Capturing info in the public interest

To report a release or spill, contact the federal government’s centralized reporting center, the National Response Center (NRC), at 1-800-424-8802. The NRC is staffed 24 hours a day by personnel who will ask you to provide as much information about the incident as possible.

Recent releases or spills in the region of eastern Ohio, western Pennsylvania and north central West Virginia are shown below. This particular list was provided by Sky Truth of Shepherdstown, WV.

>>>>>>>…………………>>>>>>>…………………>>>>>>>

NRC Report: Sewage near Buckhannon, WV
Description: Incident Type: FIXED – NRC Report ID: 1326969 – Medium Affected: SOIL – Suspected Responsible Party: SAINT GOBAIN CORP
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-20 14:15:00
Tags: NRC, other, release

NRC Report: Drilling Brine (With Zinc Salts) near Pennsboro, WV
Description: Incident Type: MOBILE – NRC Report ID: 1326796 – Medium Affected: WATER – Suspected Responsible Party: GAS FIELD SERVICES LLC
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-17 21:42:00
Tags: NRC, other, BigSpill, major, release

NRC Report: Unknown Oil near Lost Creek, WV
Description: Incident Type: FIXED – NRC Report ID: 1326576 – Medium Affected: WATER – Suspected Responsible Party:
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-14 11:00:00
Tags: NRC, oil, release

NRC Report: Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC) near Wileyville, WV
Description: Incident Type: FIXED – NRC Report ID: 1326360 – Medium Affected: AIR – Suspected Responsible Party: EQT
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-11 18:43:00
Tags: NRC, other, release

NRC Report: Crude Oil near Urichsville, OH
Description: Incident Type: STORAGE TANK – NRC Report ID: 1326320 – Medium Affected: WATER – Suspected Responsible Party: DIVERSIFIED ENERGY CORP
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-11 11:45:00
Tags: NRC, oil, BigSpill, major, release

NRC Report: Coal near Graysville, PA
Description: Incident Type: RAILROAD – NRC Report ID: 1326220 – Medium Affected: BALLAST – Suspected Responsible Party:
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-10 01:30:00
Tags: NRC, other, release

NRC Report: Triethylene Glycol near Wind Ridge, PA
Description: Incident Type: FIXED – NRC Report ID: 1326221 – Medium Affected: LAND – Suspected Responsible Party: EQUITRANS MIDSTREAM
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-10 00:30:00
Tags: NRC, other, BigSpill, major, release

NRC Report: Ethylene Glycol near Wind Ridge, PA
Description: Incident Type: STORAGE TANK – NRC Report ID: 1326219 – Medium Affected: LAND – Suspected Responsible Party: EQUITRANS MIDSTREAM
Incident Date/Time: 2022-01-10 00:30:00
Tags: NRC, other, BigSpill, major, release

>>>>>>>…………………>>>>>>>…………………>>>>>>>

SkyTruth, P.O. Box 3283, Shepherdstown, WV 25443

CONTACT ~ info@skytruth.org

#######………..……########……..………#######

Pollution trail in sky west of I-79

Pollution trail seen beyond local power plant steam plumes

NOTE PHOTOS: Atmospheric Pollution Trail From Clarksburg to Morgantown from Betsy Lawson, Morgantown, WV

Saturday morning while driving north on I-79, a long, uninterrupted ribbon of brown, purple, grey pollution was seen near the western horizon. This started in the vicinity of the Harrison Power plant just north of Clarksburg and stretched at least as far as Morgantown.

We’ve never seen a cloud formation that looked anything like it. The second photo looks toward the Fort Martin and Longview power plants from University Town Center. The pollution trail still appears low on the western horizon from I-79. So the length of this trail is at least 35 miles, perhaps much more?

This pollution trail was reported to the WV-DEP complaint desk ~
https://dep.wv.gov/Contact/Pages/Report-a-Complaint.aspx

MVP Involves Environmental Violations in WV & VA

From a Submitted Essay by Thomas Hadwin, Roanoke Times, July 18, 2021

I have read with interest the various community opinions about the Mountain Valley Pipeline. As a former electric and gas utility executive, I am very familiar with the challenges involved in creating the energy facilities we need at a reasonable cost and with the least possible disruption to our environment.

