MVP and ACP Pipelines Are Not Needed, Period!

Experts find that large long-distance pipelines aren’t needed

Commentary Published in the Roanoke Times, Greg Buppert, October 9, 2016

The Mountain Valley Pipeline would slash through 300 miles of countryside starting in Wetzel County, West Virginia, and ending in the middle of Pittsylvania County.

It would dip into the Old Dominion at Giles County, where crews would carve a construction corridor 125 feet wide through five Virginia counties, forcing our neighbors to negotiate away full use of their lands. If they decline, the pipeline companies would seize the easements in court once the project is approved.

Add this to the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, and the scar would stretch more than 800 miles across farms and forests, mountains and meadows. Homeowners are worried for their neighborhoods; business owners for their livelihoods.

Proponents declare these projects are needed to keep the lights on and homes heated. Many regulators appear to be taking the utilities at their word. They shouldn’t.

In 2015, the Department of Energy reported that using existing pipelines in our region could reduce the need for new ones. Now new evidence suggests the highly controversial Mountain Valley and Atlantic Coast pipelines are, in fact, not needed.

A recent report from Synapse Energy Economics revealed that, with upgrades and modification, the existing system of underground pipelines and other gas infrastructure could supply our region’s natural gas needs at least through 2030.

The energy researchers conclude: “[T]he supply capacity of the Virginia-Carolinas region’s existing natural gas infrastructure is more than sufficient to meet expected future peak demand.”

So far, the only information about the need for the MVP and the ACP has come from the developers. Now independent experts have delved into the core supply-and-demand argument for the proposed pipelines. They calculated our region’s future wintertime peak demand for natural gas, and whether the current system can suffice.

Synapse overestimated demand by assuming renewable energy lags in the future, and that a greater number of coal-fired power plants are replaced with natural gas facilities. Even under that worst-case scenario, Synapse showed the current network of pipelines is adequate.

The existing system can deliver 300 million cubic feet (MMcf) per hour to Virginia and the Carolinas. Planned upgrades to one pipeline, and a reversal in flow of another, double that volume. Add to that the capacity of known storage facilities inside the region, and Synapse concluded the current system can move enough natural gas to easily handle the future “peak hour” demand on our coldest days.

Not surprisingly, Dominion Virginia Power dismisses the report. But what is surprising is the company’s fact-challenged attack.

First, Dominion says Synapse experts should have considered peak demand as the benchmark, which is the exact measure the researchers used. And second, Dominion claims because researchers weren’t privy to the full capacity of natural gas storage, the conclusion is unreliable. In reality, if there is storage beyond what the researchers considered, that only bolsters the report’s merit.

The pipelines’ investors do have reasons to disparage dissenters. Projects like these deliver not only gas, but also handsome financial returns for the developers. In most cases, utility customers pay the bill – they don’t have a choice – and federal rules guarantee investors a healthy reward.

This is a system that encourages overbuilding, even when cheaper alternatives like existing pipelines make sense. And it is a system that can trap the region in fossil-fuel dependence even longer.

The pipelines would last 80 years, and with so much time and money pored into them, utilities will have a powerful incentive to thwart meaningful pursuits of renewable energy, like solar power.

We do want to be clear about one thing: Shuttering coal-fired power plants is good for the environment. But natural gas is still a fossil fuel. It’s finite, and it is not without environmental consequences. Proponents tout it as a bridge fuel that helps move us from coal to more reliable and renewable energy sources.

But if these pipelines are built, we could be stuck with this fossil fuel as our chief option until the year 2100. That’s a mighty long bridge.

The Synapse report reveals we have better, less damaging options than new pipelines across our mountains, something the utilities have yet to concede. It raises critical questions that must be answered before these projects are approved.

We need a meaningful dialog about these pipeline proposals centered not so much on where they should go, but whether they should go anywhere at all.

NOTE: Greg Buppert is a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center.

See also: www.FrackCheckWV.net

Tagged as: ACP, drilling, energy policy, explosions, fracking, greenhouse gas, marcellus shale, methane, MVP, natural gas, pipelines