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KY Court Decision Goes Against Pipelines re Eminent Domain

In December of 2013, a group of people opposed to the Bluegrass natural gas liquids (NGL) pipeline in Kentucky called KURE (Kentuckians United to Restrain Eminent Domain) sued the Bluegrass, a joint venture of Williams and Boardwalk Pipeline Partners, to prevent them from using eminent domain (see Bluegrass NGL Pipeline’s Eminent Domain Challenged in KY Court). The argument was that the NGLs flowing through the pipeline just pass through Kentucky and don’t benefit local Kentuckians, therefore the pipeline has no right to use the state’s eminent domain law to force landowners to accept the pipeline. That is, it’s not a permitted utility under the definition of the law. In March 2014, a circuit court judge agreed with KURE and told Bluegrass they could not use eminent domain (see Judge Rules Bluegrass Pipeline Cannot Use Eminent Domain in KY). That takes a pretty big stick away from the Bluegrass in their fight to lay the pipeline. Not long after the judge’s decision Williams gave up on the project, although Boardwalk didn’t (see Williams Stops Work on Bluegrass Pipeline, Boardwalk Says “It’s Not Dead”). The circuit court judge’s decision was appealed, and last week the Kentucky Court of Appeals upheld the previous no-eminent domain decision. This new decision has implications for the Bluegrass to be sure, but it has even more implications for an active project now under way by Kinder Morgan…
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Lunacy: NH Group Votes Against Pipeline Because of Global Warming

It’s maddening. It makes one want to scream, “You idiots! Can’t you see the utter hypocrisy?” But it happens more than we’d like to admit. A group of “volunteers” who advise the Select Board in the New Hampshire community of Wilton have unanimously voted to oppose Kinder Morgan’s proposed expansion of the Tennessee Gas Pipeline that would run through Hillsborough County. The reason they oppose it? Natural gas is not a “renewable” energy source. They don’t oppose it because pipelines are unsafe or in any way threaten the environment. Nope. They oppose it because they cling to the belief that mankind is causing catastrophic global warming by using fossil fuels. Meanwhile, everything in their lives is made possible by the very fossil fuels they profess to loathe. And they don’t see it–don’t understand it–don’t seem to comprehend it. We want to point out that, in their own words, they voted against support for the pipeline because they are prejudiced against fossil fuel energy and they seek to deny everyone else the option of using it…
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Richard Kinder: Northeast Energy Direct to Proceed Later This Yr

Richard Kinger, CEO of the country’s largest midstream company, Kinder Morgan, went on CNBC on Wednesday to chat about the price of oil and its “sweet spot” and other things. It was Kinder’s Kinder’s comments on his company’s future plans for the Marcellus/Utica region that most interested MDN. Topic A was Kinder’s plans to run an extension of the Tennessee Gas Pipeline into New England, the Northeast Energy Direct project (NED). Kinder said that project is very close to critical mass and should launch later this year, provided FERC approves it…
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Kinder Morgan Hops on the Pipeline Payola Bandwagon in NEPA

Look–we’ve written about this before and we’re not going to belabor the point–about pipeline companies using payola to buy support for the pipelines they plan to build through communities. The Constitution Pipeline did it last March in New York (see Constitution Pipeline Payments to Groups – Donations or Payola?). PennEast recently did it this March in southeast Pennsylvania and New Jersey (see PennEast Payola? Buying Support One Community at a Time). Now it’s Kinder Morgan’s turn. KM handed out checks this week in Wayne, Susquehanna, Pike and Luzerne counties in northeastern PA. It’s amazing how much good press, and good will, a $10,000 donation can buy you–especially when you give it to a school…
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AP Takes Swipe at NED Pipeline over Export Issue, MDN Responds

Once again the AP attempts to make a case against Kinder Morgan’s Northeast Energy Direct (NED) pipeline project that would stretch from Pennsylvania through New York (following the Constitution Pipeline’s route) and into Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and back into Massachusetts near Boston. NED is a huge $6 billion project that will provide jobs for thousands (while it’s constructed) and abundant, cheap Marcellus Shale gas for New Englanders, saving them on the order of $1 billion per year on utility bills for decades to come. But irrational hatred of fossil fuels continues to rein in liberal New England, where many oppose the project (see Deerfield, MA Hoping Kinder Morgan Sues Them over Pipeline “Ban”). The AP has taken up the “most of the gas flowing through the pipeline will get exported” argument, in an effort to stop the pipeline (so much for unbiased “reporting”). Exported where and how? Via one of five planned LNG export facilities in Canada, four of them in Nova Scotia. Just one little problem there AP, it looks very doubtful that any of those plants will actually get built (see Moody’s: “Vast Majority” of LNG Export Projects Will be Canceled). That kind of takes the wind out of the “it’ll all get exported” argument, eh? But let’s assume at least one of those LNG export plants does get built…
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Power Lines and Pipeline Corrosion – A Quick MDN Primer