So far, MVP’s record of environmental protection has not been good. They have been cited for hundreds of permit violations and fined $2.7 million. Construction in the areas with the greatest potential for landslides, soil erosion and stream crossing impacts has not yet occurred.

In their June 30 opinion column, Cline Brubaker and Bob Camicia, former Franklin County Supervisors, argue that if the MVP were finished, the Summit View Business Park could draw new businesses and jobs to the area, benefitting the region and making a certain amount of environmental disruption acceptable.

Choosing between protecting our water, heritage and property rights versus increased economic activity is a false choice based on incomplete information.

The former supervisors said the MVP could be tapped “at no cost to residents.” This is probably accurate in the context of the way the connection was presented to the Franklin County Board of Supervisors, but it does not reflect the cost to Roanoke Gas customers.

Roanoke Gas told the Virginia energy regulator that Franklin County could obtain gas service with a connection to its existing supplier East Tennessee Gas. This extension would cost about $37 million for 40 or more years of service. Connecting to the MVP, which was routed through the Summit View Industrial Park, would cost just $6.5 million.

It looks like MVP is the better choice, but an important detail was left out. Roanoke Gas committed to pay the MVP $122 million over 20 years to reserve a small amount of capacity on the pipeline, based on the current estimated cost of $6.2 billion for the MVP. Two such contracts would be needed to equal the 40 years of service from East Tennessee. The gas is purchased separately.

Connecting to its existing supplier would save over $200 million compared to using the MVP. Such a connection could have been accomplished years ago and the added economic development would already be occurring.

Why didn’t it happen that way? My guess is that RGC Resources, the company that owns Roanoke Gas, wanted to make a bigger profit. They will receive about $211 million in revenues over the first 20 years as an owner of the MVP. RGC’s 1% share of MVP taxes, financing and operating costs would be deducted from those revenues.

It is claimed the MVP is required for us to have the gas we need. That is untrue. Existing pipelines in the region have expanded by more than twice the amount the MVP would provide. EQT, the nation’s largest gas producer, is responsible for about two-thirds of the capacity of the MVP. This requires them to pay over $620 million each year to the MVP for a pipeline they don’t need.

EQT’s chief executive officer told financial analysts that gas production in the Appalachian Basin will not be growing if gas producers want to remain profitable. He said they have all of the pipeline capacity they need to get their gas to market. The MVP just adds to the existing surplus of capacity and creates a huge financial risk for our largest gas producer.

We need to talk about the “whole story.” We can protect our environment and have the lowest cost access to the gas we need — but that’s not possible with the MVP.

>>> Thomas Hadwin served as an executive for electric and gas utilities in Michigan and New York. He lives in Waynesboro, Virginia.

########……………………########……………………########

See also: US EPA challenge muddles future of Mountain Valley pipeline – Allegheny-Blue Ridge Alliance, July 12, 2021

Extensive frac sand mining is damaging thousands of acres

Public Announcement from FracTracker, Public Lab, & Save the Hills Alliance, February 8, 2021

“Undermined,” is an audio story featuring interviews with three residents impacted by the Hi-Crush Mine in Augusta, Wisconsin.

Christine Yellowthunder, Tom Pearson, and Terence O’Donahue give first hand accounts of their struggles for clean air and water, healthy farmland, and sustainable livelihoods amidst broken promises from frac sand companies.

Listen here: “UNDERMINED: VOICES FROM THE FRONTLINES OF FRAC SAND MINING”

The perils of fracking are well documented, but the impacts from mining frac sand are less widely known. In this OpenHour, we speak with the people fighting for clean air and water, fertile farmland, & sustainable livelihoods in fenceline communities from across the midwest.

Fracking is an extractive technology that has spread across massive landscapes and unzoned, small towns in the USA as industry has purchased up land rights to conduct operations. Mining for silica sand, use of chemicals, and local water all are pumped into the ground to release small pockets of oil & gas. We will hear directly from community members who have been bringing their communities together to unite in the struggles for healthy homes and justice amidst broken promises from frac sand companies.

