Tag Archives: History

Spectra, Duke, NextEra, Williams, all members of ALEC super-lobby group

All the companies behind the Southeast Market Pipelines Project have representatives sitting in those back rooms voting on draft bills on an equal basis with state legislators, according to the latest information publicly availlable. Back in the news a year after an Atlanta TV station reported on an ALEC meeting in Savannah, ALEC is not just for Georgia, every state has legislators in that super-lobbying group, including Florida and Albama, taking those draft bills back to their legislatures and often getting them passed. Now you know why the same bad bills to ban home rule on fracking, to block renwable energy portfolios, to impose a solar tax, and of course to promote fracked methane pipelines, show up at the same times in states all across the country.

Brendan Keefe and Michael King, WXIA-TV, 22 May 2015, Legislators and corporate lobbyists meet in secret at Georgia resort. They found out quite a bit before ALEC had off-duty deputies throw them out of their hotel. Continue reading Spectra, Duke, NextEra, Williams, all members of ALEC super-lobby group

Sabal Trail sues Georgia landowners for federal eminent domain –Atlanta Journal Constitution

Which Houston, Texas pipeline company has sued Ted Turner, Bob Graham, and dozens of other Georgia landowners, including a Georgia Centennial Farm? That’s right, Spectra Energy, as in the Sabal Trail fracked methane boondoggle.

Dan Chapman, AJC, 1 May 2016, South Georgia pipeline fight turns into battle over eminent domain,

A Texas company wants to condemn private property in Georgia for a pipeline to deliver energy to Florida.

Continue reading Sabal Trail sues Georgia landowners for federal eminent domain –Atlanta Journal Constitution

Third Atlanta Journal-Constitution about Sabal Trail and Palmetto Project

Atlanta has heard about Sabal Trail, Palmetto Project, and several other proposed pipeline projects three times now from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It’s time to act.

Greg Bluestein, AJC, Pipeline project fuels anger in Georgia,

Their proposal comes as pipeline projects — and controversy surrounding them — pop up across Georgia. A 157-mile Sabal Trail Pipeline that would cross nine southwest Georgia counties has sparked outrage in Albany and Valdosta. And Atlanta Gas Light wants to begin pumping gas from Coweta County to Dalton by 2017.

But Kinder Morgan’s proposal has struck a throbbing nerve, in part because of the length of the proposed pipeline — the 320-mile route stretches by Augusta, Savannah and Jacksonville — and in part because of the threat of eminent domain hanging over the landowners.

“Where do we draw the line? There are no reset buttons,” Troy Davis, a local landowner, said at one of the town hall meetings that Kinder Morgan called to calm fears about the project. “It will be a Kroger, a CVS, a Burger King that comes to this community and says, ‘Hey, we have a necessity for this.’ ”

That’s why the real solution is for the Georgia legislature to revoke eminent domain for private companies. But the legislature doesn’t meet until January, and we need to stop these pipelines before then.

About Kinder Morgan trespassing 1.7 miles into land owned by Billy Morris, who also owns the newspapers in Augusta and Savannah: Continue reading Third Atlanta Journal-Constitution about Sabal Trail and Palmetto Project

Spectra already lost at FERC once; could also lose at NRC

FERC previously denied a Spectra pipeline, and now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) may prevent one. After three months of asking, John Peconom of FERC divulged how many pipelines FERC had ever denied: two, of which one was for a pipeline from an LNG site in Providence, Rhode Island, proposed by KeySpan LNG, L.P. and Algonquin Gas Transmission LLC, and denied by FERC 5 July 2005. According to Spectra Energy:

Continue reading Spectra already lost at FERC once; could also lose at NRC

Seize the opportunity to end fossil fuels and soar with sun, wind, and water power

The opportunity is here right now, with oil and gas dropping while solar power goes up like a rocket. We can end the century-long domination of fossil fuels and get on with a cleaner, safer, more prosperous world powered by sun, wind, and water. Oh, and pry those clammy oily hands off our political systems while we’re at it. Solar power is going to win anyway. And we have the opportunity to speed that victory fast enough to stop the fracking-junkie pipeline push, including stopping Sabal Trail and the Palmetto Pipeline.

Jon Queally, Commondreams, 25 March 2015, Naomi Klein: Shock of Oil Price Plunge Is Opportunity World Must Seize,

“Sometimes capitalism gives us a gift, and the sudden drop in oil prices is one of them. Think of what we could do, in rolling out renewable energy, for instance. We could take power and wealth generation away from multinationals and put it into the hands of communities. And we could ensure that the jobs paid a living wage and went to the people who need it most. The same goes for our food and transit systems.”

