Re: How much oil? At most, eight months

scharrison — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 17:33:20 -0400

And we've also been hearing about how the location of petroleum infrastructure (refineries, pipelines, etc.) in North Carolina would bring a lot of good jobs to the economically blighted Eastern part of the state, but the environmental impact would make the OLF seem like a little girl's tea party in comparison.

First of all, the Pamlico Sound would need to be deeply and almost constantly dredged to allow the transport of crude to these facilities, and whatever critters survived that scourge would be exposed to invasive species like never before. Aside from the environmental impact that would have, some 1,300 (10% of the population) people in Pamlico County alone are involved in the fishing industry...

Okay, so: let's say that idea was rejected and Hampton Roads was used as the port, and the crude was then trucked, railed or piped(?) down to the new refineries in North Carolina. While some of the crews running these plants will be drawn from the local labor pool, most of the management and tech positions will be already-trained, out-of-state workers. Now comes the really bad part: these refineries emit over three times as many chemicals as a coal plant, including lead, PM10, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, benzene, hydrogen flouride, methane, chlorine, etc., etc. Into the air, into the ground, into the water.

I know Eastern North Carolina residents would love to catch up with the central part of the state as far as economic opportunities go, but I'm not sure catching up with us in the pollution category is what they have in mind.

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Re: How much oil? At most, eight months