Searching for articles on this subject was really easy. I just went to the Marriot library homepage and searched up 'red butte oil spill'. I clicked on an interesting article about Jim Matheson's statement on the spill. I verified the date and it was correct too.

Jim Matheson's statement on the Red Butte Oil Spill in June 2010:

He started off saying that he was in contact with the president of the Chevron pipeline and the current status of what happened was given out. He addressed the public in saying that he was going to make sure that it wouldn't impact the local ecosystems and ensure that the spill will not reach the salt lake. He then stated that he asked the company to be open about it's plans to the public for cleanup. That was the summary of the address.

Personal statement:

I think this article was interesting to me because it's nice to see someone being short and forward with an address to a big event that just happened. I learned how Jim Matheson gave a statement and how he worded it.

Source:

https://www.proquest.com/docview/859232419?parentSessionId=xkNyXlaVbIjuWBPB9HtFJ8uuaDxyMPfWtJeBpyNQjj0%3D&pq-origsite=primo&accountid=14677&sourcetype=Other%20Sources

Things I learned from the article included that 20,000 gallons were spilled from a line that runs down emigration canyon. The oil flowed into Red Butte creek at a rate of 50-60 gallons per minute. Near the top of the article there’s a photo of Liberty park that shows the lake coated in oil. This was interesting to see because I have spent a lot of time at Liberty park and the Tracy Aviary and never knew that the Red Butte oil spill had hurt so much of its wildlife. The article said “Where children would normally play and chase ducks, those same waterfowl were coated with the gooey substance, helplessly trying to groom the oil off themselves.” As well, I learned that the city had to be careful and couldn’t remove the oil rapidly, as Dan Griffin, an environmental engineer stated, "Right now there appears to be crude oil in the creek beds along the creek, and that has to be cleaned out, and you have to do that properly. If you force it into the creek bed or the soils and damage or destroy the natural habitat — the cleanup can ruin the environment of the creek completely." I found the article interesting because it covered statistical aspects of the oil spill and the environmental impact on wildlife. It was also interesting to hear the process of how the city approached cleaning the oil spill.

Article: https://www.deseret.com/2010/6/12/20121242/oil-spill-in-red-butte-creek-threatens-waters-wildlife/

From Mayor Becker's News Bulletin, I learned about how the local community and city officials responded to the Red Butte Oil Spill in June 2010. The newsletter detailed the city's coordinated efforts with county, state, and federal agencies, as well as Chevron, to manage the cleanup process. It also highlighted the community's strong response, with many residents expressing their willingness to volunteer and support the recovery efforts.

What I found most interesting was the level of community engagement described in the article. The mayor's office received numerous offers from residents eager to help with the cleanup, demonstrating the solidarity and resilience of the local community in the face of an environmental disaster. Additionally, the bulletin emphasized the broader environmental implications of the spill, calling it a “painful and visible reminder” of the dangers associated with fossil fuel dependence. This perspective made me consider the importance of sustainable practices and reducing reliance on oil to prevent future incidents.

Source: Salt Lake City (Utah) Mayor. (2010, July). Mayor Becker's News Bulletin (Issue 2, July 2010). Salt Lake City (Utah) Mayor’s Office. https://digitallibrary.utah.gov/#!/s?v=L&a=c&q=June%202010%20Red%20Butte&type=16&criteria=issued_date_ss%3D%222010%22

After poking around on the library's search tool a bit longer, I manged to find newspaper articles about the spill and its repercussions. The one that stood out to me was a newspaper from New York which gave an overall piece for what happened. From this article I learned that the leak came from a quarter-sized hole. I also learned that Jim Matheson, Utah's House Representative at the time, was supportive of Chevron's response, while the locals were not so optimistic. Here is the citation:

Red Butte Creek Spill. (2010). Oil Spill Intelligence Report, 33(26), 3-4. https://login.ezproxy.lib.utah.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/trade-journals/red-butte-creek-spill/docview/612887250/se-2

From this article I learned the the stream was "running black" and that it "[stunk]" and was "toxic." In addition, as the article reported on my teacher's experience (who I know is obsessed with nature and climate change), they gave a personal description of how my teacher felt: "The creek that runs through his backyard and normally gives him such delight instead swamped the morning air with a horrible smell." Lastly, I also learned about the rate of oil being spilled, where at the height of the spill it was going at "50 to 60 gallons" every minute. Apparently, even 4 hours after hitting the shutoff valve, it was still going at 20 to 25 gallons per minute.

