benefit of improving the air in communities impacted by polluting oil and gas.
In their efforts towards repealing this much needed safeguard, many members of Congress have overlooked the people this rule benefits the most: people living with oil and gas.
Below are the stories of people who need the safeguards provided by the BLM Methane Waste Rule that some in Congress are so determined to repeal. These people are salt of the earth who work hard for a living in communities throughout the West. These people feel the first-hand impacts of oil and gas air pollution as it affects their health, obscured their views of landscape, or even forced them to move.
* * *
RIFLE, CO
“I’ve got asthma now. Terrible respiratory problems. If I get a cold, seems like it develops to near pneumonia, and I’m not alone. I checked with my neighbors up and down the street one day, and the lady across the street is on oxygen, the lady two doors down from me…her husband is on oxygen, dying of emphysema, and she’s got a nasty cough. You know, it’s just…it’s what happens when you live in the gaslands.”
Leslie Robinson
Rifle, CO
Help Leslie by taking action now!
* * *
MANDAREE, ND
“I’m surrounded by oil and gas development. From the north, to the west, to the east, to the south. Visually, at nighttime, when you look at the horizon, it’s pink, or orange, and it’s wavering– the light’s wavering– because there are flares out there. They’re just everywhere. And what’s troubling is that flaring is not contained to the site. Those gases travel. In Mandaree, there are flares located in close, close proximity to schools, houses, everything.”
Joletta Bird Bear
Mandaree, ND
Help Joletta by taking action now!
* * *
BAINVILLE, MT
“The first company to drill on our ranch was called Zenergy. Zenergy’s policy was, they wouldn’t turn a well on until they had a gas line hooked up to it. So it took ’em a while to build that stuff in, and be able to get the wells going. But then, a different company bought Zenergy, or their Montana holdings. And what was odd about that was…well, the new company would drill a well, and there’d already be a gas line very close to it, from when Zenergy was running the show, but the new company would say, ‘Well, we use a different company to market our gas, so we’re not going to use that line.’ So they’d flare it off, until the new line was built. Eventually, we ended up with double pipelines all over the place. Just…real odd. It took the infrastructure of two companies to solve the one thing.”
Mike Wilson
Bainville, MT
Help Mike by taking action now!
* * *
DOUGLAS, WY
“We had to move, and leave all our friends, because the government put oil and gas industry’s profits over my health, my family’s health and our environment. I did not feel safe living there.”
Kristi Mogen
Douglas, WY
Help Kristi by taking action now!
* * *
Take action on Methane Waste Rule today!
Read more stories about oil and gas here.
Sign up for WORC blogs
WORC will send you a notice of new blog posts. You can sign up here.
Read more:
Colorado Oil and Gas Activists Hopeful, Despite Ballot Defeat
Fracking Cover-Up Continues Groundwater Contamination Disaster in Pavillion, Wyoming
WORC Files Injunction to Stop Secret Royalty Policy Committee Meetings