Sen. Kaine does his homework & presents reasoned arguments

From Senator Tim Kaine (D – VA), Senate Office Building, Washington, DC, October 13, 2022

Thank you for contacting me about energy permitting reform and the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). I appreciate hearing from you.

On Tuesday, August 16, 2022, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law. This historic legislation invests $369 billion in addressing climate change and improving domestic energy production and manufacturing, reducing carbon emissions by roughly 40 percent by 2030, and bringing an estimated $11.6 billion of investment in large-scale power generation and storage to Virginia. The Inflation Reduction Act does not fund or approve the construction of any pipeline.

As part of a bargain to ensure the passage of the historic Inflation Reduction Act, which I was proud to support as the biggest step the United States has ever taken to address climate change, Senate leadership agreed to take up separate legislation to ensure the completion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). If completed as proposed, the MVP would run through Craig, Franklin, Giles, Montgomery, Pittsylvania, and Roanoke counties.

For many years, I have received input from Virginians about the MVP. However, I was not consulted about this deal, and I did not support the pipeline provisions in it pertaining to the Mountain Valley Pipeline. I expressed my views publicly in the run-up to a vote on a critical government funding bill that contained this provision, and I am relieved it was ultimately stripped out due to enough other Senators joining me to oppose it.

We owe it to Virginians to ensure that any energy project that deeply affects their communities, even to the point of seizing their property, should only proceed following an orderly, fair, and transparent process overseen by energy and environmental agencies. That’s why I agree with the need to reform our broken process for permitting energy infrastructure. I am receptive to many of the permitting reform provisions in the Manchin bill, though I believe it could be significantly improved by including my legislation to improve the permitting process, the Pipeline Fairness, Transparency, and Responsible Development Act.

However, the MVP portions of this bill were unacceptable to me. Over 100 miles of this pipeline are in Virginia, but I was not included in the discussions and therefore not given an opportunity to share Virginians’ concerns. In that sense, I stood in the same position as many of my constituents who have felt ignored along the way.

Green-lighting the MVP is contrary to the spirit of permitting reform. Such a deliberate action by Congress to put its thumb on the scale and simply approve this project while shutting down opportunities for full administrative or judicial review is at odds with the bipartisan desire to have a more transparent and workable permitting process. It also contradicts a position I have publicly advocated for many years—that Congress should not be the decider of these projects, but should instead set up an effective administrative permitting system and allow it to work without legislative interference.

I also strongly objected to the highly unusual provisions to eliminate any judicial review for key parts of the MVP process and strip jurisdiction away from the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit for cases involving the MVP. The owners of the MVP may be dissatisfied with rulings of the Fourth Circuit; in my 18 years as a civil rights lawyer practicing in the Fourth Circuit, I wasn’t always happy with the Court’s rulings. But a litigant in federal court—rich or poor, individual or company—has appellate remedies if it disagrees with a court ruling. Allowing one party disappointed with the actions of a court to pick a different court, bypass normal administrative processes, and eliminate meaningful judicial review of its project would set a dangerous precedent that could easily lead to abuse and even corruption in the future.

I have tracked the checkered regulatory process of the MVP for many years. I have held public input sessions as far back as 2015. I wrote a 5-page letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) summarizing the key points of what I heard. I introduced bipartisan legislation with Senator Mark Warner and Congressman Morgan Griffith to improve the FERC process when it comes to issues like eminent domain, adequate public meetings and opportunities for input, compensation for crossings of the Appalachian Trail or conservation easements, and whether multiple pipelines in the same geographic region should be sited less than 100 miles from one another.

I have been doing everything I can to amplify the voices of Virginians in this process. Whether you oppose or support the pipelines, Virginians deserve to have confidence that FERC has followed a full and fair process and considered all factors. Congress should not make decisions on individual pipelines because that would inevitably lead to partisan decision-making. But Congress writes the laws that govern FERC, and I believe that if the FERC process is flawed, Congress should adjust the law to fix the flaws. This is what I have proposed to do.

