Dave Archambault II, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, waits to give his speech against the Energy Transfer Partners’ Dakota Access oil pipeline during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland September 20, 2016.
Denis Balibouse/Reuters Despite the controversy surrounding the Dakota Access Pipeline, it commenced operations on June 1 under an executive order from Donald Trump.
But many members of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe say the pipeline, which snakes through their only water source, is a death sentence.
To Energy Transfer Partners, the company behind the $3.8 billion project, it’s a necessary part of the US energy network.
In a ruling issued June 14, Judge James Boasberg said that the agency in charge of the pipeline didn’t adequately consider some matters important to the Standing Rock tribe, such as how an oil spill might affect the tribe’s fishing and hunting rights, and whether the tribe would be disproportionately affected by a leak.
Legal battle In July of last year, the Standing Rock Sioux tribe filed a lawsuit against the Army Corps of Engineers claming that the legal and environmental review process for the pipeline was rushed and undertaken largely without the tribe’s input.
Judge Boasberg’s recent ruling appears to lend some support to that claim, but he also determined that the agency "largely complied" with environmental law when approving the pipeline.
Jan Hasselman, an attorney for Standing Rock, told the Associated Press that Boasber’s decision is enough to "reset the clock to where we were last fall," when the tribe demanded a comprehensive environmental study of the pipeline and asked the Army Corps of Engineers to consider alternate routes that would not threaten their water supply.
Energy Transfer Partners said in a statement to AP that it believed the Corps "properly evaluated both" of the issues that Judge Boasberg said were not adequately addressed, including how an oil spill might affect the Tribe.
"If this leaks, it is going to spill into the river.

Japan Supports IOM Emergency Response in Food-Insecure South Sudan.
South Sudan – An estimated 5.5 million people in South Sudan are facing severe food insecurity and malnutrition due to conflict and a collapsing economy.
The Government of Japan is providing USD 1 million to support IOM’s efforts to mitigate the impact of severe food insecurity on families across South Sudan through lifesaving health and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) assistance.
The crisis is particularly severe in Unity, where an estimated 100,000 people are facing famine conditions.
However, people are affected in parts of every state and many are extremely vulnerable.
IOM undertakes efforts to both increase access to safe water and ensure the promotion of good hygiene and sanitation practices to safeguard these communities against further health risks, including the spread of waterborne diseases.” Through Japanese support, IOM is procuring critical basic household items to ensure that relief agencies have access to humanitarian WASH supplies.
In food-insecure and famine-affected areas, IOM aims to help partners reach an estimated 50,000 people with water storage and treatment supplies, 21,000 women and girls with menstrual hygiene management kits, and 20,000 people through improved sanitation facilities.
As populations in Kapoeta are facing severe food insecurity, a cholera outbreak can be catastrophic in areas where individuals already experience malnutrition, poor WASH conditions and limited access to health facilities.
IOM’s team on the ground is working to increase communities’ access to safe drinking water through borehole repairs and distribution of water treatment supplies, as well as improving hygiene and sanitation through hygiene promotion activities.
The Government of Japan funding has also provided a boost to IOM’s rapid response health teams, which are able to react quickly to health needs and emergencies, such as disease outbreaks, across the country.

Japan Supports IOM Emergency Response in Food-Insecure South Sudan.
South Sudan – An estimated 5.5 million people in South Sudan are facing severe food insecurity and malnutrition due to conflict and a collapsing economy.
The Government of Japan is providing USD 1 million to support IOM’s efforts to mitigate the impact of severe food insecurity on families across South Sudan through lifesaving health and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) assistance.
The crisis is particularly severe in Unity, where an estimated 100,000 people are facing famine conditions.
However, people are affected in parts of every state and many are extremely vulnerable.
IOM undertakes efforts to both increase access to safe water and ensure the promotion of good hygiene and sanitation practices to safeguard these communities against further health risks, including the spread of waterborne diseases.” Through Japanese support, IOM is procuring critical basic household items to ensure that relief agencies have access to humanitarian WASH supplies.
In food-insecure and famine-affected areas, IOM aims to help partners reach an estimated 50,000 people with water storage and treatment supplies, 21,000 women and girls with menstrual hygiene management kits, and 20,000 people through improved sanitation facilities.
As populations in Kapoeta are facing severe food insecurity, a cholera outbreak can be catastrophic in areas where individuals already experience malnutrition, poor WASH conditions and limited access to health facilities.
IOM’s team on the ground is working to increase communities’ access to safe drinking water through borehole repairs and distribution of water treatment supplies, as well as improving hygiene and sanitation through hygiene promotion activities.
The Government of Japan funding has also provided a boost to IOM’s rapid response health teams, which are able to react quickly to health needs and emergencies, such as disease outbreaks, across the country.

