Tag Archives: Sabal Trail Transmission

Canadian natives reject $1 billion offer from fossil fuel company: environment more important

A fossil fuel company can make a real financial offer when it wants to, not just the pocket change people in the U.S. southeast are being offered for easements for the Sabal Trail or Palmetto pipelines. And no offer is enough to outweigh the environmental damage, was the unanimous vote of a Canadian native group about a competitor of Spectra Energy.

Brent Jang, Globe and Mail, 8 May 2015, Environment dwarfs financial merit in LNG deal for B.C. First Nations,

For the Lax Kw’alaams in British Columbia, Thursday’s decision turned out to be simple — the environmental risks of a massive liquefied natural gas project far outweighed the financial rewards.

In the second stage of three votes, Continue reading Canadian natives reject $1 billion offer from fossil fuel company: environment more important

Massive opposition to KMI Palmetto Pipeline in Waynesboro + Sabal Trail

Most of the 400 people at the final Georgia Department of Transportation hearing vehemently opposed Kinder Morgan’s Palmetto petroleum products Pipeline. There’s still time to ask GDOT to deny the Palmetto permit. Now is the time also to ask GDOT to deny any permits for the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline, and for Georgia Governor Nathan Deal and Lieutenant Governor Casey Cagle to oppose Sabal Trail like they just said they oppose the Palmetto Project.

That’s SpectraBusters ally Gretchen Elsner of the Georgia Climate Coalition on the Friday front page of the Savannah Morning News, Clapping in the blue shirt is Continue reading Massive opposition to KMI Palmetto Pipeline in Waynesboro + Sabal Trail

GA Gov. says state opposes KMI’s Palmetto Pipeline

Congratulations to Push Back the Pipeline for this victory!

Party in Waynesboro tonight! Georgia Governor Nathan Deal today said the state and GDOT oppose Kinder Morgan’s Palmetto Project, and will take it to the courts if necessary. Come to the GDOT Hearing in Waynesboro anyway, as a victory party. And if Georgia objects to KMI’s Palmetto pipeline, Georgia should object to Spectra’s Sabal Trail pipeline.

WRDW, 7 May 2015, Georgia’s Governor says the state is against pipeline project,

“We’re going to object from the state level and I think that process will then go to the courts for a judge to decide,” Gov. Deal said.

“We’ve been in consultation with Continue reading GA Gov. says state opposes KMI’s Palmetto Pipeline

Kinder Morgan FERC filing to ship fracked methane to Jacksonville

The pipeline companies are in cahoots to export through all our lands. 300x194 Exhibit F: Compressors and loops; Suwannee, Columbia, and Bradford Counties, Florida, in Jacksonville Expansion Project, by FGT, for SpectraBusters.org, 31 March 2015 Beware especially Suwannee, Columbia, Bradford, and Clay Counties, Florida. Beware Atlantic coastal Georgia, the same Kinder Morgan (KMI) of the Palmetto petroleum products Project to Jacksonville wants to push fracked methane to Jacksonville, apparently for export. Beware Alabama, Georgia, and Florida on the proposed path of Sabal Trail: This new Florida project could ship Sabal Trail fracked methane to Jaxport for LNG export.

In March 2014 TECO Peoples Gas announced intention to ship fracked methane to Jacksonville, which the Jacksonville Business Journal interpreted as for export, since Continue reading Kinder Morgan FERC filing to ship fracked methane to Jacksonville

Duke Energy buys into Sabal Trail

Are Spectra and FPL running short on money so they have to take on a new investor? Has the opposition cost them $225 million already?

The AP story includes two misconceptions. After protests continuing into this year, a criminal trespass lawsuit against Sabal Trail, and multiple parties filing amicus briefs, this is all AP remembers:

The pipeline drew protests from southwest Georgia residents last year, who said they do not want a pollution-emitting compression station near their homes.

And despite Sabal Trail’s continued failure to demonstrate need, AP repeats this old canard:

Currently there are only two major pipelines that deliver natural gas to Florida. Both are nearing capacity.

Not if the Sunshine State gets on with solar power, like even the most corrupt state (Georgia) is doing.

Interestingly, there’s no press release from any of Sabal Trail, Spectra, NextEra, or FPL about this, but there’s this obviously slanted Duke Energy PR, 5 May 2015, Duke Energy buys 7.5% of previously announced Sabal Trail pipeline that will meet growing need for natural gas in Southeast U.S., Continue reading Duke Energy buys into Sabal Trail

Kinder Morgan campaign contributions to GA Gov. Deal and Lt. Gov. Cagle

Kinder Morgan contributed to the campaigns of Georgia Governor Nathan Deal and Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, and to numerous other elected officials, similar to Spectra Energy PAC and many other pipeline companies or associated political action committees. Could this have something to do with how Georgia state officials are not being very helpful to the citizens who overwhelmingly oppose both Kinder Morgan’s proposed Palmetto petroleum products pipeline through eastern Georgia and Spectra’s proposed Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline through southwest Georgia? Could it explain why the Georgia government seems to be treating both pipelines as if they were public-private partnerships with the state?