Seven Canyons Trust. "Oil Spill in Red Butte Creek Threatens Waters, Wildlife." Seven Canyons Trust, June 12, 2010. https://sevencanyonstrust.org/blog/oil-spill-in-red-butte-creek-threatens-waters-wildlife.

For my research on the Red Butte Oil Spill of June 2010, I began by exploring the Campus Research Guides provided by the Marriott Library. I accessed the guides through the library homepage at   https://lib.utah.edu/ by clicking on the Research Guides tab and searching for keywords related to my topic, such as “Red Butte Oil Spill” and “Chevron Pipeline Oil Spill.” The guides offered a variety of resources and databases, which helped me narrow down my search to credible sources.Using these guides, I found a link to the Utah Government Digital Library, which had several publications related to the oil spill. Among the documents I reviewed, "Mayor Becker's News Bulletin (Issue 2, July 2010)" stood out as particularly useful. This newsletter provided an in-depth update on the city's response to the spill and highlighted community involvement and the broader impact of the disaster.

From Mayor Becker's News Bulletin, I learned about how the local community and city officials responded to the Red Butte Oil Spill in June 2010. The newsletter detailed the city's coordinated efforts with county, state, and federal agencies, as well as Chevron, to manage the cleanup process. It also highlighted the community's strong response, with many residents expressing their willingness to volunteer and support the recovery efforts.

What I found most interesting was the level of community engagement described in the article. The mayor's office received numerous offers from residents eager to help with the cleanup, demonstrating the solidarity and resilience of the local community in the face of an environmental disaster. Additionally, the bulletin emphasized the broader environmental implications of the spill, calling it a “painful and visible reminder” of the dangers associated with fossil fuel dependence. This perspective made me consider the importance of sustainable practices and reducing reliance on oil to prevent future incidents.

Source: Salt Lake City (Utah) Mayor. (2010, July). Mayor Becker's News Bulletin (Issue 2, July 2010). Salt Lake City (Utah) Mayor’s Office. https://digitallibrary.utah.gov/#!/s?v=L&a=c&q=June%202010%20Red%20Butte&type=16&criteria=issued_date_ss%3D%222010%22

My search experience started off quite rough because my computer was having some technical difficulties and I'm not familiar with the campus search engine. After a few minutes of searching I found some news articles about the Red Butte oil spills. On challenge with the campus search engine is the database was limited for articles found. The article I did find was reposted multiple times in the same page so results we few. One thing I found interesting was the point of view of the Chevron corporation. They had the viewpoint of money not being an issue. They were willing to do all that they could to fix the problem. In total after the multiple oil spills and the original in June 2010 the company has spent of $75 million to fix this major issue. It is cool to see that they were so willing to fix the mistake and rebuild relations with the local community. I had no idea that a small oil spill would cost so much to clean up. I also found the fine interesting. The fine was almost half a million dollars.

Source:

“Red Butte Oil Spill Price Tag Climbs.” Oil Spill Intelligence Report 34.42 (2011): 3. Print.

This article provides a timeline of the updates that the Department of Environmental Quality was providing the residents of the area. The early updates describe the immediate response that the government and the Chevron corporations had to the spill. Some important details that were provided in these early updates were the places that were helping treat the wildlife affected by this spill, mentioning Hogle Zoo as one, and the results of samples taken from different places along the path of the spill. One interesting update that was provided in this article was that during the cleanup efforts the remains of a person who had died some time before the spill occurred were found, there was no connection between the persons death and the oil spill. The last update provided is around one year after the incident and showed that there was very little evidence of the spill still present. It does state that due to the high runoff in the spring of that year the contaminates was mostly removed from the sediment.

Source: red5. (2010, June 12). Red Butte Creek - Utah Department of Environmental Quality. Utah Department of Environmental Quality. https://deq.utah.gov/destinations/red-butte-creek

Im not the best at research documents, although this was a bit easier going through the search engine but also a bit confusing as it took me a bit to get used to. I was able to find a story on the oil spill and found that there were people wanting chevron to do something to help prevent this. An article by Seven Canyons Trust states, "They want Chevron to create a $15 million escrow fund to pay any future cleanup costs that might emerge, and they want changes to prevent more spills" all the people affected the most would agree with this to help prevent another accident like this. I honestly wouldn't even think twice about an oil spill mostly because you dent hear of them too often in media anymore and surprised they wanted chevron to use so much money to fight against that. 

Trust, Seven Canyons. “Salt Lake Residents Speak Out on Red Butte Oil Spill | Seven Canyons Trust.” Seven Canyons Trust, 21 July 2021, sevencanyonstrust.org/blog/salt-lake-residents-speak-out-on-red-butte-oil-spill.