I will be sure to keep your views in mind should permitting reform legislation again be considered by the full Senate. Again, thank you for contacting me on this important issue, and please continue to make your voice heard.

Sincerely, Sen. Tim Kaine, U. S. Senate, Washington, DC

Residual Waste is toxic brine, as with the diesel truck exhaust gases

From an Article by Michael Barrick, Appalachian Chronicle, September 18, 2022
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WESTON, W.Va. – We read in Ecclesiastes that there is a season for everything, including a time to be silent and a time to speak. By now, I had hoped to be silent. As a pensioner, I was hoping to hang out with my family, do some hiking, and to travel a bit. In short, I’m just trying to live a peaceful life. The only problem is that corruption and violence are so rampant that they can’t be ignored.

Silence in the face of violence is compliance with it. (To hear a beautiful take on that notion, listen to “Medicine” by the Americana band Rising Appalachia). So my season of silence is over.

For nearly a decade, before I tried to step back a few months ago, I had written more than 100 articles about the public health, safety and environmental dangers of fracking and related pipeline development. I’ve also written about Mountaintop Removal and efforts by environmental activists to protect the pristine Appalachian Mountains. What West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin and his fossil fuel cronies have inflicted upon the people and land of West Virginia and Virginia in attempting to build the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) is nothing short of a violent assault upon the people and land.

In building the now-abandoned Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) and the MVP, energy companies EQT, Duke Energy and Dominion and their subcontractors have been ruthless, as the articles below reveal. (Note: some links within articles may no longer be valid). This collective chronicle of the gas industry’s tactics reveal deceit, threats and destruction. The MVP remains uncompleted only because of the people in its path. A coalition of individuals and groups have stalled it primarily through successful legal and regulatory challenges, not to mention dogged determination.

These articles – the first published Aug. 4 2014 – demonstrate what a roller-coaster ride of emotions and betrayal landowners and environmentals have experienced. They succeeded in shutting down the ACP and had the MVP on the ropes. Investors were nervous.

However, it appeared that all of that work against the MVP may have been undone in a behind-closed-doors deal between Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Joe Manchin to get Manchin’s essential vote to pass the Inflation Reduction Act. That deal was supposed to streamline the permitting process for the MVP.

However, E&E News Energy Wire is reporting that may not be enough to salvage the beleaguered and long-delayed project. According to the article, a primary obstacle may be legislation announced and sponsored by West Virginia’s other Senator, Republican Shelley Moore Capito. The Republican proposal is picking up bi-partisan support. The E&E News article details how legal and regulatory challenges could still derail the MVP should the proposal pass, as it would not allow the MVP to bypass judicial review.

Though this is hopeful news, this fight is far from over. There is simply too much money changing hands. So, keep up with this story and support any effort to thwart the shady dealings of Schumer and Manchin.

These articles would not have been possible without the cooperation of my family and the subjects of the articles. They are the brave souls willing to share their stories, allowing me insight, facts and documents to support my enterprise and investigative reporting; additionally, contributions from other writers have served to enrich our reporting.

So, while it may take you a while, please read through our past articles. You will see that the fossil fuel industry hasn’t changed tactics in over a century. Only this time, instead of using Baldwin-Felt thugs to do their dirty work as they did during the West Virginia Mine Wars in the early 1920s, today’s energy executives hatch their plots on Manchin’s “Almost Heaven” yacht moored on the Potomac River.

Free radicals as “reactive oxidative species” (ROS) are highly reactive and damaging

Submitted to the Morgantown Dominion Post, WVU Today (6/27/21), June 28, 2021

Every day, our bodies face a bombardment of UV rays, ozone, cigarette smoke, industrial chemicals and other hazards.

This exposure can lead to free-radical production in our bodies, which damages our DNA and tissues. A new study from West Virginia University researcher Eric E. Kelley — in collaboration with the University of Minnesota — suggests that unrepaired DNA damage can increase the speed of aging. — The study appears in the journal Nature.

