Dominion Energy | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Nelson County | Pipelines | Virginia
Court Victory for Atlantic Coast Pipe Against Nelson County, VA
The 600-mile Dominion Energy Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) project has completed about 35 miles of the project and that’s it. Why? Lawsuits, brought by Big Green groups. The biggest challenge the project faces is a lawsuit that ruled ACP could not cross under the Appalachian Trail. Dominion appealed the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court where it now sits. By all accounts, the recent oral arguments before the Supremes went well for ACP (see Atlantic Coast Pipeline had Very Good Day in US Supreme Court). Although the Supreme Court case is the biggest obstacle, there are other, smaller cases ACP still must overcome.
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Last week MDN brought you news (from the Associated Press) that Cabot Oil & Gas had “abandoned” negotiations to settle a lawsuit they brought against attorneys who had sued Cabot for something already settled in a previous lawsuit (see 
In April 2017 Dimock Township (Susquehanna County, PA) resident Ray Kemble and lawyers from two different law firms filed a new lawsuit against Cabot Oil & Gas over claims of contaminated water from local fracking. Thing is, those claims were settled by Cabot with Kemble years earlier. Cabot said this was a renewed attempt to sully its good name and reputation and countersued Kemble and his lawyers for $5 million (see 
Anti-fossil fuelers know no depths to which they won’t sink in efforts to block *any* new natural gas pipelines. Louisville Gas and Electric Company (LG&E) has state approval to build a new 12-inch, 12-mile pipeline near Louisville to supply gas to 62 homes and businesses that can’t connect to LG&E’s local natgas utility system. The local Bernheim Arboretum has resisted attempts to build across three-tenths of one percent (0.028%) of Arboretum land–along an existing cleared path where electric lines already go (see 
A kerfuffle between Gulfport Energy and Tug Hill Operating has been settled by a Texas judge. Gulfport and Tug Hill cut a deal in November 2018 for Tug Hill to purchase certain Marcellus shale assets in Ohio from Gulfport for $26 million. According to Gulfport, Tug Hill never sealed the deal and should be forced to complete it now. Tug Hill said Gulfport didn’t come through with necessary releases from third parties related to the deal, and therefore the deal is null and void. The judge agreed with Tug Hill.
While the Andrew Cuomo-corrupted New York Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) can claim a victory in stopping the much-needed Constitution Pipeline (see 
Yesterday the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) had its day in U.S. Supreme Court–and by all appearances, it was a very good day indeed. The right of the pipeline to cross the Appalachian Trail is the issue under consideration. In a case brought by environmentalist wackos, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled a permit granted by the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) is invalid because the U.S. Park Service manages the trail and according to law, USFS does not have jurisdiction over “lands” owned/managed by the Park Service. In practice such a ruling, if upheld, creates a thousand-mile long barrier across which no pipeline can cross. All of the articles we read about yesterday’s oral arguments before the Supremes indicate a likely decision in favor of the pipeline and against the wackos.
Oral arguments will be heard this morning beginning at 10 am at the U.S. Supreme Court on a case to decide whether or not the Appalachian Trail will, from now on, block all future pipelines from being installed under it. The case, U.S. Forest Service v. Cowpasture River Preservation Association, will determine whether or not Big Green wins the right to block Dominion Energy’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) project from crossing under the Appalachian Trail.
Score another victory for the Mariner East Pipeline project in southeast Pennsylvania. On Tuesday Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court ruled against Chester County Commissioners and their attempt to obtain an injunction to stop construction of the Mariner East pipeline project. The petition fought to curtail open trench construction rather than horizontal directional drilling on two easements the county gave to the pipeline. Energy Transfer/Sunoco Logistics wants to change from using underground horizontal directional drilling (HDD) to instead use conventional bore or open trench technology on those easements, which would avoid more problems with HDD already experienced during construction.
Is anyone shocked at the audacity of anti-fossil fuel groups like the Sierra Club to simply manufacture (make up, out of nothing) new “data” with wild claims of radioactivity in order to block a New York landfill from expanding to accept more PA drill cuttings from shale sites? We aren’t.
Big Green continues its fight to strip away the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) right to use tolling orders when considering requests to “rehear” decisions to approve pipelines (see 
UGI Corp. has just won a case on appeal at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit that overturns an order by a lower court ordering UGI to pay more than $380,000 combined to two sets of property owners for taking their land as part of the Sunbury Pipeline in Snyder County, PA. The landowners who sued used a so-called expert whose testimony was, according to the judges, “speculation and conjecture” and “not good science.” Therefore the lower court award was overturned.
In December 2018, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that so-called “stripper wells” (low-producing wells) can be taxed under the 2012 Act 13 law, slapped with an impact tax assessment if those wells produce more than 90 thousand cubic feet per day (Mcf/d) of gas in a single month, any month (see 
A longtime dispute between the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) and Range Resources reemerged in January when the DEP ordered Range to fix a well in Lycoming County the DEP alleges is leaking methane into the surrounding ground and water supplies. The DEP says faulty cement casing allows methane to leak. Range maintains the methane was already in the ground/water supply long before it drilled the well. Range is appealing the DEP’s order to “fix it” to a special environmental court.
The Ohio Supreme Court, on Christmas Eve, threw a lifeline to an effort to overturn an Ohio law that provides corporate welfare in the form of $1 billion of ratepayer (taxpayer) money to FirstEnergy, which recently changed its name to Energy Harbor (see