Continue reading Seize the opportunity to end fossil fuels and soar with sun, wind, and water power

Return to Leesburg, GA for Sabal Trail legal hearing against landowners

Last summer Sabal Trail limped away from Leesburg, Georgia without any ruling about eminent domain. They’re heading their pipeline posse back to town this Tuesday, 24 March 2015, for an 11:30 AM hearing on a motion of summary judgment against the same landowners, the Bells. This is an opportunity for pipeline opponents to show up at the hearing or write a letter of support for the Bells. Send your letter here and we’ll probably also publish it.

If you can’t come in person, for letters here is contact information Continue reading Return to Leesburg, GA for Sabal Trail legal hearing against landowners

If eminent domain is hardship to Mineral Interest Owners, it’s hardship to everyone else

If affected salt and other minerals in subsurface caverns are enough to deny a FERC permit, drinking water in the Floridan Aquifer should be, too. 1. Turtle Bayou Resolutions Marker, By Jim Evans, October 13, 2012 The “first formal protest of Texas colonists against Mexican tyranny” was signed at Turtle Bayou, Chambers County, Texas, where an Alabama Company four years ago wanted to store natural gas underground with an associated pipeline that FERC denied. Communities and local governments throughout the Floridan Aquifer have signed protests against fossil fuel company tyranny in the form of the unnecessary, destructive, and hazardous Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline.

FERC denied that permit application for Turtle Bayou Gas Storage Company in 2011; one of only two pipeline applications that FERC’s John Peconom could find that FERC ever denied. The applicant appealed. FERC replied in Dockets CP10-481-002 and CP10-481-000, ORDER DENYING REQUEST FOR REHEARING OR RECONSIDERATION (Issued April 11, 2012), Continue reading If eminent domain is hardship to Mineral Interest Owners, it’s hardship to everyone else

FERC trusts pipeline companies to self-regulate: result…

In one case:

“In the largest penalty in an environmental case since the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, the Connecticut-based Iroquois Pipeline Operating Company will pay $22 million in criminal and civil fines for violating federal environmental and safety laws, the United States announced today [23 May 1996].

The company and four of its high-level officers and supervisors pleaded guilty to numerous criminal violations of the Clean Water Act including failure to clean up or restore damage to nearly 200 streams and wetlands as a result of rushing to meet construction deadlines.”

That’s even larger than the U.S. EPA fine of $15 million in 1989 against Spectra’s Texas Eastern Pipeline for spilling PCBs at 89 sites, although not when you add in the $18.6 million fine by Pennsylvania plus $200 million for cleanup.

Yet Iroquois Gas Transmission System L.P. touts Continue reading FERC trusts pipeline companies to self-regulate: result…

Sabal Trail announced pipe supplier contracts before filing with FERC

Rubberstamp FERC process? Sabal Trail seems to think so, since it announced two contracts with Berg Pipe to manufacture pipe several days before it even formally filed with FERC for a permit, and the winning contractor announced a full week before that filing. Sabal Trail claimed economic benefits for Alabama and Florida, but apparently couldn’t come up any for Georgia. You can contact your local, state, and federal elected and appointed officials about this.

FERC published Sabal Trail’s formal filing 21 November 2015. Earlier that same week, 17 November 2015, Sabal Trail put out two press releases, one each for Alabama and Florida: Continue reading Sabal Trail announced pipe supplier contracts before filing with FERC

Would you buy a used car from Sabal Trail?

Why should we accept any risk from a pipeline company that has repeatedly claimed not to be familiar with the public record of its long list of corrosion, leaks, and explosions? A pipeline company that has claimed land values wouldn’t be affected? That it’s “hard to believe” its own law firm sent threats of eminent domain to landowners, despite copies of those letters being sent to newspapers and FERC? That Georgia counties need its gas, after those same counties had already passed resolutions wanting Sabal Trail’s pipeline out of their county and state? A pipeline company that claims the Sunshine State needs its gas when its own figures show half the acreage could produce just as much solar power? Why should anybody in Albama, Georgia, or Florida accept any risk from that company from Houston, Texas?

Sabal Trail claimed theirs is a safe company and leaks and explosions seldom happen, until confronted on-camera with a list of incidents. Continue reading Would you buy a used car from Sabal Trail?