The Oil Flows—Now the Tactics Change

Lindsy Williams two and a half years as Chaplain on the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline was now coming to a end. He had the distinction of being the first Chaplain assigned to the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline, and had been the only Chaplain assigned to the northern sector of that pipeline, which included Prudhoe Bay oil field.

When I first went there, he had gone as an innocent bystander, and originally the oil companies had not even wanted a Chaplain. Through through much persuasion, he had obtained permission to be allowed in the work camps to help men spiritually. The oil company's never payed him a salary of any kind. After two and a half years of watching, observing, hearing, and seeing, I was leaving the pipeline as a man with some definite opinions because of all that had happened.

Now it was all over—two and a half years of many, many experiences. Gull Island was only a matter of a few months behind him, and the construction phase of the pipeline was completed. Oil had flowed on time, despite all the attempts to stop it. Oil was now being shipped out of Valdez into the lower 48 states, to eventually wind up in the gas tanks of America.

That four-foot pipe was carrying a little over one million barrels of oil every 24 hours, and that oil flow would increase with the completion of different phases of the Valdez terminal.

Drilling at Prudhoe Bay was to continue for quite a few years, and there was a considerable work force left there, but up and down that 800-mile stretch where the men had been in camps, there were now ghost towns. Many of the men went back home, and some stayed in the State of Alaska. Those crews who had numbered thousands were now reduced to a few men at each pump station, and those pumps up and down that 800-mile line were all computerized, operated out of a great computer center in Valdez.

The big valves were automatically controlled, and the pump stations were automatic—there was only a monitoring system in each pump station.

The oil was successfully flowing. There had been no leaks, except by those caused by sabotage. Today the caribou are migrating as usual. The geese are coming back each spring. Lindsey has watched them all consistently, for although he is no longer the Chaplain to the oil pipeline, he is still a missionary to Alaska.

Alaska was Lindsey's adopted home and has watched the geese come in by the thousands. Birds of many kinds migrate to the North Slope of Alaska, and the Arctic Ocean is the same as always.

As he looks back over the years, he thought, “Well, surely things will change. Undoubtedly after some period of time there will be someone who will tell the American people the story. The truth will be revealed. It will be known just how much oil there is on the North Slope of Alaska. Surely the natives of Alaska, and even the government, are interested in the royalties that could come from that oil.”

However, instead of the energy crisis being reduced and the truth being revealed, that energy crisis has gotten worse.

Lindsey began to hear more about the supposed reasons why the North Slope Alaska oil could not come to the lower 48 states, and why they were not getting the gasoline in their tanks out in the Midwest.

He had heard rumors as to the excessive Sulfur content in the Alaskan oil, and heard it more and more as I began to travel across America in those months that I was in the lower 48 on speaking engagements.

Because of Lindsey's associations in Alaska, people kept telling him about the high content of Sulfur—that it was so bad it could not be used in the lower 48 states. Over and over again, he heard that the lower 48 refineries could not produce the oil from Alaska.

Lindsey had come to a new phase. His services were no longer a part of the pipeline as such, but now he found that there was a new phase. Where previously the attempts had been made to prevent the oil from flowing, new tactics were now being used. It was too late to prevent the oil from flowing, for that was now history. Now the tactics were to mislead the public into believing that the oil itself was unsatisfactory, virtually unusable, and that the whole thing, that massive project of the Alaska oil pipeline, was what is proverbially called a “white elephant.”

The campaign against those terrible oil people destroying precious tundra, could no longer be continued and screamed from every newspaper, radio, and television, because it had been proven that the ecology was not affected. Those massive programs causing overruns into the billions of dollars had not ultimately prevented the flow of oil, but now there was a different campaign.

This propaganda about the high sulphur was coming from the media right across the lower 48 states, and it was even coming from some oil companies, which was hard to believe.

Lindsey Williams was conducting a missionary conference in Neodesha, Kansas. Neodesha has a very interesting place in the history of the United States, for it was there that the first oil gusher ever found in the U.S. took place. During the week of the conference, Lindsey was staying in the home of the Texaco distributor for that area.

One day, the host said to me, “Preacher, you know we have a real energy crisis in this area. The farmers are worried where they will get their fuel from, and they don’t know how they’re going to harvest their crops, and the business people don’t know where their gas is coming from. Right through this whole area there is a serious energy crisis. It comes right down to the businesses, the farms, and the highways, as well. The reason I’m mentioning this to you is that I’ve been told it’s because the Prudhoe Bay oil that comes down from Alaska can’t be cracked in the refineries in other states. Do you know anything about that?”

The word “crack” is a term that is used to refer to the oil being broken down into auto fuel, aviation fuel, diesel, etc.