About Frac Sand Mining in Wisconsin, Illinois, Texas, etc.

To learn more about frac sand mining, see FracTracker’s collection of aerial imagery, and explore the collection of articles and interactive maps, please visit our informational page below:

Get the Scoop on Frac Sand Mining

ACP 42 inch coated steel pipe being barged north on the Monongahela River at Pt. Marion, Pennsylvania on 11/12/20

From an Article by Emily Brown, (Lynchburg) News & Advance, November 9, 2020

LYNCHBURG — A federal agency has put the canceled Atlantic Coast Pipeline on the clock, asking officials to file specific plans by the end of 2020 for disposition of the defunct project.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission last week asked ACP to file a plan within 60 days on intentions for the project’s facilities and the areas for which the pipeline was set.

“In order for us to determine if additional Commission authorizations are required … we will need more detail …,” FERC’s request states.

The interstate natural gas pipeline received federal approval from FERC in 2017. In early July, facing a number of court challenges to other regulatory requirements, ACP officials canceled the project.

Nelson County was one of several localities that would have been crossed in Virginia; the project had been set to cut through 27 miles in the county. The 600-mile project was planned to cross West Virginia, Virginia and North Carolina.

Specifically, FERC asked ACP to provide a schedule — including initiation and completion dates — for disposition and restoration. FERC’s request also asks for a description of restoration activities on disturbed rights of way, as well as updates on ACP’s consultation with landowners on preferences for restoration.

Information on landowners’ preferences should include, as applicable, hopes for how to restore disturbed areas or whether to remove felled trees, FERC added.

“In the coming months, we will respond to FERC’s request and provide detailed plans for closing out the entire 600-mile project. This will include plans for disturbed areas of the right of way, installed pipe, storage yards and compressor and metering stations,” said Aaron Ruby, spokesperson for ACP partner Dominion Energy.

“Our goal is to close out the project as efficiently as possible and with minimal environmental disturbance. We will work with each landowner whose property has been disturbed to develop a plan for the right of way on their property.”

Most pre-construction activity in Nelson County took place near Wintergreen. Now near the resort, a path where trees were cut down stands as a reminder of the project that never came to be.

But that area of disturbed land, where the trees still lay, is beginning to heal, according to Wintergreen Property Owners Association Executive Director Jay Roberts. Roberts said the organization hopes trees are left there so regrowth happens naturally out of that material; bulldozing over the path that already was cleared and is beginning to heal would do more damage, he previously told the Nelson County Times.

In addition to formally filing a strategy with FERC that will deal with such issues and executing those plans, ACP officials also are working to tie up other loose ends on the canceled project.

Landowners like Wintergreen Property Owners Association signed easement agreements — sometimes resulting in hundreds of thousands of dollars or more in revenue — for use of their property for the project. Many of those agreements — most of which grant ACP perpetual rights to the land for a natural gas pipeline — remain in effect despite the project’s cancellation.

Determining what happens with those easement agreements also is on the “to-do” list for ACP as it winds down the project.

“We will also evaluate each easement agreement on a case-by-case basis in consultation with each landowner,” Ruby said.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Large diameter pipelines disturb mountain terrain ...

Letter to the Editor of Richmond Times-Dispatch, Jessica Sims, July 12, 2020

In response to the July 8 editorial, “Pipeline problems: A bad week,” I’d like to offer a headline revision: “A bad week for corporate polluters in the United States.”

The end of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) was warranted and overdue. Billions over budget and lacking permits, the project inflicted six years of harm on Virginia communities at a time when our utility monopoly, Dominion Energy, could have invested in clean, renewable energy and the jobs associated with them. It has not “been a bad week for energy production” — it’s been a great week for the people in impacted communities in Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina who fought to preserve their homes, water and air from a ruinous project.

The Atlantic Coast Pipeline would not have brought “plentiful, affordable energy.” Rather, it would have brought energy with enormous production costs to a domestic market that is flat.

What this past week also highlights is that the same reasons to end the ACP apply to what should be canceled next: the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). MVP also is environmentally unjust, lacking in permits, billions over budget and unneeded. It would move Virginia further from the clean energy we need to mitigate the climate crisis.