MDN told you yesterday about a story in the anti-drilling Albany Times Union newspaper that seeks to spread FUD–fear, uncertainty and doubt–about the proposed Kinder Morgan Northeast Extension Direct pipeline (see Albany Times Union Says Electric Lines will Corrode NED Pipeline). The meme trying to be spread by the TU is that if Kinder moves forward with a plan to co-locate the pipeline along miles and miles of high voltage power line corridors, the power lines will eat away the pipeline and turn it into a ticking time bomb that will one day explode. That’s our words, not the TU’s words, but that’s clearly the impression the TU reporter attempts to convey in the article. We poked fun at the notion that electric lines corrode pipelines. However, it does happen! No less than three sharp MDN readers, one of them from the federal government, emailed with information about the phenomenon of pipeline corrosion from AC power lines. The upshot is that a) this is a known issue, b) there are ways to safely mitigate any potential corrosion from AC power lines, and c) pipelines have been co-located along power line corridors for decades–safely…
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Albany Times Union Says Electric Lines will Corrode NED Pipeline

In an effort to bend over backwards, forwards and in any direction that will help, Kinder Morgan continues to have multiple talks with multiple communities in an effort to build their $6 billion extension to the Tennessee Gas Pipeline, a project called Northeast Energy Direct (NED). The pipeline would stretch from New York State through Massachusetts into New Hampshire before re-entering Massachusetts and terminating near Boston. It aims to bring desperately needed natural gas to New England. Yesterday we told you about the gutsy move by a local gas utility in MA that said if the pipeline isn’t built, no gas new customers (and no new gas appliances for existing gas customers) would be allowed–indefinitely (see Guts: No New Pipeline in MA? Then No New Natgas for Utility Customers). One of the ways Kinder hopes to minimize the project’s impact is by running the pipeline through existing rights of way where electric power lines are run. But ninny nanny anti-drillers have a counter argument even for that. Get this (it’s really quite funny): The anti-drilling Albany Times Union is reporting that the presence of power lines way up in the air will corrode pipelines deep under ground–so say “numerous scientific studies.” The TU refers to just one such study, written for Israel (not even a North American study). We’d say the TU is diggin’ deep in their propaganda advocacy to prevent shale drilling and pipelines…
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Does New England Really Need a New Natgas Pipeline?

Don’t look now, but we actually read a pretty fair and balanced report on pipelines to New England…published by PBS! We predict a reporter who will soon be out of a job. The article (which we quote from below) frames up the arguments against and for new natural gas pipelines coming to New England this way: Those against say electric generation that requires natgas really only demands an extra supply in the dead of winter–typically 30-45 days. Because of that heightened demand, it drives electric prices through the roof because the plants have to buy the gas on the spot market. The rest of the year that kind of intense demand is not there–meaning you’ll spend billions on pipelines to solve a 30-45 day problem. And the rest of the year? Some of that gas will go to Canada and likely get exported. Better to use the existing LNG terminal in Boston and import (!) liquefied natural gas, instead of using cheap, abundant Marcellus gas from a few hundred miles away, and use more LNG at electric generation plants. Those who favor building the pipelines see it differently…
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Kinder Morgan Fails to Sign Up New NED Customers in Last 8 Mos

Yesterday Kinder Morgan announced they have contracts in hand for “anchor” shippers to use 500,000 dekatherms of capacity on the proposed new Northeast Energy Direct (NED) Project. NED, you may recall, is the project that will extend the Tennessee Gas Pipeline from New York through Massachusetts into New Hampshire and back into Massachusetts delivering much-needed natural gas to New England (see Kinder Morgan Changes Route for Pipeline from MA to NH). The project is bitterly opposed by small pockets of anti-drillers–particularly in Deerfield, MA where they’ve illegally attempted to ban it (see Deerfield, MA Hoping Kinder Morgan Sues Them over Pipeline “Ban”). The interesting thing about yesterday’s announcement from Kinder Morgan is that there’s really nothing new in it! Other than the fact that they now have the officially signed agreements in hand. MDN brought you the same news about the same shippers signing up in the original open season last August (see Kinder Signs up New Customers for MA Pipeline, 63% of Capacity). Kinder continues, according to the announcement yesterday, to try and sign up more shippers. So the real news–for us–is that since August, Kinder hasn’t signed up any other new shippers, even though they’ve been trying to…
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Conway MA Offers Lame Excuses to Oppose Tenn Gas Pipeline

If it wasn’t so tragic, it would be funny. Otherwise “intelligent” people in the Massachusetts town of Conway have concocted an ominous “report” on the proposed Kinder Morgan expansion of the existing Tennessee Gas Pipeline through their area. Since there are no real negatives to building the pipeline (it IS a pipeline, it gets buried in the ground never to be seen or heard from again)–they have to invent negatives to oppose it. Here’s how the lie goes: shale gas has a lot of radon in it (it doesn’t), and the gas traveling through the pipeline will be shale gas with radon, and EVERYONE knows those pipelines leak like sieves (it’s a wonder any gas actually makes it to market through those pipelines), and that leaking, nasty, fracked shale gas with radon will leak out and cause cancer. Just one teeny, tiny problem with that particular lie. How do you mitigate radon? Anyone? That’s right: You vent it into the air where it dissipates immediately…
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Anti Groups Beat Export Drum in Opposing MA Pipeline

