Rivers of Oil Feb 11, 2016

AN AMAZING FACT:  Since it first open in 1977, the Trans Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS) has moved 16 billion barrels of oil from the North Slope of Alaska to the northern most ice-free port in Valdez, Alaska.

TAPS, also called “Alyeska Pipeline” or simply “The Pipeline,” travels more than 800 miles over extremely cold and difficult terrain. Special construction techniques were invented to deal with issues like permafrost. Crude oil travels through 11 pump stations over the world’s largest pipeline system. The actual pipe is 48 inches in diameter and begins in Prudhoe Bay, where oil was discovered in 1968. Environmental, legal, and political debates prevented immediate work on the project, but the oil crisis of the early 1970s changed all that.

It cost $8 billion to build TAPS. More than half of the pipe is above ground. It crosses about 800 streams and rivers and is actually built in a zigzag pattern to accommodate expansion and contraction. Around 88,000 barrels of oil go through the pipeline an hour. It takes four-and-a-half days for oil to travel the entire length. Workers are stationed all along the pipeline to oversee its function. Over 20,000 tankers have moved oil out of Valdez since the pipeline opened. This river of oil boosted the economy of Alaska and created several “boom” towns, especially during construction.

Micah, the Old Testament prophet who was a contemporary of Isaiah, was a creative writer. He asked God’s people, “With what shall I come before the Lord, And bow myself before the High God? Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, With calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, Ten thousand rivers of oil?” (Micah 6:6, 7). Would all the oil from TAPS make God happy? Obviously not.

Think about Micah’s response to his rhetorical question as you walk through your day. “He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God” (v. 8).

KEY BIBLE TEXTSBut go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Matthew 9:13