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Clean Air Is:
We are guilty of the terrible things we allow to happen.
Clean Air Ambassador:
Rev. Wade Schemmel
Bismarck, North Dakota
We face three basic sources of air pollution: coal mining, oil wells and farming. As the Conference Minister of the Northern Plains Conference of the National Council of Churches, I experience the effects of air pollution by the many ways it impacts the lives of the people of the churches. The elderly person that has breathing problems, the younger person that has cancer and the child that deals with digestive issues.
We need stricter enforcement of coal dust from the two-mile long trains that haul coal across the state. Also, the oil industry needs to be controlled and guided—there have been more than 30 spills on the Botkin formation since the first of the year. Most of that was water that is used to extract the oil and natural gas. Then there should be some control of the chemicals that are put on the land to kill insects and fertilize the land. Some of the most toxic air quality in the area is found in rural areas from the dust that is blown off of the fields.
We are guilty of the terrible things we allow to happen. If I would pray for a better world for my children—and I do—I need to do something about it.
I completely agree with you Rev. Schemmel and admire your status as a Clean Air Ambassador for North Dakota. I grew up on the Fort Berthold Reservation in ND and have seen first hand the effects of the mercury pollution from the seven coal fired power plants and strip mining in our state. I've seen and continue to see the devastating effects the current oil boom in the Bakken and Three Forks formations are having on us due to hydraulic fracturing and i say ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! We are literally making our land, water and air toxic in a state where farming abounds. What will we do with unclean water, acidified soil and barely breathable air?
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