A judge rules that rushing approval for the Dakota Access Pipeline violated the law.. U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg issued a ruling Wednesday that deemed the previous environmental review process inadequate.
His decision comes in response to a legal challenge filed by Standing Rock Sioux in February, after President Trump greenlit the pipeline shortly after his inauguration.
Specifically, the judge said the Army Corps of Engineers, which must approve pipelines that cross water, “did not adequately consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice, or the degree to which the pipeline’s effects are likely to be highly controversial.” According to Jan Hasselman, the Earthjustice attorney representing the tribe, the ruling represents possibly the first time that a federal judge has dinged the Army Corps for not considering environmental justice concerns.
The Army Corps must now do additional review.
Hasselman is unsure what form that will take.
“Do they just try to paper this over with a supplemental or revised environmental assessment, which is likely to lead to more litigation?” he says.
“Or do they go back to the environmental impact statement process?” The tribe has argued for months that the pipeline would endanger their drinking water and ancestral lands.
Since oil began flowing in March, the pipeline has already leaked several times.
Oil will continue flowing for now, but Standing Rock Sioux Chair Dave Archambault II said the tribe “will ask the Court to shut down the pipeline operations immediately” while it undergoes further environmental review.
Related: Read Grist’s investigation of the paramilitary tactics used to track and target pipeline opponents.

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration must conduct additional environmental review of the Dakota Access Pipeline, handing a limited victory to Native American tribes fighting the administration’s decision to move forward with the project. In an extensive opinion, Washington, DC District Court Judge James Boasberg sided with the tribes by agreeing the Army Corps of Engineers “did not consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, human rights, or environmental justice.” “This decision marks an important turning point,” said Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman. “Until now, the rights of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe have been disregarded by the builders of the Dakota Access Pipeline and the Trump administration—prompting a well-deserved global outcry. The federal courts have stepped in where our political systems have failed to protect the rights of Native communities.” Boasberg did not order a shutdown of operations on the pipeline,…

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has ruled that the Trump administration failed to follow proper environmental procedures when it granted approval to the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline project.
It’s a legal victory for the Standing Rock Sioux tribe and environmentalists, who protested for months against the pipeline.
The tribe fears that the pipeline, which crosses the Missouri River just upstream of their reservation, could contaminate their drinking water and sacred lands.
This ruling does not order a halt to pipeline operations.
But it opens the door to that possibility.
The judge writes that the standard remedy in this situation would be to vacate the pipeline’s permits and easement, thereby halting pipeline operations until the Army Corps is in compliance with environmental procedures.
We applaud the courts for protecting our laws and regulations from undue political influence and will ask the Court to shut down pipeline operations immediately."
As we have previously reported, "during President Trump’s first month in office, he reversed a decision by the Obama administration and called on the Army to expedite the approval process for the section of the pipeline that had not yet been built."
Energy Transfer Partners, the pipeline company, has not commented on Wednesday’s ruling.
The first argued that "the grading and clearing of land for the pipeline threatened sites of cultural and historical significance," while the second contended that the oil in the pipeline under a lake significant to the tribe "would desecrate sacred waters and make it impossible for the Tribes to freely exercise their religious beliefs."

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration must conduct additional environmental review of the Dakota Access Pipeline, handing a limited victory to Native American tribes fighting the administration’s decision to move forward with the project.
In an extensive opinion, Washington, DC District Court Judge James Boasberg sided with the tribes by agreeing the Army Corps of Engineers "did not consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, human rights, or environmental justice."
"This decision marks an important turning point," said Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman.
"Until now, the rights of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe have been disregarded by the builders of the Dakota Access Pipeline and the Trump administration—prompting a well-deserved global outcry.
The tribes and pipeline owner Energy Transfer Partners are ordered to appear in court next week to decide next legal steps, and the tribes are expected to argue for a full shutdown of pipeline operations.
Dallas Goldtooth, national Keep It In the Ground organizer for Indigenous Environmental Network, had this to say about the ruling: "This is a huge victory for the tribal nations of the Oceti Sakowin, Water Protectors around the world and for the Indigenous leaders who led organizing efforts to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline.
"We’re ecstatic with the court’s decision, and applaud the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and Cheyenne Sioux for continuing to hold the line and take the fight against the Trump administration and the Dakota Access Pipeline to the nation’s courts.
We hope this decision leads to the stoppage of oil flowing in the Bakken crude oil pipeline as a permanent remedy to protecting the drinking water of the Cheyenne River and Standing Rock Sioux Nations.
We’re seeing those efforts bear fruit, and now our movement has dealt a major blow to big oil.
For a deeper dive: For more climate change and clean energy news, you can follow Climate Nexus on Twitter and Facebook, and sign up for daily Hot News.

