"From the hill country in the north to the marshy lowlands in the south, Louisiana and its citizenry have enjoyed the hard-earned fruits of the oil and gas industry's labor. Stories abound of pioneering exploration, engineering achievements, production technologies, and economic prosperity. With those successes, though, have come also the contamination and degradation of other natural resources. In "A Thousand Ways Denied," John T. Arnold documents the oil industry's sharp interface with Louisiana's environment. He traces ...
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"From the hill country in the north to the marshy lowlands in the south, Louisiana and its citizenry have enjoyed the hard-earned fruits of the oil and gas industry's labor. Stories abound of pioneering exploration, engineering achievements, production technologies, and economic prosperity. With those successes, though, have come also the contamination and degradation of other natural resources. In "A Thousand Ways Denied," John T. Arnold documents the oil industry's sharp interface with Louisiana's environment. He traces the history of oil-field practices and their ecological impacts in tandem with environmental regulations and their non-enforcement. Deeply researched, the book draws on government, corporate, and personal files, many previously untapped. Arnold reveals that early on, Louisiana instituted conservation programs and policies in recognition of its vast wealth of natural resources. With the proliferation of oil production, though, government agencies splintered between those promoting production and others committed to preventing pollution. As oil's economic and political strength grew, regulations commonly went unobserved and unenforced. Meanwhile over the decades, oil, saltwater, and chemicals flowed across the ground, through natural drainages, and down waterways. A maze of interconnected canals were dredged with tank batteries, pits, and equipment on their spoil banks. Fish and wildlife fled their habitats, and drinking-water supplies were ruined. In later years, debates raged over the cause for coastal land loss. Oil is an inseparable part of Louisiana's culture and politics, Arnold asserts, but the state's original vision for caring for its natural resources has become compromised. He urges a return to those foundational conservation principles or otherwise risk the loss of Louisiana's people, viable uses of its land, and, in some places, its very way of life"--
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