The MVP actively harms the communities and waterways of Giles, Craig, Franklin, Montgomery, Roanoke and Pittsylvania counties.

Gov. Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring should take a moment to reflect, then publicly speak out for the cancellation of a project that actively harms their constituents.

Jessica Sims, Richmond, Virginia

##############################

See also: Climate change will cause more extreme wet and dry seasons — Clemson University, ScienceDaily, July 13, 2020

The world can expect more rainfall as the climate changes, but it can also expect more water to evaporate, complicating efforts to manage reservoirs and irrigate crops in a growing world, according to new research.

There is no environmental justice in such a large diameter pipeline on extremely steep mountain terrain

Update from the Southern Environmental Law Center, June 15, 2020

Washington, D.C. — Today, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a lower court decision that limited the U.S. Forest Service’s authority to issue a permit to the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP). The original ruling by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals stated the Forest Service lacked authority to grant approval for Dominion and Duke Energy’s pipeline to cross the Appalachian Trail on federal land. The Fourth Circuit also vacated the Forest Service permit on other grounds not addressed by today’s decision, and the pipeline still lacks that permit in addition to several other approvals required for construction.

“While today’s decision was not what we hoped for, it addresses only one of the many problems faced by the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. This is not a viable project. It is still missing many required authorizations, including the Forest Service permit at issue in today’s case, and the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals will soon consider the mounting evidence that we never needed this pipeline to supply power. It’s time for these developers to move on and reinvest the billions of dollars planned for this boondoggle into the renewable energy that Virginia and North Carolina customers want and deserve,” said DJ Gerken, Southern Environmental Law Center Program Director.

The Supreme Court’s decision comes at the same time that the purported need for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, proposed in 2014, is receiving renewed scrutiny, as states are steering their energy economies away from fossil fuels. In March, Dominion Energy told Virginia regulators that the build out of new gas-fired power plants is no longer “viable” in the state, and the Virginia Clean Economy Act signed into law in April requires that the utility shut down all of its existing gas plants by 2045. North Carolina’s Clean Energy Plan calls for a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from power plants of 70% over 2005 levels by 2030 and total carbon neutrality by 2050.

“It’s been six years since this pipeline was proposed, we didn’t need it then and we certainly don’t need it now,” said Dick Brooks of the Cowpasture River Preservation. “Today’s decision doesn’t change the fact that Dominion chose a risky route through protected federal lands, steep mountains, and vulnerable communities.”

“This pipeline is putting our farmlands, our water and the livelihood of Virginians in jeopardy,” said Nancy Sorrells with Alliance for the Shenandoah Valley, “And all for a pipeline that isn’t even in the public interest of Virginians.”

Meanwhile, the exorbitant price tag for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline continues to climb because of Dominion’s insistence on a harmful and risky route. Under these circumstances and at a time when the region is moving rapidly to 100% renewable energy, it’s unreasonable to expect customers to pay for this obsolete $8 billion fracked gas pipeline.

“With the ACP still lacking 8 permits, this decision is just plugging just one hole on a sinking ship,” said Kelly Martin, Director of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Dirty Fuels Campaign. “Nothing in today’s ruling changes the fact that the fracked gas Atlantic Coast Pipeline is a dirty, dangerous threat to our health, climate and communities, and nothing about the ruling changes our intention to fight it. From the day the ACP was proposed, the smart investment for Dominion and Duke would have been clean, renewable energy sources, and with the project billions of dollars over budget, that’s even more true today. Despite this ruling on one narrow question, economics, common sense, and public opinion are still squarely against the ACP.”

Among the permits in question for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline are:

@ — Endangered Species Act permit (Biological Opinion) from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

@ — Special use permit and right-of-way grant from the U.S. Forest Service

@ — Right-of-way permit from the National Park Service

@ — Virginia air pollution permit for the Union Hill compressor station

@ — Four Clean Water Act authorizations from the Army Corps of Engineers for Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, and North Carolina

@ — The Atlantic Coast Pipeline’s central permit from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is under review in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, and arguments are expected later this year. The case will determine if FERC correctly determined that the Atlantic Coast Pipeline was needed to fuel gas-fired power plants when it approved the project in 2017.