During my search experience, I found myself looking through the Marriot Library database to find someone's firsthand experience of what happened. After not finding much there I went to local news websites and searched for articles there as well. Finally, I ended up on Google where I found an article from “Seven Canyons Trust”, a nonprofit working on restoring creeks in the Salt Lake Valley. 

One month after Utah's largest oil spill, residents near Red Butte Creek are divided. Some, like Peter Hayes and the Citizens Response Committee, demand a $15 million escrow fund, significant fines, and an independent investigation into Chevron's spill and cleanup. They criticize Chevron's lack of action on culverts and oil-stained rocks. Others, such as Carolyn and Omar Barrani, praise Chevron's efforts, saying the company exceeded expectations in cleaning the creek on their property. The public remains divided ahead of a hearing on the incident.

This article was interesting to me because it dived deep into the opinions of the locals who were affected by the incident and gave them a place to speak about it.

Citation: Trust, S. C. (2021, July 21). Salt Lake residents speak out on Red Butte oil spill | Seven Canyons Trust. Seven Canyons Trust. https://sevencanyonstrust.org/blog/salt-lake-residents-speak-out-on-red-butte-oil-spill

I learned a lot when researching this topic. I choose my particular article because it has direct responses from the oil company responsible, described the situation directly and without any bias and had perspective of locals affected by the disaster. Something big I learned when doing this particular research was to fact check a lot of citations in an article. I would consistently cross reference other articles and try to find at least two other articles covering the same story. 

Source:

https://www.proquest.com/docview/612887250?parentSessionId=WiuYRIR%2BZse0kXdvFAGpxSk2k%2BIrpGweg%2BC7C3D9BmA%3D&pq-origsite=primo&accountid=14677&sourcetype=Trade%20Journals

From this report, I have gained a lot of information about the cause and impacts of the oil spills. I was shocked when I heard that more than 33,600 gallons of oils spilled into Red Butte Creek. Because of that, many animals faced immediate death which demonstrates how deadly this event is toward the local ecosystem. To solve this, the local officials worked together to begin the clean up campaign. One of the main reasons why I love reading reports is because it provides a lot of facts and statistics. Besides giving statistics about the amount of oils being spilled and the number of fishes being dead from water contamination, the report also provides a long term effect of these events and also comes up with a specific solution. 

"Red Butte Creek spill." Oil Spill Intelligence Report, vol. 33, no. 26, 17 June 2010, pp. 3+. Gale OneFile: Environmental Studies and Policy, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A231091451/PPES?u=marriottlibrary&sid=bookmark-PPES&xid=f9ab7999. Accessed 8 Sept. 2024.

KSL article ) https://www.ksl.com/article/18198866/red-butte-creek-gets-new-fish-after-oil-spill-wipes-them-out

U of U )Red Butte Creek Healthy Enough to Sustain Trout. (2012). Oil Spill Intelligence Report, 35(4), 4. https://login.ezproxy.lib.utah.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/trade-journals/red-butte-creek-healthy-enough-sustain-trout/docview/925639696/se-2

O’Donoghue, Amy Joi. “Oil Spill in Red Butte Creek Threatens Waters, Wildlife.” Deseret News, Deseret News, 12 June 2010, www.deseret.com/2010/6/12/20121242/oil-spill-in-red-butte-creek-threatens-waters-wildlife/.

A Chevron pipeline leaked 21,000 gallons of oil into the Salt Lake City waterways, leading to a massive clean-up effort. As of 4 p.m. Friday, June 11 officials stated they have slowed the speed of the flow of oil leaking into the Red Butte Creek to just two or three gallons per minute. An estimated 500 barrels have been released into the creek. Salt Lake Valley Health Department stated that the oil has already reached the Jordan River to 1300 South and is continuing to the Great Salt Lake. This leak led Liberty Park to close down until crews could clean up the mess. 

The leak was traced back to a 10-inch wide Chevron crude oil pipeline that was leaking an estimated 50 to 60 gallons per minute into the creek. The pipeline was located underground by the Red Butte Garden by the University of Utah. It was lucky that a Big D construction crew was working nearby on an unrelated project, the crew quickly helped to try and contain the leak. The plant's manager Mark Sullivan stated that Chevron takes full responsibility for the leak and will cover any financial and environmental damages and also ensure that people's safety concerns and health concerns are addressed. 

