PA Town Loses Appeal to Block ME2 Pipe with Local Zoning Ordinance
Yesterday MDN brought you news that Uwchlan Township (Chester County, PA) has filed a lawsuit in an attempt to stop construction of the Mariner East 2 Pipeline (ME2) through portions of the town, claiming the pipeline violates a town ordinance for “setbacks”–how far the pipeline is located from buildings and other structures (see PA Town Sues Sunoco for ME2 Pipe Construction “Too Close” to Homes). As we said yesterday, while residents in Uwchlan may have legitimate concerns, they are trying to handle those concerns illegitimately–by claiming local ordinances have power over state regulations. It’s the other way around. State regulations trump local ordinances in cases like ME2. Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court agrees. Uwchlan isn’t the only town to try this approach. Two towns away in Chester County is West Goshen. We won’t bore you with the details, but suffice it to say West Goshen has tried a number of regulatory and legal actions to block ME2 in the town. One of those actions was a lawsuit brought by the anti-drilling, anti-pipeline THE Delaware Riverkeeper (Maya van Rossum). Riverkeeper, on behalf of a couple of town residents, took Sunoco to court to block ME2 on the basis that it violates a local zoning ordinance. Yesterday Commonwealth Court rejected that claim and reaffirmed what everyone (who knows and obeys the rule of law) knows: State regulations trump local ordinances. The misguided officials in Uwchlan have said they “will evaluate [their] enforcement action in coming days, in light of the Commonwealth Court ruling.” Indeed. If Uwchlan pushes forward with their case, it will be to certain defeat–a total waste of taxpayer money…
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The Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) is actively working on new regulations “regarding storage, recycling, treatment, processing, and disposal of brine and other waste substances.” That is, for wastewater treatment and disposal from the oil and gas industry. It’s taking the ODNR a while to hash out the new regs (they were instructed to do so back in 2014). However, in the meantime, ODNR issues special orders/permits on a case by case basis to allow wastewater treatment and disposal facilities to start up and operate. Hoping to shut down all drilling (in Ohio and other states that send wastewater to Ohio), the odious Food and Water Watch and misnamed FreshWater Accountability Project sued in the Tenth District Court of Appeals, arguing that because ODNR hasn’t released the new regs, they shouldn’t be allowed to keep issuing temporary/special permits. The Tenth District said the radical enviro groups didn’t have standing to file the case and dismissed it. On appeal to the State Supreme Court, the Supremes said the same thing. Therefore, ODNR’s authority to continue granting temporary/special permits for wastewater treatment remains in effect. Another huge loss for Food and Water Watch…
This simply must stop. We MUST begin to countersue (monthly/weekly/daily if necessary) the Big Green radical groups that continue to bring a flood of lawsuits against legally permitted pipeline projects. We must! It is the only way to even the playing field. Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP)–a $3.5 billion, 301-mile pipeline that will run from Wetzel County, WV to the Transco Pipeline in Pittsylvania County, VA–is one of the targets of Big Green. MVP has had so many lawsuits filed against it, we can’t keep track of them all. Two recent examples. (1) Five radical green groups, including the Sierra Club, Appalachian Voices, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, West Virginia Rivers Coalition, and Wild Virginia, sued the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in federal court in early January over FERC’s approval of the project (see 
Something momentous has just happened. The loons at the Sierra Club, who once loved natural gas until they began irrationally hating it, have just admitted to the world that burning natural gas to produce electricity is A.O.K. with them. Brunner Island Power Plant is located in York County, PA, straddling Lancaster County. It is a huge, 1,490 megawatt coal-fired electric generating plant, and has been the target of environmentalists for years. In February 2017, MDN told you that the new owner of the plant is investing $100 million to retrofit the plant so it can, at least part of the time, burn Marcellus Shale gas (see 