Anti-fossil fuelers continue to try and make the case that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission should not allow Kinder Morgan to build an extension to the Tennessee Gas Pipeline through Massachusetts, called the Northeast Energy Direct project. Their favorite tactic is to find an issue that they believe will resonate with the general population and push for all it’s worth on that issue–with the gleeful help of mainstream (or “drive-by”) media. The latest wedge issue they’re harping on is that natural gas flowing through the pipe will get exported–implying that none of the gas flowing through the pipeline will benefit New Englanders. We previously dealt with the complex issues behind exporting (see Canadian LNG Exports, New England Pipelines & the Marcellus). Will some of the gas flowing through the TGP pipeline get exported to Canada and liquefied into LNG and exported across the ocean? No doubt. Will most of it get exported? No…
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Mass. Town Sues FERC to Stop Pipeline Claiming Gas is for Export

A bunch of aging New Englanders hippies have no problem whatsoever with the federal Environmental Protection Agency running roughshod all over the Constitution with its edicts that shut down coal-powered electric plants and threaten oil and gas drilling, but the same people turn around and have filed a lawsuit against the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) claiming a law granting FERC the power to regulate pipelines, including pipelines that will flow oil and gas for export, is unconstitutional. That’s real chutzpah. We’ve previously written about the Deerfield, MA Town Health Board and their puffery in presuming to “ban” the Tennessee Gas Pipeline expansion through their town on the basis that some of the gas flowing through it would be exported (see Deerfield, MA Hoping Kinder Morgan Sues Them over Pipeline “Ban”). Deerfield can’t get FERC to sue them, so Deerfield has decided to sue FERC instead…
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Kinder Morgan NE Projects Update – Filing with FERC for Broad Run

Kinder Morgan, the largest midstream company in the U.S., issued a press release yesterday nominally to say they’ve raised the quarterly dividend by 10% or $0.45 per share because they had a great year last year, despite the low price of oil and the gyrations in the market. But as part of that update, if you put on your hip boots on and wade through all of the tiny print, you find some interesting nuggets and updates. For example, we get an important update on their Northeast Energy Direct project–an extension of the Tennessee Gas Pipeline through Massachusetts and New Hampshire. We also learn that Kinder is ready to file with FERC–this month–to move forward with the Broad Run Flexibility and Broad Run Expansion projects that will flow Marcellus and Utica Shale gas from West Virginia to delivery points in Mississippi and Louisiana. All (100%) of the capacity for the the Broad Run pipelines is already spoken for, by Antero Resources…
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Deerfield, MA Hoping Kinder Morgan Sues Them over Pipeline “Ban”

Grasping at straws, a lawyer for Deerfield, Mass. continues to attempt an illegal “ban” on the Tennessee Gas Pipeline and its plans to come through that area (see MA Town Health Board Claims “Unlimited Power” to Stop TGP). The Deerfield Board of Health says most of the gas that will flow through the TGP will be exported. Their proof? They say there’s way more gas that would flow through the pipeline than could be used by New Englanders. And if a single molecule of that gas gets exported, shazam, exporting supports their right to ban it. Yeah, we don’t get quite get the logic either. But let’s back up a step. Deerfield and its zealous lawyer argue from a false premise–that current demand will remain static in New England. Their argument overlooks Obama’s war on coal and his earnest desire to mothball every single coal-generating electric plant on U.S. soil. There are a number of huge coal-generating (and nuclear) electric plants IN NEW ENGLAND that will shut down in the next few years. Would New Englanders welcome rolling blackouts from lack of electricity? Would they enjoy paying 100x the electric rates they pay now? Or might having more natural gas come to the area to convert those coal generating plants to natgas be the wise solution? Deerfield’s attempt to block the TGP overlooks the fact that demand will only increase, dramatically, in the coming years…
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Tenn. Gas Pipeline Fined $800K for Violations, Illegal Dump Sites

Seems that the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) has been busy clearing up outstanding cases of violations by both drillers and pipeline companies. In addition to a stiff $1 million fine against Vantage Energy yesterday (see our companion story), the DEP fined the Tennessee Gas Pipeline (TGP) $800,000 for violations in four different counties during pipeline construction for the 300 Line Project. TGP will pay a penalty of $210,000 and will fund a $540,000 clean-up program of illegal dumpsites in Pike, Potter, Susquehanna and Wayne counties. The details…
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More Marcellus Gas Going to Cheniere LNG Export Facility in TX?

Earlier this week Kinder Morgan signed a new 15-year agreement with Cheniere to supply Cheniere’s Sabin Pass LNG export facility near Corpus Christi, Texas. One of the pipelines that will deliver the gas is Kinder’s Tennesses Gas Pipeline. Although the press release doesn’t say so, we believe at least some of the gas that Kinder will provide to Cheniere via the TGP will be Marcellus Shale gas…
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