Lindsey said to his host, “I don’t know any thing about that, but when I get back to Alaska, I shall make some inquiries. It happens that I know the man who designed the cracking plant at Prudhoe Bay,and we should get an answer. This man was there when the first wells were sunk, and he is an important man at Prudhoe Bay.”

About two months later, Lindsey was back in Alaska, and again saw Mr. X. Lindsey told him that he had been in Neodesha, Kansas, and that while, he was in the home of a Texaco distributor. He had asked questions about the problems in breaking down the Prudhoe Bay oil in American refineries. Lindsey mentioned that my friend had said that the oil had such a high Sulfur content that it simply was not suited to these refineries.

Lindsey knew that this matter of “high Sulfur content” was a pet peeve of the ecologists, and Lindsey was interested to see the reactions of Mr. X.

His face lit up and he burst into laughter. “Is that really what the man told you?”
Lindsey replied, “Yes, sir, it is.”

Mr. X had been there at Prudhoe Bay at the time when the first well produced oil, and he had analyzed the samples taken out and from all the other wells in the area. He reminded Lindsey that he was able to speak with authority and certainty on the matter of Sulfur content in the Prudhoe Bay oil.

He said to Lindsey, “The oil at the Prudhoe Bay field is pure enough that it can be cracked by any refinery in the United States, with only minor refinery alterations. Prudhoe Bay crude oil contains only 0.9% sulphur, which is quite low.”

Mr. X went on, “The sulphur content from the Prudhoe Bay is not excessive. It certainly is not a major problem. Alaskan Prudhoe Bay oil can be used very readily to supply all the needs of all the people of the United States for many years to come.”

Lindsey thanked Mr. X, and soon went on his way. Once again he knew that this fitted into the overall picture (which, as you will recall, is nationalization of American oil industry).

Lindsey had seen a number of newspaper reports, and heard spoken commentary on the media to the effect that Alaskan oil had too much Sulfur to crack in U.S. refineries. Once again this was shown to be a prejudiced judgment, without basis. Other oil company officials have since confirmed the authoritative statements made to me that day by Mr. X.

There had been other press reports to the effect that the Alaskan oil field is drying up. One wonders whether such reports are deliberate scare-tactics, or intentional distortions of fact. It is certainly true that huge quantities of oil are available from Prudhoe Bay, and from other areas of the North Slope of Alaska.

Could this somehow be done again under the guise of protecting the ecology? Yes, that could be what the next step was. So now they were suggesting that they barter the oil, let some other country take the Alaska oil, and then more of other countries’ oil would come into America. It was very plain that this was yet another part of the scheme to make this nation dependent upon other nations for its supply of oil.

Then how about all the rest of that oil at Prudhoe Bay? How about the fact that Mr. X had said that there was as much crude oil on the North Slope of Alaska as in all of Saudi Arabia? What about Gull Island, of all things?

Lindsey Williams remembers what Senator Chance had said, “I was in the Senate Chambers of the State of Colorado when the men from Washington came to talk to us as to why there was an energy crisis, and about the severity of the energy crisis.”

After one week on the North Slope of Alaska, Senator Chance said to Lindsey, “Almost everything said to me by those briefers from Washington, D.C. was a lie.”

Six months went by, and the oil was flowing. One year went by. Lindsey thought to himself, “No one is coming out with the truth yet.” A year and a half went by, and then he saw it again, and again, the same identical thing, except that this time it was disguised under a different heading.

Now it was price increases. Yes, every few days the prices at gas pumps were going up and up. They said it would reach a dollar a gallon, and Americans said there was no chance of it ever getting that high. Then it got to a $1.50 a gallon, and now they are saying $2.00 per gallon. WHY? There is no shortage. There is no genuine oil shortage.

There is plenty of oil here. It is all over the country.
Lindsey then began to analyze the new strategy that seemed to be coming out of somewhere, and I found there were all kinds of other regulations being insisted upon. I learned there were regulations that said that we must put filtering devices on all gas stations across the nation, so that no fuel fumes escape into the atmosphere from the trucks that deliver the fuel.

All the fumes left in a truck have to be recycled. So at exorbitant expense again, it is being insisted that there must be special gadgets put on those trucks, and on all the vents of the filling stations all across America. They Lindsey that the price of fuel must go up two cents per gallon in order to pay for that. It was becoming clear to Lindsey to me that there was another campaign on, to make the fuel companies look like fools.

Then one day, Mr. X and Lindsey crossed paths again. As they did, Lindsey asked him a question.
“Mr. X, now that the oil has flowed and the oil companies have remained solvent, contrary to what the Federal government seemed to want, could it possibly be that the campaign now is to make the oil companies look like fools? Are they being made to show exorbitant price increases and likewise being made to appear to show exorbitant profits? Is that why there are these new regulations that make the price of fuel go up and up?”