###########################

About the Southern Environmental Law Center

For more than 30 years, the Southern Environmental Law Center has used the power of the law to champion the environment of the Southeast. With more than 80 attorneys and nine offices across the region, SELC is widely recognized as the Southeast’s foremost environmental organization and regional leader. SELC works on a full range of environmental issues to protect our natural resources and the health and well-being of all the people in our region. For more info see the following: www.SouthernEnvironment.org

About the Sierra Club of the United States

The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 3.8 million members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person’s right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.

Penna. Attorney General Josh Shapiro

From an Article by Deb Erdley, Pittsburgh Tribune Review, 6/12/20

Range Resources, a major driller in the region’s Marcellus Shale industry, pleaded no contest to two misdemeanor counts of negligent oversight of Washington County well sites and will pay $50,000 in fines and $100,000 in contributions to the Washington County watershed funds, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced Friday.

The plea was the culmination of a two-year statewide Grand Jury investigation into allegations of environmental crimes across the state by oil and gas companies companies engaged in horizontal drilling and fracking.

The charges alleged that Range’s negligent maintenance of a waste water storage pond at the Yeager well site in Amwell Township contaminated the water at local springs on the Yeager property. The neighborhood’s longstanding battle over allegations of air and water contamination was detailed in “Amity and Prosperity,” the 2019 Pulitzer Prize winner for nonfiction.

Charges involving the Brownlee well site in Buffalo Township alleged that leaks from a containment tank holding fracking waste water contaminated nearly ⅓ acre of a nearby farm and required the removal of approximately 100 trees and 12,000 square feet of soil.

“In Pennsylvania, clean air and pure water is a constitutional right, yet too often frackers from across the country come to our Commonwealth, walk into our communities, and — sometimes without care or consequence — strip us of those basic rights. Backed by big investors and big influence, too many fracking companies act like they’re above the law, and put themselves ahead of the people who work on the job site, as well as the farmer, neighbor, and children impacted by their operations. We’re here to remind these fracking companies that the people of Pennsylvania come first,” Shapiro said.

A spokesman for Range Resources said the company has taken responsibility for the incidents cited in the charges, has completed “full remediation, approved by regulators,” at both sites and has enhanced containment operations.

“Over the past decade, Range has led significant advancements in operational innovations that have enhanced the safety and sustainability of our industry, which include becoming the first company to voluntarily disclose our fracturing fluid, and to achieve 100 percent reuse levels through our water recycling program,” Range spokesman Mark Windle said.

Terms of the pleas agreement call for Range to pay a $6,000 fine to the Solid Waste Abatement Fund, $3,000 to the Clean Water Fund, a $16,000 charitable contribution to the Washington County Watershed Alliance for the Brownlee site, $41,000 to the Solid Waste Abatement Fund, and an $84,000 charitable contribution to the Washington County Watershed Alliance for the Yeager site.

Natural gas pipeline disturbances on Nixon Ridge, Marshall County, WV

From an Article by Shelby Davis, WTRF 7News, July 30, 2019

After many unanswered attempts to save his property, one Marshall County resident reached out to 7News for some help. Steven Coladonato moved to West Virginia from Connecticut in 2012 after visiting the area to see his grandkids.

He fell in love with the land on Nixon Ridge in Moundsville and built a brand new home there in 2013. Steven described his land as beautiful, with deer roaming all over his property.

He says he could get on his 4 wheeler, and ride through the country for hours, but claims all of that has changed. Just one year ago, he signed a contract for a 12-inch pipe to run through his land.

Now Steven says the land has slipped multiple times leaving a crumbling foundation. He is blaming Clearwater Construction and HG Energy. The homeowner is fed up.

“The amount of dust factor that’s out here is insane. It’s just terrible. My whole ground has shifted down hill and my foundation. I’m about ready to lose my house because of this. My foundation is gone.”

Steven Coladonato – Marshall County Resident — says that the workers are some of the nicest people he’s met, but he is upset up with the company for what he called neglect to the land on the ridge.