Kelley and his team created genetically-modified mice with a crucial DNA-repair protein missing from their hematopoietic stem cells, immature immune cells that develop into white blood cells. Without this repair protein, the mice were unable to fix damaged DNA accrued in their immune cells.

“By the time the genetically-modified mouse is 5 months old, it’s like a 2-year-old mouse,” said Kelley, associate professor and associate chair of research in the School of Medicine’s department of physiology and pharmacology. “It has all the symptoms and physical characteristics. It has hearing loss, osteoporosis, renal dysfunction, visual impairment, hypertension, as well as other age-related issues. It’s prematurely aged just because it has lost its ability to repair its DNA.”

According to Kelley, a normal 2-year-old mouse is about equivalent in age to a human in their late 70s to early 80s.

Kelley and his colleagues found that markers for cell aging, or senescence, as well as for cell damage and oxidation were significantly greater in the immune cells of genetically-modified mice compared to normal, wild-type mice. But the damage was not limited to the immune system; the modified mice also demonstrated aged, damaged cells in organs such as the liver and kidney.

These results suggest that unrepaired DNA damage may cause the entire body to age prematurely.

When we are exposed to a pollutant, such as radiation for cancer treatment, energy is transferred to the water in our body, breaking the water apart. This creates highly reactive molecules — free radicals — that will quickly interact with another molecule in order to gain electrons. When these free radicals interact with important biomolecules, such as a protein or DNA, it causes damage that can keep that biomolecule from working properly.

Some exposure to pollutants is unavoidable, but there are several lifestyle choices that increase exposure to pollution and thus increase free radicals in the body. Smoking, drinking and exposure to pesticides and other chemicals through occupational hazards all significantly increase free radicals.

“A cigarette has over 10 to the 16th free radicals per puff, just from combusted carbon materials,” Kelley said.

In addition to free radicals produced by pollutant exposure, the human body is constantly producing free radicals during a process used to turn food into energy, called oxidative phosphorylation.

“We have mechanisms in the mitochondria that mop free radicals up for us, but if they become overwhelmed — if we have over-nutrition, if we eat too much junk, if we smoke — the defense mechanism absolutely cannot keep up,” Kelley said.

As bodies age, the amount of damage caused by free-radical formation becomes greater than the antioxidant defenses. Eventually, the balance between the two tips over to the oxidant side, and damage starts to win out over repair. If we are exposed to a greater amount of pollutants and accumulate more free radicals, this balance will be disrupted even sooner, causing premature aging.

The issue of premature aging due to free-radical damage is especially important in West Virginia. The state has the greatest percentage of obese citizens in the nation and a high rate of smokers and workers in high-pollution-exposure occupations.
“I come from an Appalachian background,” Kelley said. “And, you know, I’d go to funerals that were in some old house — an in-the-living-room-with-a-casket kind of deal — and I’d look at people in there, and they’d be 39 or 42 and look like they were 80 because of their occupation and their nutrition.”

Many West Virginians also have comorbidities, such as diabetes, enhanced cardiovascular disease, stroke and renal issues, that complicate the situation further.
Although there are drugs, called senolytics, that help to slow the aging process, Kelley believes it is best to prevent premature aging through lifestyle change. He says that focusing on slowing the aging process through preventive measures can improve the outcome for each comorbidity and add more healthy years to people’s lives.

“The impact is less on lifespan and more on healthspan,” he said. “If you could get people better access to healthcare, better education, easier ways for them to participate in healthier eating and a healthier lifestyle, then you could improve the overall economic burden on the population of West Virginia and have a much better outcome all the way around.”

The Property Rights and Pipeline Center is very concerned about resident rights to their lands and forests

News Report from the Allegheny Blue Ridge Alliance, May 28, 2021

The Property Rights and Pipeline Center, a national coalition of which ABRA is a member, this week released five new mini-documentary films about the unjust manner in which the power of eminent domain is granted by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

These are excellent depictions of the issues involving eminent domain use to take farmers lands for private gain. Pipelines involve more than the taking of land. The disturbances, noises, air pollution fumes, and water pollution are extreme. Safety issues are due to leaks, fires and explosions.

