Here in Southwest Louisiana, every morning feels like a battle for clean air. The recent explosion in Cameron Parish at the gas pipeline owned by Delfin Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) is a stark reminder of the dangers that haunt our community.
At a facility not yet built, a pipeline rupture sent 56 million cubic feet of natural gas into the air, which ignited with such strength that it ejected several feet of 42-inch pipe and blew a crater into the ground, according to a corrective order issued by the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
We’ve seen explosions before, but to ignore this latest incident is to ignore a clear pattern and the dangers these facilities present to the people living in their shadow.
I’m Roishetta Ozane, founder and CEO of the Vessel Project, which provides mutual aid in this part of Louisiana. As a Black woman and mother of six, I stand in the wreckage of grief and fear. I lost my son to a seizure which could have been exacerbated by pollution; every day I watch my other children struggle with asthma and eczema, their bodies reacting to the toxic clouds that loom over us.
The pain of losing a baby to miscarriage weighs heavily on my heart, compounded by the knowledge that pollution plays a cruel role in these tragedies. We are not just statistics; we are families living in the shadows of corporate greed, forced to inhale the very toxins that threaten our lives. The profits come at a devastating human cost. When pipelines fail, our families pay first, and we are demanding answers and accountability.
To write about the explosion, I teamed up with Jasmine Gil, Associate Senior Director at the Hip Hop Caucus, which works with local residents like me to fight the expansion of fossil-fuel projects that disproportionately harm Black, Brown and Indigenous communities in the Gulf South.
The Trump administration is actively fast-tracking approvals for a number of LNG projects, including Delfin LNG), that are expected to cause premature deaths, billions in health costs for Americans every year, and increased asthma rates.
Louisiana is ground zero for this assault. Though Black residents make up one-third of the state’s population, we lack access to and protection of clean air and clean water. Residents of Cancer Alley face more than 10 times the cancer risk from hazardous air pollutants compared to other Louisiana residents, according to 2016 and 2020 data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Cameron Parish is a microcosm of environmental injustice. In the most petrochemical dense region in the U.S., Cameron contains several existing LNG export terminals, such as Siempra’s massive Cameron LNG and Venture Global’s 432-acre Calcasieu Pass, and Delfin’s up-and-coming infrastructure. Even more are planned, including the controversial CP2 project, with projected emissions equal to that of 532 coal plants.
Cameron Parish LNG’s thermal oxidizers have failed roughly every 2 months since exports began and led to unpermitted venting of methane and other pollutants over nearby communities.
The fossil fuel industry and political allies justify these facilities and expansions with promises of job growth and energy security, but research shows these outcomes are a deliberate deception designed to silence opposition.
LNG terminals create few long-term jobs, and most of the jobs that are created go to white workers. Facilities are often owned by global fossil fuel companies that export the profits (and gas) away from the communities in which the facilities sit all while leaving behind the air, water, and health pollutants in communities like Cameron Parish.
Fossil-fuel boosters have long painted the LNG industry as a patriotic effort, to protect U.S. strategic interests and that of its allies. But only a small fraction of Delfin’s current LNG contract will go to U.S. allies in Europe. Instead more than 75% of its LNG contracts are with “portfolio players” in financial firms that buy LNG to resell at the highest price globally.
We will continue to fight against further LNG intrusion and expansion in Louisiana. But in the wake of this recent explosion, we also need to pay attention to our community’s immediate needs.
- Locally, residents within a 10-mile radius of the recent explosion deserve comprehensive, free, health screenings, with a focus on respiratory and cardiovascular impacts. Funding and technical support should be provided for any community-led air quality monitoring systems (especially programs that already exist) independent of industry or state regulators, to track pollution in real time.
- The state of Louisiana needs to revoke air permits for facilities with repeated violations including Delfin and other facilities within and around the parish. Legislators must also redirect economic development incentives away from the fossil fuel industry and toward clean energy programs that are community-led and centered on other public goods.
Explosions and gas leaks are always unacceptable. When malfunctioning pipelines and facilities are a regular community hazard, we cannot hope for good health and clean air and water—some of the most essential elements of life.
Our families and our children deserve to live in our homes without worry of becoming a casualty of the fossil fuel industry. Our demand is a pollution-free environment and clean air.
Roishetta Ozane is the founder and CEO of Vessel Project. Jasmine Gil is Associate Senior Director at the Hip Hop Caucus