WTRF 7News reached out to the company and are waiting to hear back.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

See also: NATURAL GAS — Landslides, explosions spark fear in pipeline country; Mike Soraghan, E&E News, Energywire, June 4, 2019

Denver protests of O & G operations in Colorado

From an Article by Chase Woodruff, Westword News, July 31, 2019

Protests briefly shut down a meeting of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission today, July 31, as climate and environmental activists continued to pressure the agency to crack down on the fossil fuel industry.

The meeting was the third regularly scheduled monthly hearing of the COGCC since the passage of a landmark oil and gas reform bill earlier this year — and by far the most contentious. In response to past complaints about cramped hearing rooms at the COGCC’s Denver headquarters, it was held at the University of Colorado Denver School of Public Affairs, where commissioners heard from dozens of speakers during the three-hour public-comment period that began the hearing.

“We are suffering,” AnnMarie Cleary, a Broomfield resident who lives near a fracking site, told commissioners. “We’ve reported it. We’ve gone to doctors. We have health issues. This commission is a new commission, with a new vision, and the vision now is to first protect health and safety. We can no longer go on allowing everything until those rules are established.”

Tensions ran high throughout the comment period, as activists from a wide range of grassroots environmental groups held up protest signs, interrupted pro-industry speakers and repeatedly clashed with COGCC officials.

“The reason that we’re showing up and making more noise is that we’ve tried it your way,” said Suzanne Spiegel, an activist with anti-fracking group Colorado Rising. “We tried to be polite, and yet you haven’t denied a single permit.”

Demonstrators donned breathing masks, coughed over speakers who defended the oil and gas industry and displayed signs calling attention to the “F” rating given to the Denver metro area’s air quality by the American Lung Association. Oil and gas sites are known emitters of ozone-forming pollutants like nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds, and studies have shown that industry facilities along the Front Range are among the top contributors to the region’s elevated ozone levels, accounting for nearly half of the region’s local ozone production.

As protests began, Dan Gibbs, the director of the state’s Department of Natural Resources, which oversees the COGCC, called a recess that lasted about twenty minutes. A security guard was present as the hearing resumed, and two Denver police officers were stationed inside the meeting room shortly afterward.

Gibbs repeatedly asked demonstrators to quiet down and be respectful of all speakers, and at one point objected to what he called the “intimidation” of industry proponents. “I don’t think that’s the Colorado way,” he said.

Following the end of the public comment period, activists again disrupted the meeting, spreading out across the room to hold up banners and chant protest slogans. “No more fracking, no more oil, keep the carbon in the soil,” activists chanted as Gibbs called another recess and most commissioners filed out of the room.

As they have since the passage of Senate Bill 181 (the oil and gas reform legislation signed into law by Governor Jared Polis in May), activists urged commissioners to impose a moratorium on new drilling permits until the law is fully implemented, and argued that continued fossil fuel development is incompatible with the state’s commitment to fighting climate change.

Deborah McNamara, an activist with 350 Colorado, pointed commissioners to the most recent report issued by the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which warned that the world must cut greenhouse gas emissions nearly in half by 2030 to keep warming below catastrophic levels. “The most reasonable response to this information, for this commission, would be to do exactly what is recommended: rapidly phase out CO2 emissions,” McNamara said.

Over 90 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions are the result of the combustion of fossil fuels like oil and natural gas, the production of both of which has soared in Colorado over the past two decades. State officials, like their counterparts in many other governments around the world, have enacted a slate of so-called demand-side energy policies that seek to reduce the need for fossil fuels by incentivizing new renewable electricity generation and the electrification of transportation, heating and other sectors. But many activists with groups like 350 Colorado believe that these demand-side policies should be accompanied by tougher restrictions on the supply of fossil fuels, enacted by bodies like the COGCC.

“This should be front and center on all decision-making processes,” McNamara said. “You should ensure that you have an immediate short-term as well as a long-term plan to rapidly transition away from oil and gas in our state, and toward a renewable energy infrastructure.”