Kudos to our filmmaker friend and colleague Sarah Hazelgrove for creating such compelling stories! Each video is 12-14 minutes long.

Links for all are below:

• A Town at Risk – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsCVUSWkSAU

• Averitt Family ACP – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXLABUIgNpU

• Megan Holleran Fighting the Constitution Pipeline – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sljN2RmGWg

• The Hero from the Holler – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMe-nrvmNTY

• Landowners vs The Law – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrTufM0W3D4

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See also: The Property Rights and Pipeline Center (PRPC) is committed to ending the use of eminent domain for oil and gas pipelines and associated infrastructure. We are determined to fight oil and gas infrastructure that takes land without the consent of its owners and puts treacherous pipelines under their homes and in protected forests, water supplies, farms and neighborhoods.

The fact is, we don’t need these pipelines — there is currently an oil and gas glut. Energy demand is generally flat in many cases and going down around the country. Pipelines leak and explode all the time and in many cases are used to move product for overseas export; not for our energy needs at all. Americans treasure their right to own and enjoy their property. Companies that foul the local environment and add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere should not take Americans property against their will.

Across America, more municipalities, citizens and landowners every day push back as pipeline companies threaten their land and safety. Many property rights and pipeline fights and legal battles are going on today throughout the country. We hope to join the many voices together so that we can speak with a powerful, unified voice for property rights and a clean energy future in all corners of this country.

Kathy Chandler protests MVP in 2017

From an Article by Laurence Hammack, Roanoke Times, May 16, 2021

When a company building the Mountain Valley Pipeline first selected a route, cutting directly through James and Kathy Chandler’s “slice of heaven” atop Bent Mountain, it offered them $89,343.

A jury on Friday ordered Mountain Valley to pay the Chandlers $430,000. After hearing four days of testimony, the jury settled on the figure as “just compensation” for an 8.6-acre easement the company took in 2018, using its power of eminent domain to force a sale when the owners resisted.

Currently under construction, the 42-inch diameter natural gas pipeline bisects the Chandlers’ 111-acre property, passing about 500 feet from their custom-built home.

“There’s a huge gap that cuts through the heart of their land, 125 feet wide and half a mile long,” Stephen Clarke, the Chandlers’ attorney, said during the first trial to decide just compensation for the owners of one of nearly 300 parcels condemned by Mountain Valley.

The Chandlers testified about how they had long searched for the perfect place to build their dream home. In 1997, they found a remote spot on Bent Mountain, with forests and pastures along Mill Creek, that became their “slice of heaven,” James Chandler testified.

When plans for the pipeline were announced in 2014, the Chandlers knew their land would be forever changed. Even after it is buried, the pipeline will occupy a cleared right of way through a forest that Kathy Chandler once called her yard. “The pipe will always be there,” James Chandler told the jury. “It will always be a visual reminder. Nothing will be normal.”

After Mountain Valley decided to build a pipeline that will pass through the New River and Roanoke valleys on a 303-mile path from northern West Virginia to Pittsylvania County, the joint venture of five energy companies began to buy the land it needed. About 85% of the landowners struck voluntary agreements, the company has said.

In October 2017 — about two weeks after the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission found there was a public need for the natural gas that will be pumped through the pipeline at high pressure — Mountain Valley sued the owners of about 300 parcels in Virginia who had refused to sell.

Under the Natural Gas Act, the company was allowed to use the power of eminent domain, which originally was used by governmental agencies for public projects such as highways or schools.

U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Dillon granted Mountain Valley immediate possession of the land, allowing it to begin cutting trees in early 2018 while the property owners waited to be paid.

Since then, most of the cases have been settled, either through voluntary agreements or after a judge’s ruling on evidentiary issues forced a resolution. About a dozen cases remain pending.