Mr. X looked sort of stunned, as if Lindsey had been reading his mind.

He answered, “Yes, Chaplain, there does appear to be a move on today to so disgrace the oil companies in the minds of the American people that some day the people themselves will ask the government to nationalize the oil companies.”

Lindsey asked, “Why don’t you tell the truth about those price increases?”
Mr. X again remarked, just as he had to Senator Chance that day, “Chaplain, we can’t. We don’t dare tell the truth. As oil companies we can’t tell the entire story. After all, the Federal government has already imposed so many regulations and stipulations over us, and there are so many laws held over our heads (laws that have never yet been strictly enforced), that if we ever told the truth in its entirety, then by the enforcement of laws that have already been passed, we could be forced into bankruptcy within a year’s time.”

At that point, Lindsey decided it was time for somebody to tell this story, the story of a scandal greater than Watergate. Then came the Republican men’s committee dinner in Denver, Colorado. Someone heard that Lindsey had information about the energy crisis, and he was asked to be the speaker.

He gave the truth.
That day the men seemed to be fascinated, and soon there was another speaking engagement, and another, and another. It began to mushroom, so Lindsey decided it was time to put his story in print. It is necessary to do this so that everyone can know it, if they are willing to believe it. These are the facts as Lindsey actually saw them.

Then one day, after several speaking engagements, Lindsey met a man who had a good position with one of the major oil companies of America. He came to Lindsey after he had told him the facts of Prudhoe Bay, and he questioned him at length about other things beside what he had said during that meeting. However, as their conversation continued, Lindsey asked him a question,
“Sir, were you in accord with everything I had to say today? And have you ever been to Prudhoe Bay?”

He answered, “I have been to Prudhoe Bay.”
But then he said, “No, I am not fully in accord with everything you have said today.”

“Why not?” Lindsey asked.
He said, “Because I do not believe that there is that much crude oil on the North Slope of Alaska.”

Lindsey asked him, “Sir what makes you think there is not that much oil there?”
He answered, “I am a geologist, and I was on the North Slope, and I went to Prudhoe Bay.”

Lindsey said to him, “Then, Sir, you must know about Gull Island?”
He said that he had heard something about the Gull Island find.
Lindsey said to him, “Then you must know that there is another pool of oil there as big as the Prudhoe Bay pool?”

His answer was, “Now, we were informed that the Gull Island find was very small and insignificant, and we were told that the proof of find there indicated it was not worth production.”

They continued talking, and several other topics were discussed.
He then said to Lindsey, “Chaplain, I hope you will not make drastic statements about how much oil is at Prudhoe Bay.”

Lindsey decided that he would pin him down.
Lindsey asked, “You were at Prudhoe Bay.” “When were you there?”
He answered, “Oh, only for the first few months of production back in 1974.”
Lindsey persisted, “How long did you actually stay there?”

“Oh,” he answered, “I did not actually stay there. —I was just in and out of Prudhoe Bay periodically.”

Lindsey said to him, “Sir, the Gull Island find did not take place until 1976. How could you know the details?”

“Well,” he answered, “To be honest with you I really don’t. I only know what I heard.”

Lindsey left the meeting that day, knowing that the “powers that be” had successfully spread false reports across America, in an attempt to make the American people believe that there really is not the quantity of oil in Alaska that they originally thought was there.

Lindsey Williams knows different, because he lived there for 2 1/2 years. He was there in summer and winter. He watched the well come in. He watched the burn. He watched the proofs of find. He saw the technical data. He looked at the statistics. He saw the sheets that represented the seismographic tests and talked with the officials. He lived in the dorms. He rubbed shoulders with the oil company officials of America. He was allowed to ride about freely across that North Slope area in his own vehicle, as well as company officials. He was allowed to see what was there for himself. He can declare only what he saw, just as it was. That is not always what is published today, but it is as he saw it, as it literally exists.

Another oil company official spoke to Lindsey one day, where he had been speaking in another men’s committee meeting. He came to Lindsey after the meeting and said,
“Chaplain, I also am with one of the major oil companies.”

As he shook Lindsey's hand he said, with a big smile on his face, “I sure am glad to see someone willing to tell it like it is.”

Lindsey said to him, “Sir, why do you say that? You say that you are with one of the oil companies—why can’t you tell it as it is?”

He said, “Chaplain, we tried, but it doesn’t work. Every time, someone stops us. We cannot tell it as it is because they think we are biased. After all, we’re paid by the oil companies.”

He then said, “As an oil company official, I just want to shake your hand today and say one thing: I concur with what you said. Congratulations! Go tell it to the American people, because we can’t.”

That is the intention of the book that Lindsey Williams wrote.

Reference: http://www.lindseywilliams.net/lindsey-williams-the-energy-non-crisis-chapter-18/