Clearfield County Still Looking for Way to Stop Injection Well
It’s been seven long years since Windfall Oil and Gas first floated a plan to drill a shale wastewater injection well near Dubois, in Brady Township (Clearfield County), PA. After all that time, the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) finally approved the project in March of this year (see PA DEP Approves Wastewater Injection Well in Clearfield Count). Residents who live near the proposed injection well have opposed the plan from the beginning. The Clearfield County Board of Commissioners is also opposed. In April, several residents filed an appeal of the DEP decision to approve the project to the Environmental Hearing Board, a special court set up to hear appeals of DEP decisions (see Clearfield County, PA Residents to Appeal Injection Well Approval). The appeal may take up to two years. In the meantime, the well is likely to get built anyway. Recognizing the well is coming, Clearfield Commissioners held a public hearing yesterday to strategize how they might still block the project, and barring that, how they will live with it if the project becomes reality…
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It’s about time! One of the favorite tactics of antis to fall back on when they don’t win in court is to simply take the law into their own hands (i.e. anarchy). If the courts or a regulatory body (like FERC, or the PA DEP) refuse to stop a critical energy infrastructure project, like a pipeline, antis take it upon themselves to trespass, illegally, in an attempt to block work on the project. They call it “free speech.” It’s nothing of the sort. To trespass is, by definition, breaking the law. Antis know this. However, such a violation of the law is currently only a misdemeanor–a lessor penalty. The PA Senate has just approved a bill that would make infrastructure trespass for pipelines and other key energy infrastructure a felony, giving antis more incentive to behave themselves. Most Republican Senators (except a few Philly RINOs) voted for the bill. Most Democrat Senators (who prefer to be lawless), voted against it. We can only hope the bill gets adopted–it now goes to the House–although with Wolf as governor, we’re not confident it will get signed into law…
Last week MDN told you that the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals had invalidated (vacated) a permit issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that allows Dominion Energy’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) to accidentally kill a few bats and bumble bees (classified as endangered) as it builds the massive $6.5 billion, 600-mile project from West Virginia to North Carolina (see 
On average, New York residents pay 44% more for electricity than neighboring states, like Pennsylvania. In January of this year, New Yorkers (and NY utility companies) were briefly forced to pay a record high of $140.25 per thousand cubic feet (Mcf) for natural gas, as opposed to what everyone else was paying (an average of $3.08/Mcf)–which is 46 times as much! Both stats are rooted in the same issue: NY pays WAY MORE for energy than it has to, because Andrew Cuomo is blocking natural gas pipelines into the state from PA. So says a new report titled “Pipelines and their Benefits to New York” (full copy below). The report, published by the Consumer Energy Alliance, examines the benefits of pipelines to New York, highlighting the need for affordable energy supplies to keep the daily lives of families and businesses across New York moving. Without those pipelines, we’re toast. You can’t build windmills and solar farms fast enough to meet the growing demand for electricity–and natgas. Cuomo’s dysfunctional energy policies are blocking all New Yorkers, upstate and downstate, from living even moderately prosperous lives…
Lately we’ve wondered what’s been going on in the years-long struggle by Crestwood to create an LPG (liquefied petroleum gas, or propane) storage facility in a depleted salt cavern along the shoreline of Seneca Lake in the Finger Lakes region of Upstate New York. Last December we brought you the news that Crestwood had won a victory when a chief administrative law judge, part of the state Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC), ruled against antis who are demanding ongoing, never-ending hearings about the project–a transparent tactic to continue the years-long delay in perpetuity (see 
Has someone “gotten” to FERC Commissioners Cheryl LaFleur and Richard Glick–told them, “You vote against these pipeline projects or you don’t have a future in the Democrat Party”? That’s the thought we increasingly have as we watch the two sitting Democrats on FERC repeatedly vote against projects that in some cases they previously voted to approve. What makes someone like LaFleur flip and change her vote on something that two years ago she was 100% on board with? Something has to explain it! Two and a half years ago LaFleur, then a member of FERC, voted to approve Dominion Energy’s $165 million New Market Project, a project that expands Dominion’s transmission pipeline from western New York across the state to the Capital Region of the state, near Albany (see 
Correction: PIOGA contacted MDN to let us know it is only brine from conventional (non-shale) wells that has been allowed to be spread on PA roadways–NOT brine from shale wells. Thanks to PIOGA for letting us know! We have tweaked the story below to reflect the change.
