Antis Want FERC to Use Communism Instead of Capitalism
A general warning and heads-up on the newest/latest attack in the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Well, maybe it's not all that new--it's been going on for a few years--but the intensity and pace of the attacks have picked up. We're talking about the argument being made by anti fossil-fuelers that FERC doesn't, by law, consider all pipelines when it evaluates a single pipeline--i.e. "cumulative effects." For example, if three different pipeline requests for the same region are filed with FERC, FERC does not have the authority to decide only one of the three is really "needed" and that building all three would be "overbuilding." FERC evaluates them one by one and (properly so) and lets the free market (i.e. capitalism) decide which one(s) will get built. FERC is not in the business of Communistic command-and-control decisions over private companies. FERC's concern is that a given, single pipeline project doesn't harm the environment and shows a need. Period. Antis, detecting an opportunity, want to force FERC, either by social pressure or by the courts, to take into consideration larger regional concerns--and even mythical global warming concerns--before making decisions. Here's the latest example, from Virginia...
To view this content, log into your member account. (Not a member? Join Today!)