Searching Georgia Campaign Finance Commission campaign records show Kinder Morgan (KMI) subsidiary Southern Natural Gas (SONAT) contributed to a whole bunch of people, including Casey Cagle: Continue reading Kinder Morgan campaign contributions to GA Gov. Deal and Lt. Gov. Cagle

Why Georgia Doesn’t Need the Palmetto Pipeline –Poets Love Birds

The Suwannee River faces invasion by both Kinder Morgan’s Palmetto petroleum products pipeline and Spectra Energy’s Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline. Plus the Savannah, Ogeechee, Altamaha, Satilla, and St. Mary’s River are threatened by the Palmetto Project, Chattahoochee, Flint, Withlacoochee, and Santa Fe Rivers are threatened by Sabal Trail, plus most both projects is above the fragile Floridan Aquifer. All for no known local benefit; just to profit corporate greed.

Curtis and Norma Beaird, Poets Love Birds, 30 April 2015, Why Georgia Doesn’t Need the Palmetto Pipeline: Our Filing to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC),

We are writing this article because we are very concerned about the proposed Palmetto Pipeline to be built in the state of Georgia. Kinder Morgan plans to build 360-mile pipeline that will run from Belton, South Carolina to Jacksonville, Florida. According to the Savannah Riverkeeper, 218 miles of the pipeline will be in Georgia and 142 miles of the pipeline will be built in South Carolina. This pipeline would move refined petroleum products, to include denatured fuel ethanol. …

According to Push Back the Pipeline:

In the continental U.S., there are only 42 free-flowing rivers greater than 124 miles in length. Georgia contains five of these rivers, three of which are in the path of the proposed pipeline, Altamaha, Ogeechee, and Satilla Rivers. The Okefenokee Swamp is also the headwaters of the St. Marys and the Suwanee River, which flows to the Gulf of Mexico.

Georgia also contains most of the free-flowing 205-mile Alapaha River, which fortunately isn’t currently the target of any pipeline. However, Spectra Energy proposes to gouge its Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline under the 115-mile Withlacoochee River in Georgia. And Sabal Trail would cross the Suwannee River in Florida, so the Suwannee is a target of both pipelines: Palmetto in Georgia, and Sabal Trail in Florida.

Here’s Curtis Beaird’s FERC filing, which notes that Kinder Morgan has not proven any need Continue reading Why Georgia Doesn’t Need the Palmetto Pipeline –Poets Love Birds

Video dramatization of landowner receiving Sabal Trail eminent domain threatening letter

Lowndes County citizen Larry Rodgers received this letter from Sabal Trail as dramatized in this video, which also contains many “Pipeline? No!” signs with spectrabusters.org on them, thanks to WACE. That letter and a response by Larry Rodgers’ attorney Bill Langdale are included with the SpectraBusters letter to the judge in Leesburg, GA, where Sabal Trail is demanding eminent domain authority against other landowners, and those landowners are countersuing for criminal trespass. Continue reading Video dramatization of landowner receiving Sabal Trail eminent domain threatening letter

Georgia has no use for new pipelines –AJC

Four pipeline projects surround Atlanta, and Georgia’s governor won’t comment. Spectra’s Andrea Grover did, though, saying the Albany compressor station would be no louder than “a modern-day dishwasher.”

Dan Chapman, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 3 April 2015, Pipeline project fuels fight on state’s future,

VALDOSTA — Southwest Georgia is roiling mad over a proposed gas pipeline to Florida that virtually nobody in Atlanta, except Ted Turner, has heard about.


John Carlton looks over a gopher tortoise hole a few feet away from a 1954 easement for an 8 inch natural gas line on his property at Morrison Pines Plantation in Moultrie. The planned Sabel Trail pipeline would run 50 feet over from the existing line. Carlton is undecided on the proposal.
Photograph credit: Curtis Compton, AJC

Electric Power & Light has more of the text: Continue reading Georgia has no use for new pipelines –AJC

Grasping at semicolons: Sabal Trail fail in Leesburg

Semicolons and disjunctive ands vs. propaganda, subterfuge, and fraud yesterday in Leesburg, GA, and evidentiary briefs will be received by the judge over the next 20 days.

300x225 Attorneys preparing for hearing, in Grasping at semicolons: Sabal Trail fail in Leesburg, by John S. Quarterman, for SpectraBusters.org, 24 March 2015 After patiently listening to Spectra attorneys detail how a 1920s version of Georgia pipeline eminent domain law had a semicolon that they claimed separated “in the State of Georgia” from their pipeline, Judge Smith later remarked that the legislature passing a bill that removed the semicolon could be used to infer that they intended to remove the semicolon. Sabal Trail also tried to argue that the “and” in the same sentence was a disjunctive that similarly separated. The judge seemed more interested in the basic question: does Sabal Trail provide gas to customers within the State of Georgia?

The landowners’ attorney made it even more interesting, referring to Continue reading Grasping at semicolons: Sabal Trail fail in Leesburg