Source : 

https://www.ksl.com/article/11142432/massive-cleanup-effort-underway-after-oil-leak-in-red-butte-canyon

My article covers the spill as well as the aftermath that came after. The spill deeply scarred the lake but also the community, leaving residents uneasy about the long-term effects the spill could have on their health.

My research began with some of the links provided in our course work page. Which gave me a broad understanding of what I was looking for. From there I began researching through Google to look at articles and I even found an obituary for Peter Hayes, which got me started on this city weekly article. Peter was one of the leading voices on the spill clean up.

I learned through various articles that the spill occurred to to a power surge on a Rocky Mountain Power line that was buried way too close to the oil line. The cause of the power surge is still unknown but the resulting damaged was indisputable. It burned a whole a coin sized hole in the line causing thousands of gallons of crude oil to flow through Red Butte Creek and into Liberty park.

Thankfully the spill was detected before reaching the Great Salt Lake but upstream the damage was done. Residents reported the smell in the early hours of the next morning and authorities were quick to block spaces off and begin remedying the situation.

My article covers Peter Hayes who the community suspects may have perished from a disease brought on by the spill and that is serves as proof of the harmful long-term effects situations like this can have on the population. He passed away in 2015 to a condition called idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF).

What I found most interesting about my article is how it didn't make it to national news because it truly was a big deal. Also the time frame between "repairs" to the pipeline. Chevron sent a crew to contain and fix the pipe and reopened almost immediately only to have another spill just 6 months later. Because of this, I feel that Peter Hayes defiantly was justified in his distrust of the oil giant.

Source:

https://www.cityweekly.net/utah/crude-awakening/Content?oid=3130054

Specifically for Peter Hayes, he owned a house along the creek. A few years after the spill he developed a condition called Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IBF). It was believed that the spill caused this condition. Peter acted as an unofficial spokesman of the Creekside residents demanding that someone take responsibility of the spill and take care of the. Unfortunately, Peter passed away and the support they demanded never really came. The only health monitoring that has been promised was by Salt Lake County, and that pledge was only to conduct a cancer incidence review every five years. I found this interesting because it provides an account of a local resident and not just a zoomed out summary.

Source:

Frazier, C. (2016, January 6). Crude awakening. Salt Lake City Weekly. https://www.cityweekly.net/utah/crude-awakening/Content?oid=3130054

After typing in "June 2010 Red Butte Oil Spill" into the search query, a number of articles came up. I read one article about the settlement, which I found very interesting because it presented an itemized list of what the settlement would be spent on. However, the article that really resonated with me was the article from the Salt Lake Tribune that detailed the illness and fumes associated with the spill.

I chose this article because it made it apparent that innocent people were randomly hurt by this oil spill. It brought to light the suffering of families and children who had no causal relationship to their suffering - they suffered because of the bad practices of a large company. What's more, this happened right in the heart of Salt Lake City.

To me, this article raised two questions. How could this happen in the first place? How does one quantify a child's suffering and potential long term health effects in the form of a dollar sign? The first question rings of the pervasive obsession with money and power that clouds the professional world and often comes between good engineering goals. The second question just has no good answer and points to the need to put human health and our neighborhoods above the price of a company's publicly traded stock.

Of course, as engineers we will try to quantify the losses versus the gains and the pros versus the cons. Sometimes, that is genuinely all we can do in the worst of situations. But I do not believe this crises counts for that sort of situation. I believe that a board room came between the health of a community, and that whatever justification made would have been better served by a belief in people's ability to adapt. Maybe rather than paying 3.40 for a gallon of gas, a 7 dollar gallon of gas would actually be a net gain on society - maybe we have lost touch with the actual price of these things.

Anyways, I digress.

Citation

Fahys, J. (2010, Jun 26). Fumes may be safe, but Red Butte spill still making some sick. The Salt Lake Tribune https://login.ezproxy.lib.utah.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/fumes-may-be-safe-red-butte-spill-still-making/docview/521265410/se-2

Source:

O’Donoghue, A. J. (2010, June 12). Oil spill in Red Butte Creek threatens waters, wildlife. Deseret News. https://www.deseret.com/2010/6/12/20121242/oil-spill-in-red-butte-creek-threatens-waters-wildlife/

I chose this article because it gave the perspective of a Utah resident that was affected by the Red Butte oil spill. Additionally, this is especially interesting to me because I was living in Utah at this time and was unfamiliar with the event. In this article it talks about a Utah resident named Mike Shepard who lived on 1710 S 900 E, Salt Lake City (just 7 blocks away where I lived my freshmen year). When a pipeline that was carrying Chevron Oil burst just a few miles northeast of his house. Mike was quick to notice the smell from the spill and two men showed up at his house to address the situation. Mike was surprised with the Chevrons ability to respond to the event , “For as bozo a move as it was, Chevron really stepped up to the plate as far I was concerned”.The spill was ultimately contained just a few hours after its discovery. 