MDN told you last week that anti officials who lead the City of Green, OH (Summit County), had finally faced the reality that NEXUS Pipeline–a $2 billion, 255-mile interstate pipeline that will run from Ohio through Michigan and eventually to the Dawn Hub in Ontario, Canada–will come through their vicinity (see 
Kentucky antis have gone to court to try and block a plan by Kinder Morgan to convert a portion of the Tennessee Gas Pipeline that flows natural gas from the Gulf Coast to the northeast, to reverse the pipeline and flow natural gas liquids from the Marcellus/Utica region to the Gulf. Part of the 964-mile project runs through Kentucky (see 
It’s about time! The gloves need to come off and our side (pro-fossil fuel) needs to aggressively launch lawsuits against the lawyers and groups who continue to launch a barrage of frivolous lawsuits against us, trying to shut down all fossil fuel companies (but not before they empty fossil fuel company coffers). Exxon is fighting back. The gloves are off. It’s time to talk about Fight Club–out in the open. We have, from time to time, chronicled the lawsuits launched by New York State’s out-of-control Attorney General, Eric Schneiderman. Schneiderman, Massachusetts AG Maura Healey and other lefty Dems formed an unethical secrecy pact in their campaign to shake down Exxon Mobil by claiming the company “knew” man-made global warming exists and that burning the nasty fossil fuels the company produces contributes to it (see 
Contrary to stories begin spun by anti-fossil fuel groups, Williams has not given up the fight to build the Constitution Pipeline–a $683 million, 124-mile pipeline from Susquehanna County, PA to Schoharie County, NY to move Marcellus gas into New York State and from there, into New England. The pipeline faces stiff odds. In 2016, the Andrew Cuomo-corrupted NY Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) abrogated their fiduciary duty by denying the project a federal stream crossing permit (see 
Last week National Fuel Gas Company (NFG), headquartered in Western New York State which operates drilling subsidiary Seneca Resources and pipeline subsidiary Empire Pipeline, issued its first quarter 2018 (everyone else’s fourth quarter 2017) update. Via Seneca Resources, NFG drills wells in northcentral and northwestern PA. Via Empire Pipeline, they build and maintain hundreds of miles of pipelines. NFG wants to add to their pipeline portfolio by building the Northern Access Pipeline–a $455 million project with 97 miles of new pipeline along a power line corridor from northwestern PA up to Erie County, NY. Northern Access would allow Seneca to drill new wells in an area currently pipeline “constrained.” However, Northern Access construction has been blocked by the corrupt NY Dept. of Environmental Conservation (see 
Ever hear of “title washing?” MDN alerted readers about this funny sounding practice that has to do with mineral rights in Pennsylvania, with possible implications for landowners and drillers, back in 2016 (see 
As we told you last week, Monday (Feb. 5) was the final day for landowners who live along the path of the PennEast Pipeline to accept an offer from PennEast to lease their land for the pipeline (see 
A construction company based in North Dakota, Bilfinger Westcon, has filed several lawsuits against MarkWest Energy (now owned by Marathon Petroleum) claiming MarkWest has failed to pay more than $40 million for work done on a number of projects. Bilfinger Westcon says MarkWest used a “time & materials cap” scheme to cap the amount of money they paid for various projects, but then slipped in last-minute change orders. Essentially, it was a way of getting more work for free–that’s the charge being made. Bilfinger says MarkWest was getting ready to sell itself to Marathon and wanted to rush to complete several projects and using time & materials cap was how they did it without breaking the bank. We have to say this is the first time we’ve heard or read anything negative about MarkWest’s business practices. We suspect there’s another side to this story, but MarkWest says they won’t comment on pending litigation. Here’s the Bilfinger Westcon side of the story…
In the end, it came to down to cold, hard cash. Last May, MDN told you about antis running the City of Green, Ohio who were/are hellbent on stopping the NEXUS Pipeline (see 
As we told you last week, today (Monday, Feb. 5) is the final day for landowners who live along the path of the PennEast Pipeline to accept an offer from PennEast to lease their land for the pipeline (see