Mountain Valley often makes lowball offers while using its eminent domain authority as leverage over landowners, according to Mark Jarrell of Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights, an anti-pipeline coalition. Jarrell, who is from West Virginia, owns land that has been taken by Mountain Valley.

“Regardless of how great or small a verdict may be, the forced easement is a loss, a gut punch for landowners — like being taken to the gallows,” Jarrell said in a statement following the trial. “This is a no win, they’ve lost their privacy, peace of mind, their sense of safety and security, and they have a potential 42-inch pipe bomb in their back yard.”

The Chandlers’ trial featured a mostly empty courtroom, rearranged to accommodate for pandemic social distancing, and the numbers-laden testimony of appraisers to determine a fair-market value of their loss.

Joseph Thompson, a Roanoke appraiser hired by Mountain Valley, put the value of the land and home at about $1 million. The pipeline would diminish that by 15%, he told the jury, arriving at a just compensation amount of nearly $170,000, which included temporary easements.

Virginia Beach appraiser Dennis Gruelle offered a much different picture when called by the Chandlers. By Gruelle’s calculations, the property was worth about $1.6 million, which was reduced 40% by the pipeline’s presence.

That meant Mountain Valley owed the Chandlers $665,391, Clarke argued. After deliberating for a little more than an hour, the jury returned with a verdict of $430,000 — roughly in the middle of the two requests.

The jury was not told how much Mountain Valley had offered to pay for the land, or the outcome of any negotiations. After the trial, Clarke said the $89,343 offer from Mountain Valley was made before the eminent domain suit was filed in 2017.

Although Mountain Valley’s right to take private land for its own profit was not a question for the jury, pipeline opponents hope trials like the Chandlers’ will draw more attention to the subject.

“Our constitutional girders rest upon private property ownership,” Jarrell said. He urged legislators to make changes to a law that allows property to be “literally stripped and quartered at the whim of a private gas company.”

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See also: DEQ denies MVP Southgate water quality permit — again, Lisa Sorg, Progressive Pulse, April 29, 2021

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality has again denied a key water quality permit for the proposed MVP Southgate natural gas pipeline, dealing another setback to the controversial project that would run through Rockingham and Alamance counties.

DEQ originally denied the water quality permit application last August. At the time Division of Water Resources Director Danny Smith wrote that because of “uncertainty surrounding the completion of the MVP Mainline project … work on the Southgate extension could lead to unnecessary water quality impacts and disturbance of the environment in North Carolina.”

MVP appealed the DEQ’s denial to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va. But last month, appeals court judges determined that DEQ’s decision to deny the permit was consistent with state and federal law. The agency also adequately explained its concerns about the viability of Southgate in the context of the delayed mainline project. But where DEQ erred, the court said, is that it failed to fully explain why it chose to deny the permit outright rather than granting a conditional one, contingent on the successful construction of the main line.

Today’s denial corrects that error and explains the agency’s reasoning, DEQ said.

Delaware River (black trace) forms boundaries for these Penna. counties: Delaware, Philadelphia, Bucks, Northampton, Monroe & Pike

From an Article by Maya Weber, S&P Global — Platts News, March 10, 2021

Washington — Even with the change in presidential administrations, the US is supporting PennEast Pipeline’s position in a Supreme Court case examining a private developer’s ability to use eminent domain to seize properties in which a state has an interest.

The continuation of the US Solicitor General’s support that emerged toward the end of the Trump Administration could benefit the 116-mile, 1.1 Bcf/d project linking Marcellus Shale dry gas production with markets in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York.
The project has struggled with regulatory and litigation hurdles in New Jersey, which challenged the project’s use of eminent domain and rejected water permits.

At issue before the Supreme Court is a 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals judgment that found that because of state sovereign immunity, the private pipeline company lacked authority to pull the state of New Jersey into federal court for condemnation proceedings.