Activists departed Wednesday’s hearing after their brief demonstration, leaving commissioners to work through an agenda full of other agency business, including the finalization of the “500 Series” rulemaking that represents the first major regulatory change of the post-SB 181 era. But the next scheduled hearing is just three weeks away, and Wednesday is unlikely to be the last time the commission hears from Coloradans opposed to oil and gas drilling.

“Many of the people in this room today have been coming to meetings for ten years,” says Spiegel. “And what we’ve seen is that nothing changes. So we have to try something different, because our communities are on the line, our air is on the line, and we know that the future of our planet is on the line. We’ve tried being polite, and now we’re committed to getting their attention.”

MVP pipeline has violations and court challenges

From an Article by Laurence Hammack, Roanoke Times, May 14, 2019

Developers of the Mountain Valley Pipeline have agreed to pay a fine of nearly $266,000 for violating environmental regulations in West Virginia.

The agreement, outlined in a consent order from the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection, marks the first financial penalty for problems with storm water runoff caused by building a 303-mile pipeline that will also cross the New River and Roanoke valleys.

Photographs included in the 179-page document show a “drastic change” in streams since work on the buried pipeline began last winter, said Angie Rosser, executive director of the West Virginia Rivers Coalition. “These are clear-running streams and they have been forever,” Rosser said. “And you look at the photos now and they are just brown.”

Mountain Valley faces similar issues in Virginia. A lawsuit filed in December by the Department of Environmental Quality alleges more than 300 violations of erosion and sediment control measures. Online court records indicate the case is still pending.

In West Virginia, 26 notices of violation filed from April to November of last year were resolved by the consent order.

The agreement, signed May 6 by Robert Cooper, Mountain Valley’s senior vice president for engineering and construction, states the company will pay a fine of $265,972 and submit a plan of corrective action to state regulators.

A public comment period on the agreement runs through June 20.

Most of the violations “were the result of unprecedented rainfall throughout the spring and summer of 2018,” Mountain Valley spokeswoman Natalie Cox wrote in an email.

“MVP appreciates the oversight of the WVDEP and the MVP team will continue to work closely with project inspectors to maintain its high standards of safety and environmental stewardship,” the email said.

The $4.6 billion project is still scheduled for completion by late this year, Cox wrote. However, at least two members of the five-partner venture have said in recent financial reports that a delay is likely, considering legal challenges that led to suspended permits.

Rosser said the fine, which represents well less than 1% of the project’s cost, is unlikely to lead to significant change. “The concern is that paying the fine is cheaper than doing it right in the first place,” she said.

Mountain Valley and other pipelines being built in West Virginia have all encountered the same problems, Rosser said, and it’s becoming apparent that state-approved plans to control erosion are not working.

“It’s a lot of erosion and a lot of sediment that doesn’t belong in our streams,” she said. “Looking at the photos, you just can’t deny that these pipelines affect water quality.”

Critics say the worst pollution will come when crews begin to run the 42-inch diameter pipe through streams and wetlands. Water body crossings have been on hold since October, when the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a permit issued by the Army Corps of Engineers.

Mountain Valley hopes to obtain new permits from the Corps later this year.

But the project must also get renewed approval to cross through the Jefferson National Forest — a process that was complicated by a separate opinion from the 4th Circuit that invalidated a U.S. Forest Service approval for the crossing of the Appalachian Trail by a similar project, the Atlantic Coast Pipeline.

About two-thirds of the pipeline, which will transport natural gas from the Marcellus and Utica deposits to a pipeline in Pittsylvania County, is in West Virginia, where problems with construction were first documented by state regulators.

The consent order from West Virginia documents a variety of improper steps taken by Mountain Valley to control erosion. Sediment-laden water often left the construction sites and made its way into nearby streams and rivers, the order states.

Other violations included a failure to clean debris from adjacent public and private roads, a lack of temporary stabilization of areas where construction was dormant for more than 21 days, and no reseeding of denuded areas where vegetation had failed to take root after 30 days.

In a written defense to the lawsuit claiming regulation violations in Virginia, lawyers for the company blamed the problems on “extraordinary, high-intensity storm events and flooding beyond MVP’s control.”

They also wrote that the company would be willing to settle the Virginia case.