Huge Sinkhole Forms Near ME2 Pipe in Delaware County, PA

Our lead story yesterday was the rumor there has been another sinkhole open up in Delaware County, PA near an existing (old) pipeline temporarily being used as part of the Mariner East 2 (ME2) NGL pipeline system (see PUC Investigates ME2 Bypass Pipe in Delaware Co. for New Sinkhole). Indeed there was. Officials report a 12 foot by 12 foot sinkhole in the right-of-way for several Sunoco-owned pipelines. The good news is that no bare pipe was exposed, the hole has already been filled, and ethane/propane continue to flow through ME2.
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Yesterday the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) voted 5-0 to deny Sunoco Logistics Partners permission to restart construction of Mariner East 2 pipeline in West Whiteland Township in Chester County. Why? Because construction at that location (Shoen Road), along with three other locations, is currently under review in Commonwealth Court. In other words, for the time being (until the court rules), the PUC’s hands are tied.
Last we had heard, the official word coming from Equitrans, builder of the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), is that the project will be done and online by the end of this year. However, a partner in the project, NextEra Energy, is now saying otherwise.
A group of four Democrat Pennsylvania State Senators and one RINO, all from the Philadelphia region, have requested the Senate committee that will hold a hearing on reconfirming state Dept. of Environmental Protection Secretary Patrick McDonnell to a second term, be put on hold. The gang of five are fighting the completion of the Mariner East 2 pipeline project and believe McDonnell improperly approved and has covered up problems with the project. Don’t you love it when Dems turn on their own?
Good news for residents and politicians in Westchester County, NY! (Yes, we’re being facetious.) Consolidated Edison, the local electric and gas utility for parts of New York City and its suburbs, says they’ve cut a deal with Tennessee Gas Pipeline (TGP) to get more gas supplies flowing to Westchester County (northern suburb of NYC) and they will potentially lift their moratorium on new natgas customer hookups…four years from now in 2023.
Andrew Cuomo, the man-child who governs New York State like it’s a third world, tinpot dictatorship (it’s rapidly becoming as poor as a third world country), says NY is going to sue President Trump over his recently signed Executive Order that will make it harder for states like NY to reject pipelines for purely political reasons (see 
In March a group of Pennsylvania landowners from Lancaster County asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case in which they say they’ve been screwed over by Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline, that the pipeline should not have had the right to use eminent domain to build the pipeline before the matter of compensation was fully adjudicated (see
Middletown, NJ officials recently passed, unanimously, a resolution opposing the proposed construction of the Northeast Supply Enhancement (NESE) pipeline, part of the Transco pipeline system. There are a number of components to NESE, but the key component, the heart of the project, is a new 23-mile pipeline from the shore of New Jersey into (on the bottom of) the Raritan Bay–running parallel to the existing Transco pipeline–before connecting to the Transco offshore. Comments by Middletown Mayor Tony Perry are instructive and provide us with a teachable moment.
Are underground shale wastewater pipelines the “next big thing” for the Pennsylvania midstream (i.e. pipeline) industry? According to Thomas Karam, CEO of Equitrans Midstream Corp. (formerly EQT Midstream), they just may be. Most of Equitrans’ pipeline business is flowing natural gas. A little bit of their business is dedicated to flowing wastewater. Karam wants to grow that little bit into a much bigger bit.
Williams is planning to build two new compressor stations in eastern Pennsylvania as part of its Leidy South Project (see
Since January 20, all of Sunoco Logistics’ Mariner East 1 (ME1) pipeline has been shut down on the orders of the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (see
This stuff continues to make us angry. In March we told you that MacAllister Machinery Co. Inc. of Michigan used lawyers to serve landowners in Lancaster County, PA with “mechanic’s liens” making the landowners liable to pay money to MacAllister for work done on the Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline project (see