PennEast appealed the decision to the Supreme Court, with backing from other natural gas companies, which argued the ruling could enable states to block interstate gas pipelines and chill investments in infrastructure across the US.

In a friend of the court brief filed March 8, Acting Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar argued that the 3rd Circuit lacked jurisdiction to determine whether the Natural Gas Act authorizes the pipeline company to condemn state property. The state should have raised its contention about the lack of authority before FERC and in the pending appeals court review of the commission’s decisions, the brief said.

The US also argued that the “text, structure, history and purpose” of the NGA show it authorizes pipeline certificate holders to condemn all property needed to build a FERC-approved pipeline, “whether or not a state claims any interest in such property.” On its face, the US argued, the authority extends to any property needed for the project, and the court cannot narrow that reach by inserting words Congress chose to omit.

It also argued that principles of state sovereign immunity do not require a different conclusion; it said Congress has long delegated the right of eminent domain to private actors.

Impact on role of Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)

In addition, the US brief warned of a potentially profound effect on FERC’s ability to administer the interstate natural gas system, suggesting the 3rd Circuit decision would turn state conservation easements into “a sword against federally approved projects.”

“Under the court of appeals’ decision, all the state needs to preclude any FERC-approved project it opposes is a willing landowner along the route,” the US wrote, adding the state could also use its own eminent domain powers if the landowner was unwilling.

Congress added the section of the NGA on eminent domain, it said, to prevent states from nullifying FERC’s exercise of its exclusive jurisdiction to regulate the transport of gas in interstate commerce.

New Jersey, in arguing against Supreme Court review, had called warnings about implications of the 3rd Circuit ruling overstated, and said the unanimous circuit court judgment reflected the proper application of sovereign immunity law and statutory interpretation rules.

PennEast, in a statement March 10, welcomed the continued US support, which it said “underscores this case presents an issue that cuts across party lines.”

The company said several factors potentially impact its anticipated in-service date. “Among those factors are approval from FERC on the phased approach and approval of the remaining permit applications from Pennsylvania regulators, as well as construction-related considerations,” it said. “We anticipate placing the Phase One facilities in service in 2022 and Phase Two facilities in service in 2024.”

Faced with the adverse 3rd Circuit ruling affecting the route in New Jersey, PennEast had sought permission from FERC to build the project in two phases (CP20-47), with the first in the friendlier regulatory terrain of Pennsylvania. That amendment application faces opposition from environmental groups and local interests at FERC.

Subcommittee on Civil Rights & Civil Liberties

CONTACT: Aryele Bradford, (202) 226-5181, December 7, 2020

Washington D.C. (Dec. 7, 2020)—On Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2020, at 10:00 a.m., Rep. Jamie Raskin, the Chairman of the Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, will hold a hearing to examine the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) failure to protect the rights of landowners whose properties are affected by natural gas projects, and to follow up on the investigation and video report the Subcommittee released earlier this year.

FERC is the primary federal permitting agency for the construction and operation of all major interstate natural gas pipelines. Landowners face obstacles from FERC at every stage of the natural gas pipeline process: FERC rubberstamps natural gas projects without fair consideration to landowners, favors pipeline companies, and provides insufficient options for landowners to seek recourse against pipeline companies.

On February 19, 2020, the Subcommittee launched an investigation into the use of eminent domain in the construction of natural gas pipelines. FERC routinely grants pipeline companies “certificates of public convenience and necessity,” allowing them to take possession of private land under the right of eminent domain.

On April, 28, 2020, the Subcommittee released preliminary findings of the investigation revealing that the natural gas pipeline approval process used by FERC unjustly trampled on the rights of private landowners.

On June 11, 2020, following the Subcommittee’s investigation, FERC announced it would no longer authorize construction activities for natural gas pipelines until the agency acts on the merits of challenges from private landowners and other stakeholders.

On November 20, 2020, the Subcommittee expanded its investigation by requesting information about procedures used to resolve conflicts between landowners and energy companies.

