Eagle’s Nest Latest Wrinkle in Building 7.8 Mile Pipe to NY Power Plant
A bald eagle’s nest built in a pine tree near where a tiny 7.8 mile pipeline is supposed to pass in Orange County, NY is the latest wrinkle that threatens to stop the pipeline in the ongoing soap opera that is corrupt New York State. The pipeline is a short spur, an offshoot, from the nearby Millennium Pipeline. It will feed the Competitive Power Ventures (CPV) gas-fired electric generation plant currently under construction in Wawayanda. The CPV plant is due to be completed early next year. According to Millennium, if they don’t start construction (tree clearing) TODAY, Dec. 6, there is no way to get the pipeline done in time to feed the plant–and that may well drive CPV’s project into bankruptcy. The eagle’s nest is being used as an excuse by New York (and rabid antis) to try and block the pipeline from getting built. Here’s the latest episode in this ongoing soap opera…
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Invenergy is currently building a state-of-the-art, combined cycle 1,480 megawatt Marcellus-fired electric generating plant in Jessup, PA, just outside Scranton. Construction on the plant–called the Lackawanna Energy Center–has been under way for well over a year now. Some 1,200 people are currently working at the site. MDN previously reported that Cabot Oil & Gas with their prolific Susquehanna County production will feed the plant (see 
A few weeks ago a group of environmental Nazis pledged to “swarm” and shut down a SEPTA (Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority) meeting where a vote would be taken to build a Marcellus gas-powered electric plant that would provide electricity to SEPTA’s northern Regional Rail lines–a win/win for all Pennsylvanians (see 
Hey Lancaster Against Pipelines–you might want to rethink your opposition to the Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline that flows fracked Marcellus gas from northeast PA to places like Lancaster. Why? Because you’re own hospital is powered by a new electric plant that uses Marcellus gas to generate electricity. Hospitals are known as “critical infrastructure” in PA–facilities that “deliver essential services and functions during natural disasters, emergency events, or grid outages.” Lancaster General Hospital, critical infrastructure in the Lancaster area, now produces almost all of its own electricity from a new 6.6 megawatt power plant it built right on the hospital campus (gasp!). Lancaster General uses a “combined heat and power” (CHP) system. Here’s the cool part: There are a dozen other hospitals across the Keystone State that already use natgas-powered CHP systems to generate their own electricity too. So tell us again, Lancaster Against Pipelines, how filthy fracked gas is destroying Mom Earth and poisoning the air. Quite the contrary: Natgas and the pipelines that deliver it are saving lives in hospitals across the state, including Lancaster County…
Energy Solutions Consortium, based in Buffalo, NY, has been trying to build a number of gas-fired electric plant projects in West Virginia for years (see 
A class action lawsuit was filed last week by 12 New England power customers who claim that two New England utility companies–Eversource and Avangrid–intentionally manipulated the flow of gas along the Algonquin natural gas pipeline by placing and later withdrawing orders, in order to spike the cost of gas which then spiked the cost of electricity generated by the resulting higher cost gas. It is a convoluted, cockamamie charge first brought by the radical antis at the Environmental Defense Fund (see 
In a companion story today, MDN tells you about a frivolous lawsuit that claims two New England utilities have been manipulating gas flows along the Algonquin Pipeline, by “constraining” those flows (see New England Lawsuit Claims Utilities “Constrained” NatGas Pipeline). It’s bupkis. That is, the utilities are not the ones constraining pipelines in New England. What is constraining New England pipelines is high demand for natural gas–and NOT ENOUGH PIPELINES to flow it–both for end users like residences and business, and major users like electric generating plants. So says the head of the electric grid in New England, Gordon van Welie. Speaking at a recent energy conference in Rhode Island, van Welie said, “regional pipelines were built for gas distribution companies’ heating demands, not for power generation. [van Welie] says they’re at, or near capacity, in winter and generators have to use more expensive fuels, including oil and liquefied natural gas.” van Welie also said, “The gas problem [lack of it] is going to live with us for a long time” because more than 50% of New England’s electric power generation comes from gas-fired plants. What about Big Green favorites, wind and solar? van Welie rained on Big Green’s parade, saying wind and solar can’t replace gas because they’re “intermittent sources of power.” Whoops! Big Green’s bubble just got burst by reality and good old common sense. Here’s more about the meeting, and van Welie’s remarks…
We spotted a rather long and (to us) convoluted article about an experiment a New York City-area utility is conducting. National Grid (electric and gas utility) and their software partner AutoGrid are going to “use the latest demand response technology from the electricity world for natural gas.” That is, they are going to use software hooked to hardware to control how much natural gas is used by (so far) 16 customers signed up for the service. Supposedly it will work out bottlenecks in delivering natgas to customers–somehow reducing the amount of gas used overall. And that’s where our understanding falls down. How can you use software to use less gas–unless you are forcing someone’s thermostat to be turned down? We don’t get it. But supposedly this is the latest and greatest in technology. What did catch our attention in the article was a short passage about the coming electricity shortage NY faces because we lack natural gas pipeline infrastructure to fire gas generating plants. Specifically, New York and Long Island will soon face massive electricity shortages–unless utilities figure out how to force customers to lower their thermostats so they can use the gas to generate electricity…
Last week we told you about the hypocrisy of PJM Interconnection–the regional transmission organization (RTO) that operates the electric grid in all or parts of 13 states and the District of Columbia, including PA, OH and WV (see 
In October the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection held a hearing on a proposed 488-megawatt natural gas-fired electric plant in Birdsboro, in Berks County, near Philadelphia (see 
Yesterday Patrick McDonnell, Secretary of the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection, went on a field trip and took a tour of the Panda Power Funds Hummel Station natural gas power plant site in Synder County. In February 2015, Panda announced a joint venture with Sunbury Generation to build a whopping 1,124-megawatt plant on the site of a recently retired coal-fired plant near Shamokin Dam in Snyder County (see 
We’re wondering if anyone else smells a tad bit of hypocrisy with this one. In March, PJM Interconnection–the regional transmission organization (RTO) that operates the electric grid in all or parts of 13 states and the District of Columbia (including PA, OH and WV), released a study saying even with fewer coal plants producing electricity, PJM’s electric supplies–using more and more natgas and renewables–will be just fine (see 
Last week’s big news that China committed to invest $83.7 billion in shale and petrochemical projects in West Virginia continues to reverberate (see 
We’re still reeling after yesterday’s announcement that China has agreed to invest $83.7 billion in the State of West Virginia–largely in shale and shale-related petrochemical projects (see