What I found interesting about this article is that It represented the company in a positive light, and showed that the people who were affected felt that the company who was at fault took full accountability. The article did this while also acknowledging that other people may have been affected differently but it's not worse than another catastrophic oil spill. This is different then some of the other articles that were published that blamed the company and the engineering, but I believe this article shows bias and potentially is hiding some of the voices of the affected community. However, the article did provide numbers about the oil spill which gives a bit more credibility to the article. Ultimately I believe the article is helpful because it provides a different perspective of the event that occurred.

Source:

https://www.deseret.com/2010/6/27/20124301/about-utah-talk-of-oil-spill-needs-perspective/

The article discusses the reopening of a pond in Liberty Park that was closed due to a oil spill that was caused by a ruptured Chevron oil line. The spill released 33,600 gallons of oil, affecting Red Butte Creek, the pond, and the Jordan River.

What stuck out the most to me about the article was the amount of effort it took to get the affected ecosystems back to their natural state. The pond's cleanup involved deepening the pond, adding a new concrete rim, and creating a new rock perimeter. Chevron, the company responsible for the oil spill has since made reparations to the pipeline and have continued running oil just like before. There were a lot of articles about the settlements made between the company and other people. I'm curious as to all of the lawsuits and if people feel as though reparations were made.

Jensen, Derek P. “Utah News, Sports, Religion & Entertainment.” The Salt Lake Tribune, 6 May 2011, archive.sltrib.com/article.php?itype=CMSID.

Out of the seventeen water quality and wetland projects, the largest one was Miller Park, which was also a bird refuge. According to the article, at least one resident, Joe Cook, along Miller Park found piles of dead bees shortly after the spill. ""I suspect they died from the toxic effects from either the odors that were given off or from the direct contact with the oil, if they went to get water," Cook says. "They come home and they die and the others kick them out and you find a pile. It was the middle of the season. They were still busy.""

Another resident, Annie Payne, in Miller Park found dead birds in her yard. "They were everywhere, and when they reopened the park, they were in the creek."

In 2015 the park was reopened with creek restoration work in July 2015, and its opening in December.

This work was a final tragedy in the restoration project as 194 "non-native" trees were targeted for removal. these well-established trees were removed during bird nesting season; the project was initially planned to happen outside of the nesting season. residents described it as traumatic for the birds, ""The birds were freaking out. It was so tragic, just so sad to see them do it during that time. The birds have not come back."" Much of the bird life before this tragic event had recovered, and was then shot back down.

this article in particular interested me because of the government bureaucracy it showed. Clearly less competent hands were given the reigns to handle improvements to Miller Park. And long-term impacts 5 years later are still felt in the community. The botched restoration also opened my eyes to how long an oil spill can keep hurting its environment even after the oil is gone.

Source:

Frazier, C. (2016, January 6). Fixed or Ruined? A Park is Rehabbed. City Weekly.

Judy Ojewia

I started my research by reviewing the guideline articles on using newspapers for research and evaluating news. After reviewing these I went to google to search for articles related to the event. I found a Deseret news article that I found helpful. The author has been working with the company for a long time and as it was published soon after the oil spill I thought this article was a great source for information about what happened and how it affected residents. I was living in Salt Lake at the time of the spill and didn’t know much about it and how it affected our environment so it has been an informative experience learning more about the natural disaster. This oil spill was really disastrous because it coated much of the natural environment which made it thus incredibly hard to clean. The oil leaked from a pipeline owned by Chevron and at the end of the article I was glad to read that they took responsibility for the accident and the clean up process that would be required. "We understand the sensitivity surrounding the oil industry right now, and we take responsibility for fixing this," he said. Becker also stressed that the city "would work with Chevron, but we won't leave it to Chevron." While Chevron was responsible many people didn’t want to leave clean up to just them as it was important it was done properly. 

Source: 

https://www.deseret.com/2010/6/12/20121242/oil-spill-in-red-butte-creek-threatens-waters-wildlife/

This article states that Chevron spilled over 33,000 gallons of oil into the Red Butte Creek near Salt Lake City. This affected areas including Liberty Park and the Jordan River. This also resulted in power line shortage throughout the river.

Below is the PDF for it:

https://www.slcdocs.com/oilspill/SettlementAgreement.pdf