PA Landowner Threatens to Go Up a Tree (Again) to Stop Pipeline
Elise Gerhart has been up a tree before. You may recall our story about Elise, daughter of a Huntingdon County, PA landowner, radicalized by Big Green groups (as evidenced by her association with well known protesters previously arrested), who took to a tree on her mom’s property in order to illegally stop crews working on tree clearing for the Mariner East 2 pipeline (see PA Anti Literally Goes Up a Tree to Stop Mariner East 2 Pipeline). It ultimately didn’t matter, because Sunoco came back and cut down the few trees they need to cut anyway (see Sunoco Tricks Radicalized Protester – Returns and Cuts More Trees). Eventually law enforcement got around to arresting the daughter, and the mom (who also trespassed during tree clearing). Law enforcement also arrested a serial criminal trespasser/anti who aided and radicalized them. Unfortunately, in a miscarriage of justice, the charges against all three were dropped (see Charges Dismissed Against Tree Sitting Anti in Huntingdon County). That oversight will come back to bite law enforcement, because Elise plans to go up a tree again. Or maybe, since the trees are already cut down, she plans to chain herself to a bulldozer. Who knows. One thing is for sure: Ms. Gerhart and her mom are planning to get themselves arrested when the bulldozers show up to begin digging a trench on the Gerhart’s land… Read More “PA Landowner Threatens to Go Up a Tree (Again) to Stop Pipeline”

This one has us spitting nails. We have reported, for months, about the activities of so-called protesters against Williams’ $3 billion Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline project. In particular, there is a group in Lancaster County, PA opposing the pipeline creatively called Lancaster Against Pipelines (LAP). Some of their members previously attended and participated in protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline in Standing Rock, ND–protests that turned violent and destroyed millions of dollars in equipment (see 
The City of Green, Ohio, located in Summit County (south of Akron, north of Canton) seems to have no problems with spending boatloads of taxpayer money on anti-pipeline efforts. A few weeks ago Green City Council voted to give $10,000 to the anti-pipeline CORN–Coalition to Reroute Nexus. We call the group CORNballs and have written extensively about their supposed desire to just see the NEXUS pipeline routed around them, pretending to be NIMBYs (
In June 2014, MDN told you about the Dominion New Market Project–a project that will build two new compressor plants and upgrade one other compressor station in upstate New York–to help flow more abundant, cheap and clean-burning Marcellus Shale gas from Pennsylvania (and beyond) into the northeast (see
After 10 long years, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) auctioned 719 acres in Ohio’s Wayne National Forest (WNF) last December (see
We live in a country of laws, governed by “the rule of law.” That means we elect people to pass laws, and then we collectively live under those laws–whether we like them or not. If we don’t like the laws, we vote in new representatives to change the laws. Or we challenge the laws in court. But what if those laws become tyrannical? Our founding fathers, like Thomas Jefferson, said a little revolution every now and again isn’t a bad thing and may be necessary. There is a small but well-funded group of radical environmentalists who apparently believe the time has come for revolution. Their motivation is an irrational hatred of fossil fuels, operating under the wrong belief that by burning fossil fuels mankind is doomed. That belief motivates them to use (and abuse) the court system to try and block any and all drilling and pipeline projects. And when the courts don’t decide a case their way? They threaten revolution. They call it “peaceful protest”–but we’ve seen what they mean by that (see
Looks like Middletown Township, in Delaware County, PA (Philadelphia suburb), has finally faced reality that the Mariner East 2 Pipeline is coming through town. To be fair, town council came to that conclusion last September when they voted to grant easements to Sunoco Logistics Partners to build Mariner East 2 across four parcels of public land (see
Talk about a waste of taxpayer time and money. The so-called leaders of Newtown Township in Bucks County (Philadelphia orbit) took time out to compose, debate, and pass a resolution opposing the PennEast Pipeline. Even though the pipeline isn’t coming anywhere near Newtown Township. What the vote reveals is that Newtown is led by far-left anti-fossil fuelers with nothing better to do than get on their soapbox and prance around discussing issues that don’t affect the residents of the town. Typical leftist politicians that believe they know better than you what’s best for you–even if it doesn’t even affect you…