WHAT: Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Subcommittee Hearing:

WHEN: Dec. 9, 2020, at 10:00 a.m. EST

WHO:
1. David L. Morenoff, Acting General Counsel, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

2. Terry Turpin, Director, Office of Energy Projects, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

..... “NO Eminent Domain for Private Gain” ..... No MVP on Me or Thee

U.S. Senate Confirms Two New FERC Commissioners, ABRA Update 297, December 4, 2020

The U.S. Senate on November 30 confirmed the two nominees for outstanding vacancies on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). The two new commissioners are:

• Mark Christie, Republican, who has been a longtime member and most recently Chairman of the Virginia State Corporation Commission
• Allision Clements, Democrat, now with the Energy Foundation and formerly with the Natural Resources Defense Council.

FERC will now have a full-complement of five commissioners, 3 Republicans and 2 Democrats. The FERC Chairman, James Danley, a Republican, was named by President Trump to that position on November 5, replacing Neil Chatterjee. The Chairman of FERC serves at the pleasure of the President, so Danley will presumably be replaced as Chair by President-elect Biden after January 20 by a Democrat, expected to be Commissioner Richard Glick. The present term of Commissioner Chatterjee expires in June 2021, affording Mr. Biden the opportunity to replace him with a third Democrat.

Among issues that the new FERC Commissioners will be addressing will be consideration of the forthcoming restoration plan of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline route, which is due to be filed with FERC by December 26.

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ...... “now on - trial” ... !

From Michael M. Barrick, Appalachian Chronicle, September 18, 2020

WASHINGTON – Representatives from the VOICES Coalition (Victory Over InFRACKstructure, Clean Energy inStead), a coalition of over of over 350 grassroots activists, environmental leaders, lawyers, and experts, and 250 environmental organizations representing over 35 states, will hold a Virtual People’s Hearing to testify to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC’s) extensive history of bias and abuse against the environment and the people in its approval of pipelines and fracked gas infrastructure.

It is scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 23 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. EDT.

Registration is required for the Webinar. One can register at this link:

bit.ly/RegisterVirtualHearing

Witnesses will share stories about their personal experiences, documenting the many instances in which FERC has skirted critical regulations and laws, infringed on states’ rights, hired biased consultants, and ignored requests for transparency.

Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin, who has been a leader in Congress on FERC oversight, will speak about the preliminary findings of an investigation by the Subcommittee on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties showing that the natural gas pipeline approval process used by FERC unjustly tramples on the rights of private landowners.

These stories will demonstrate to Congress the need to reform this notoriously opaque agency.

Commissioners have rejected only one pipeline project in the past 30 years, allowing many others to continue no matter the environmental and human consequences. The collection will substantiate what is already clear from FERC’s approval record: this unsupervised agency, funded by those it regulates, is unfit to serve.

To read the dossier of abuses of power and law by FERC documented by the VOICES Coalition and the Delaware Riverkeeper, visit:

bit.ly/DossierofFERCAbuse

Maple tree farm in northeastern Pennsylvania

From an Article by Susan Phillips, State Impact Penna., July 3, 2020

A Northeastern Pennsylvania family who watched as work crews, accompanied by armed federal marshals, destroyed their budding maple tree farm to make way for the failed Constitution Pipeline has settled with the company Williams for an undisclosed amount. A federal court has also vacated the eminent domain taking of about five acres, reversing an order it made more than five years ago.

“We’re really glad that it’s ended,” said Catherine Holleran, co-owner of the 23-acre property that has been in the family for 50 years. “We’ve gotten our land returned to us. That was our main objective right from the first.”

The Constitution Pipeline project would have carried Marcellus Shale gas from Pennsylvania to New York state. Though the project received federal approval and the necessary permits from Pennsylvania regulators, New York blocked the pipeline by not issuing permits. Williams dropped the project in February.

The Holleran family of New Milford fought a lengthy battle to prevent the company from building the pipeline across their property. But in March 2016, the crews arrived at the 23-acre farm in rural Susquehanna County along with the federal marshalls, who wore bullet proof vests and carried semi-automatic weapons. The crew spent several days clearing about 558 trees, including some that were hundreds of years old.

