The company called “The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission” was going to drill and find oil near a school called Frontier Academy. They were near 100 feet away from the school. This obviously made the parents of children at that school upset, so they fought back, and brought the oil company to court. The oil company lost the case… you won’t believe what they did next.
The oil company went near another school to drill. The school they went to called Bella Romero Academy had more underprivileged kids that were mostly hispanic, African American, and other people of color. Seems a little odd right, well what I forgot to tell you was that they were closer to this school than they were to the other one. I am assuming that they went to this school because it says in the text that the school “did not have the resources to testify.” The family of a student attending Bella Romero Academy protested and started rallies. One man who was 23 years of age, chained himself to a bulldozer and refused to move. Several people were charged with trespassing.
The angered people weren’t only mad about the oil drilling, but also were mad about what they were doing to the environment around the school. The oil company was performing something known as “fracking.” Fracking is “the process of injecting liquid at high pressure into subterranean rocks, boreholes, etc. so as to force open existing fissures and extract oil or gas.” So as the oil companies drill, more cracks open in the ground. Imagine little kids running around on the playground and just having the smell of oil and gas going up there nose.
The smell of gas and oil can be acidic and burn the children’s nostrils. I don’t want to smell oil and gas all day. Imagine how badly that can damage young children’s lungs. The fumes from gas can also knock you unconscious. Another fact is that gas is highly flammable, so if it ignites the fumes can carry over to the school.
In all, I think that this issue needs to be stopped. I wouldn’t want a family member of mine to go to a school where this was all happening. I believe that this is a stupid thing, since they are making expansions and cracks in the ground only hundreds of feet away from a school. In my opinion, the fracking needs to stop right now.