Federal judge strikes down Dakota Access Pipeline permits, orders re-assessment of risks.
Get short URL The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and allies are hailing a federal judge’s decision that the Dakota Access Pipeline’s permits shall be remanded until further notice.
US District Court Judge Boasberg of the District of Columbia did not order any interruption in the DAPL’s oil transporting operations on Wednesday, but he did issue a 91-page decision that states the US Army Corps of Engineers did not adequately consider various potential impacts of oil spills on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice, when it issued the permits.
An independent research firm, Clearview Energy Partners from Washington, DC, which looked into the case, pointed towards “omissions” in the Corps’ final analysis of the pipeline and may be taken care of soon, according to Reuters.
“We applaud the courts for protecting our laws and regulations from undue political influence and will ask the court to shut down pipeline operations immediately,” said Dave Archambault, III, Chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.
Energy Transfer Partners could not be reached for comment, according to the Seattle Times.
The tribe is arguing that the pipeline is putting its water supply in the Missouri River, its tribal lands, and sacred sites, at risk.
The demonstrators against the construction of the pipeline call themselves “water protectors.” The Tribe has said that an oil spill in the Missouri River could be catastrophic to them, according to PBS.
Later last year, then-President Barack Obama recommended that the Army Corps of Engineers stop construction of the pipeline in order to start an environmental impact assessment before moving forward, according to the Seattle Times.
Energy Transfer Partners, the company developing the pipeline, soon started an important part of construction that included connecting two ends of the pipeline.

Wastewater could heat cities the size of Glasgow, finds report.
GLASGOW, Scotland – Sewers in Scotland contain enough heat to warm a city the size of Glasgow for more than four months a year, according to new data.
Figures released by Scottish Renewables found that 921 million litres are flushed down toilets and plugholes in Scotland daily.
With this water in UK sewers as warm as 21C, the group claimed that renewable energy technologies like heat pumps and wastewater recovery systems could be used to harness that energy potential.
Capturing such warmth could prevent more than 10,000 tonnes of harmful CO2 entering the atmosphere every year, new analysis has shown.
Scotland’s daily 921 million litres of wastewater and sewage are transmitted through more than 31,000 miles of sewers to over 1,800 wastewater treatment facilities.
That’s in addition to the energy that it gains from the sun when stored in reservoirs.
“Technology now exists which allows us to capture that energy, and waste heat can play an important role in helping us reach our challenging climate change targets.” Donald MacBrayne, business development manager with Scottish Water Horizons, added: “Water that is flushed down the drain from homes and businesses represents a significant source of thermal energy.
"Usually, this heat is lost during the treatment process and when treated effluent is returned to the environment.
By tapping into this resource using heat recovery technology we can provide a sustainable heating solution which brings both cost, carbon and wider environmental benefits.” ### Read more

ICL sells off stake in desalination firm IDE Technologies.
TEL AVIV, Israel – Israel Chemicals Ltd (ICL) has agreed a sale for its 50 percent stake in desalination company IDE Technologies to a consortium of investors for $178 million in cash.
A sale accord has been agreed to a limited partnership, including Avshalom Felber, CEO of IDE Technologies and institutional bodies from Clal Insurance Company and the Israeli teachers’ union educational funds’ group.
The closing of the transaction is expected to take place during 2017, subject to conditions and approvals by authorities.
It was in 2015 when IDE’s two joint owners, ICL and the Delek Group partnered with investment bank UBS to help with the sale of the company in a bid to sell off non-core activities.
As WWi reported at the end of 2014, this followed ICL selling off its German water treatment business – APW – to Japanese water company Kurita Water industries (read article).
While ICL focuses on chemical and fertilizer manufacturing, the Dalek Group, a holding company owned by billionaire Yitzhak Tshuva, is reported to be refocusing its activities on the natural gas industry.
### Read more/watch more