Rover Pressuring FERC to Approve Final 2 Laterals ASAP
In a respectful, but strongly worded letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), Energy Transfer Partners’ Rover Pipeline asks FERC to (our words) get off its rear-end and approve the Burgettstown and Majorsville laterals. The two laterals, or off-shoots of the pipeline system, both reach into western Pennsylvania and are (from what we can tell) the final two pieces of the Rover pipeline that are not yet online. Rover asked FERC to approve the two laterals, along with other portions of the pipeline, by June 1st, in a letter dated May 24th. FERC did approve some items on the list, but not the two laterals (see M-U Gas Now Travels to Dawn Hub in Canada via Rover Pipeline). In a June 21 letter (read it below) Rover then asked FERC to approve the two laterals by June 25, this past Monday. That date came and went with no approvals. Rover said in its letter: “significant volumes of natural gas have been unable to flow on pipeline facilities that have been completed for nearly a month.” You can feel the frustration when reading the letter. So what, exactly, is the holdup anyway?…
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Spectra Energy’s Algonquin Incremental Market (AIM) pipeline project is an $876 million expansion of the existing Algonquin pipeline system designed to carry 342 million cubic feet of natural gas per day to New England states that badly need the gas. On March 3, 2015 the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued their final approval for the project, allowing it to go forward. Construction began in 2015 and, following extreme opposition from New York State over a small portion of the project, it finally went online in in 2016. New York’s radical, anti-drilling governor, Andy Cuomo, tried to stop the Algonquin using the flimsy excuse that some of the drilling for the pipeline would happen a half mile from a nuclear power plant–a plant that’s shutting down anyway (see 
The radicals of Food & Water Watch (FWW), a disgusting organization, have done us all a huge favor! FWW is composed of some of the worst of the worst when it comes to anti-fossil fuel nuttery. They oppose everything, including low-carbon natural gas, if it’s called a fossil fuel. FWW issued a new “report” last week taking aim at the growing number of Marcellus gas-fired electric plants sprouting up around the state, replacing dirtier coal-fired plants. Only in the mind of a demented liberal is coal better for the environment than natgas. But we digress. FWW’s report is called “Pernicious Placement of Pennsylvania Power Plants: Natural Gas-Fired Power Plant Boom Reinforces Environmental Injustice.” Those alliterations are just ingenious, aren’t they? As part of the report, FWW published a comprehensive list of 48 planned, under construction, or recently commissioned gas-fired power plant projects in the Keystone State. Wow! What a great list! We’ve extracted the list itself and shared it below (so you don’t have to endure the full report). The focus of the report is the baseless charge FWW (and others) make that new power plant projects are built in poor, black areas–where the downtrodden can’t fight back against the machine that is Big Oil/Gas. FWW includes a map (see it below) that charts where “communities of color” (meaning concentrations of black people) live in the state, along with dots that show where existing and planned gas-fired plants are located. Take a look at the dots for planned plants. Almost none of them are near “communities of color!” Whoops. Some intern wasn’t paying attention when she drafted the report…
The lawyers that infest the Sierra Club are still celebrating a temporary court victory last week that essentially stops construction of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) in West Virginia (see 
Appalachian Mountain Advocates, a far-left, radical anti-drilling organization that some media outlets refer to as a simple “nonprofit law firm,” has filed a lawsuit against West Virginia University to force the university to hand over privileged and secret communications concerning the deal WV struck with China to invest $83.7 billion in the state, in the shale and petrochemical industries. As you may recall, that deal was announced last November (see 
Last December the Trump Dept. of Energy published a 45-page report called, “Natural Gas Liquids Primer: With a Focus on the Appalachian Region” (see 
We have long thought (and written) that to concede the argument that renewable energy–wind and solar–is some sort of nirvana, a magical destination, that renewables are our inevitable energy future–is a mistake. To box ourselves in by buying into the argument that natural gas is a “bridge” to get us lower carbon emissions until renewable heaven arrives is faulty thinking. And now, none other than the CEO of BP is saying the same thing. Not in quite the same words we’ve used, but certainly the same sentiment. BP still bows to the alter of man-made global warming nonsense. But at least they have the guts to say, out loud, that natural gas itself is good enough–the “destination” as a fuel, and not simply a “bridge” to renewables. BP CEO Bob Dudley said that this week on a panel at the World Gas Conference in Washington, D.C. On the same panel, French oil giant Total CEO, Patrick Pouyanne, said, “This idea of natural gas as a transition fuel to renewables is strange.” Yes! Finally some clear thinkers willing to stand up for fossil fuels! We need more people to stand up and shout, “The renewables Emperor has no clothes!”…
The “best of the rest”–stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading: Decade of study shows PA’s environment, shale drilling can coexist; natgas execs see 100 years of supply; natgas will figure big in pared-down GE’s future; Rick Perry says “stubborn opposition” to fossil fuels keeps billions in poverty; power plant emissions continue to fall thx to natgas; protesters ineffective in stopping pipelines; Panama Canal drops LNG transit restrictions; China trucking LNG to overcome lack of pipelines; natgas costs rising in Canada where fracking is banned; and more!