In a 2018 statement filed with the court, Holleran described how the company left the trees lying on the ground, and did not remove them for a full year after the clear cut. The stumps were left in the ground.

Holleran described the stress weathered by her and her family. “The entire ordeal has had an enormous emotional toll,” Holleran wrote. “The court proceedings followed by the armed guards on the property created immeasurable stress. …After the trees came down, I experienced a terrible period of despair.”

The Hollerans’ attorney Carolyn Elefant said the Hollerans are happy to have regained ownership of the farm. “My clients are relieved to move on from the stress and uncertainty of the past few years,” Elefant said. “It was heartbreaking for the family to watch their trees come down, but with full ownership of the property restored and compensation paid, they can reclaim their land and replant their trees.”

Elefant said the family wants to continue to build upon their maple syrup business. Holleran said she and her family want to work to change the Natural Gas Act, which governs how pipeline companies can seize private property through eminent domain. She said it’s difficult for individual landowners to take on large corporations, especially since the process is so legalistic and technical.

“That can create a lot of hardship for families,” she said. “You have to have a lot of money, and you have to have resources to even go that route, which is why a lot of people don’t.”

About StateImpact Pennsylvania

StateImpact Pennsylvania is a collaboration among WITF, WHYY, WPSU, and The Allegheny Front. Reporters Anne Danahy, Reid Frazier, Rachel McDevitt and Susan Phillips cover the commonwealth’s energy economy. Read their reports on this site, and hear them on public radio stations across Pennsylvania.

This collaborative project is funded, in part, through grants from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Wyncote Foundation, and William Penn Foundation.

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See also: FERC has a big pipeline problem – Jacob Hileman, Virginia Mercury, April 10, 2020

The MVP, ACP, and Rover pipelines also account for 29% – nearly one-third – of the 48,000+ acres of upland forest cleared in order to construct all 46 pipeline mega-projects. In addition to destroying wildlife habitat and facilitating the spread of invasive species and plant disease, clear-cutting large swathes of forest on steep slopes increases the likelihood of water pollution and landslides.

Proposed Penn-East pipeline project would disturb farmland

From an Article by Mike Catalini, NBC News 10 (Philadelphia), October 12, 2019

This is the latest setback for the years-old proposed Penn-East Pipeline project that would run from northeastern Pennsylvania and terminate near Trenton, NJ.

New Jersey has denied the permits for a $1.1 billion, roughly 120-mile long pipeline that would bring Marcellus Shale natural gas to New Jersey, Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy said Friday.

“We are committed to transitioning New Jersey to 100% clean energy by 2050,” Murphy said in a tweet that included the Department of Environmental Protection’s rejection letter to PennEast Pipeline Company for permits.

It’s the latest setback for the years-old proposed project that would run from northeastern Pennsylvania and terminate near Trenton, though the company indicated in a statement it’s not finished fighting for the pipeline.

“PennEast member companies remain fully committed to the PennEast Pipeline Project and the affordable, reliable service it will bring to the region,” spokeswoman Pat Kornick said in an email.

New Jersey’s DEP said it denied the permits in light of last month’s ruling by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that said PennEast couldn’t use eminent domain to acquire dozens of properties owned by the state and preserved for farmland and open space. The Department said that because of the ruling the company no longer had the authority to carry out necessary requirements inline with New Jersey law.

PennEast has argued the pipeline would bring jobs and needed low-cost natural gas to homes in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York, but Environmental groups worry the project will cut a scar across the landscape and harm wildlife.

PennEast’s application with federal regulators goes back to 2015.

The company, which is made up of five different energy companies, has won federal and Pennsylvania permitting approvals including a key Federal Energy Regulatory Commission certificate that could allow the firm to use eminent domain to acquire land. But the appeals court short-circuited that ability in part with its September ruling.