It’s finally come to this. There is one anti-fossil fueler who sent a letter to the editor of a Colorado newspaper–the Boulder Daily Camera–that says antis “have a moral responsibility to blow up wells and eliminate fracking and workers.” In a followup interview, the same anti said, “I wouldn’t have a problem with a sniper shooting one of the workers” at a drilling site. Have we not warned you that anti-fossil fuel lunacy has finally tipped over into violence? Did we not point out the mob in North Dakota that destroyed millions of dollars in equipment, burned tires, and shot at police–is planning to spread their sedition to places like the Marcellus/Utica (see
MDN friend Tom Shepstone has long pointed out the incestuous connection between THE Delaware Riverkeeper and the William Penn Foundation. William Penn is a nonprofit that, according to its nonprofit charter, cannot use its considerable wealth to engage in political activities. So like an organized crime ring, William Penn uses Riverkeeper as the front organization to do its dirty work–investing millions in the Riverkeeper to carry out its (William Penn’s) radical environmental agenda. All at an arm’s length–to protect William Penn’s tax exempt status (hello IRS and PA Attorney General’s office, are you reading this?). It is a thinly-veiled shell game of money changing hands. The William Penn/Riverkeeper shell game is exposed in a recent article in the Washington Examiner…
In November 2015, MDN told you about Pilgrim Pipeline Holdings, developing an East Coast pipeline to carry refined petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel, heating oil, and jet and aviation fuel northbound from Linden, New Jersey to Albany, New York (178 miles). In addition, a second Pilgrim pipeline will carry crude oil from Albany south to NJ and other locations. Two pipelines, side by side, different liquids flowing through them in different directions (see
Researchers from the Department of Ecosystem Science and Management at Penn State have just published a new study/paper in the Journal of Environmental Management titled, “Linear infrastructure drives habitat conversion and forest fragmentation associated with Marcellus shale gas development in a forested landscape” (abstract below). Their thesis: “Fragmentation of ecologically important core forests within the northern Appalachians — driven by pipeline and access road construction — is the major threat posed by shale-gas development, according to researchers, who recommend a change in infrastructure-siting policies to head off loss of this critical habitat.” This isn’t the first time we’ve heard about the hazards of so-called forest fragmentation. Back in 2013 the U.S. Geological Survey published a meme on it too (see
Yesterday MDN reported that NARUC (National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners), under the watch care of Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) member Rob Powelson, currently the president of NARUC, has launched an effort that tries to help rural (and poor) folks without access to cheap, clean-burning natural gas, get access (see
A report compiled and written by the U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security (unclassified) has turned up in the public. The report, titled “Potential Domestic Terrorist Threats to Multi-State Diamond Pipeline Construction Project” (full copy below), warns about eco-terrorism and the potential for “mass casualties” from radicalized environmentalists who are now targeting the Diamond Pipeline Construction Project, due to run from Cushing, OK to a refinery in Memphis, TN–most of it located in the state of Arkansas. “Law enforcement are assessing what environmental extremists did to disrupt Dakota Access Pipeline – Molotov cocktails, rocks, arson, roadblocks, chaining themselves to equipment, improvised explosive devices, etc – and seeing many of the same activities potentially happening around Diamond pipeline,” according to a police representative. The report sees potential danger on two fronts: radical environmentalists, and anti-government militias that don’t like eminent domain being used to force landowners to accept the pipeline across their land. We’ve previously reported on numerous instances of vandalism against drilling and pipeline operations. It’s good to see the government taking such acts of crime seriously–to the point of labeling it domestic terrorism. Why mention a report about a pipeline nowhere near the Marcellus/Utica? Because bombs, equipment vandalism, shootings and all of the things mentioned in this report have happened here before. And because the nutjobs who were active in engaging in such acts against the Dakota Access Pipeline (now built and flowing oil), have promised to bring their lawlessness to our area (see