Disgusting and frustrating. That’s our reaction to a decision by the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals that invalidates (vacates) a permit issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that allows Dominion Energy’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) to accidentally kill a few bats and bumble bees (classified as endangered) as it builds the massive $6.5 billion, 600-mile project from West Virginia to North Carolina. The Sierra Club, Defenders of Wildlife and Virginia Wilderness Committee (all radical left organizations) previously sued in federal court asking the court to stop work on ACP until the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission makes a decision on whether or not to “rehear” their decision to approve the project in the first place. In March, the court declined to stop work on ACP (see 
In April MDN told you that the New York Dept. of Environment Conservation (DEC) had rejected a modest pipeline expansion proposal by Williams’ Transco Pipeline subsidiary (see 
On Tuesday, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) granted Williams’ Transco Pipeline permission to reverse the flow along part of the pipeline to begin sending more Marcellus gas south. The order allows Transco to start up modified compressor stations in Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina, and to begin flowing an extra 150 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of yummy Marcellus gas southward. Most of the time when we report on Atlantic Sunrise, we talk about the greenfield (brand new pipeline) being installed in 10 Pennsylvania counties. What’s often overlooked are other aspects of the project, like this one, that will kit out the Transco to flow 1.7 billion cubic feet per day of Marcellus gas to the south and to the Gulf Coast. The greenfield portion of the pipeline is due to be completed sometime soon–by “mid-2018.” This latest order allowing the startup of bidirectional flow along certain portions is an important part of the project…
Is there a white knight that can ride in and save the day for pipelines being blocked by radicals like Andrew Cuomo in New York State? There may just be! Last week while testifying at a House Committee on Science, Space and Technology hearing, Dept. of Energy Secretary Rick Perry said that he believes states do not have the right to block interstate pipelines. Perry stopped short of saying that President Trump would consider issuing an Executive Order to approve projects like the Constitution Pipeline and Northern Access Pipeline projects in New York. But he did appear to hint at the possibility…
Nearly a year ago MDN reported that Big Green group THE Delaware Riverkeeper (aka Maya van Rossum) and the odious Philadelphia-based Clean Air Council (CAC) had suffered a crushing legal defeat in their attempt to interfere with shale drilling on the opposite side of the state from where the Delaware River and Philly is located (see 
Last November we updated you on a lawsuit filed by a group of anti-fossil fuelers in Penn Township (Westmoreland County), PA (see 
On Friday, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued Dominion Energy permission to begin construction of the actual pipeline for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) project–in West Virginia. ACP is a (now) $6.5 billion project, up from a projected $5 billion due to delays from regulatory agencies and frivolous lawsuits filed by Big Green groups, that will run from WV through Virginia and into North Carolina–almost to the border with South Carolina. Until now FERC had allowed prep work, like tree cutting. But now actual pipeline construction can begin, which is a momentous occasion, worthy of celebration!…
In April, the Pennsylvania Joint State Government Commission released a report (full copy below) tackling the question of whether or not PA’s environmental laws and regulations are more stringent than federal requirements. The report compared the main state and federal laws in place covering clean air, clean water, natural resources, waste management and more. The report says PA’s laws, “are generally no more stringent than their federal counterparts.” But in the same paragraph, the report says, “Where additional regulations have been made, it is generally justified as a compelling and articulable Pennsylvania interest and addresses definable public health, safety or environmental risks. The area of greatest deviation involves differences between the federal Clean Water Act and the Clean Streams Law. Other more stringent regulations are found in the areas of safe drinking water, the handling of hazardous materials, and mineral extraction. In some instances, Pennsylvania regulations build upon and supplement federal law; in others, Pennsylvania has acted in areas not regulated by the federal government” (pg 6). What does that say to you? It says to us: “Heck yeah, the enviro laws in PA are a lot more strict than federal laws, but there’s good reasons (according to the authors of the report) for it.” Are there good reasons for PA raising the bar higher than the federal government requires?…