Lansing, MI to Build New 250 MW Gas-Fired Electric Plant
The Lansing, Michigan Board of Water & Light (BWL) announced yesterday it will build a brand new $500 million natural gas-fired power plant. The new plant will generate 250 megawatts of electricity, create 1,200 construction jobs, and go online in 2021. The plant will be located at the Erickson Power Station facility in Delta Township as part of its Lansing Energy Tomorrow plan, replacing (and retiring) BWL’s coal-fired Eckert plant at that location. Out with old, in with the new. Why report about a new gas-fired power plant in Michigan here on MDN? Because the mighty Rover Pipeline, which is due to be completed and online by the end of March 2018, terminates very close to Lansing (see the map below). While we’ve not spotted any stories indicating where the gas will come from to feed the new Lansing plant, we’d wager a lot of money that at least some–perhaps most/all–of the gas to feed the plant will come from the Utica/Marcellus, gas hitching a ride along the Rover Pipeline. The nuts from the Sierra Club are ecstatic that BWL will close the coal plant, but opposed to building a clean-burning natural gas plant. Some people are never happy…
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Last week NEXUS Pipeline notified the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) they had begun construction on the $2 billion, 255-mile interstate pipeline that will run from Ohio through Michigan and eventually to the Dawn Hub in Ontario, Canada. We purposely held off on sharing this exciting news until we could tell you where construction has begun. Each week NEXUS, like other interstate pipelines answering to FERC, provides a weekly update on construction and other project activities. We have a copy of that report (below). What does it show? Preliminary activities are taking place to move equipment, put up signage, and begin to work in “Spread 1”–meaning somewhere within Columbia, Stark, Summit, and Wayne counties in Ohio. Similar work is happening in “Spread 4”–meaning counties in Michigan. Initial site preparation is already happening at three of the four planned compressor stations. Here’s what we have been able to piece together about the initial construction work done on NEXUS…
Rover Pipeline has been served a violation from the Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality claiming the company discharged polluted water from its drilling operations into a wetland. Which may sound familiar, because Rover was cited for fouling a wetland in Ohio with 2 million gallons of drilling mud back in April (see 
The Washtenaw County (Michigan) Road Commission has written a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), requesting FERC deny a certificate to build the NEXUS Pipeline because (they claim) NEXUS has bullied them. It seems the Road Commission has been working with NEXUS over the past year to prepare for the pipeline. The Road Commission wants NEXUS to jump through all sorts of hoops, do handstands, backflips, and in general, dance to the Road Commission’s tune. And because NEXUS isn’t willing to bend all the over backwards, the Road Commission is miffed. The Road Commission is the lord of their domain, and no outsider is going to do anything without their permission. So the Road Commission has run to mommy (FERC) and started bawling that NEXUS are meanies and they won’t pick up after themselves and they’re just BULLIES. So FERC should just go ahead and shut the whole $2 billion, 255-mile interstate pipeline project down (that will run from Ohio through Michigan)–because of one whiny Road Commission in one county…
Isn’t it interesting how a small-but-mouthy group of anti-fossil fuelers can drive a media narrative? Just two days ago MDN told you about a meeting of 100 (likely far less) anti-fossil fuel protesters in Dexter Township, Michigan, who rallied to protest the impending construction of the Rover Pipeline in that area (see 
A young, brainwashed 17-year old woman was one of the headline speakers at a recent anti-Rover Pipeline rally in Michigan–apparently because she’s an Indian (i.e. Native American). However, her heritage really has nothing to do with her opposition to the Rover Pipeline. Her opposition is rooted in what we would call a break with reality–a psychosis. At a rally held in Dexter Township, MI near where Rover is scheduled to be built, the teenager said this to the “about 100” assembled: “‘We’re fighting extraction industries all across the country. It’s not just here. It’s not just Standing Rock,’ said…an Ypsilanti resident, urging other protesters to divest from fossil fuel companies and take their money out of big banks and put it in local banks and credit unions so they’re not supporting the extraction industry.” We hate to burst the young protester’s bubble, but “extraction industries” are the reason she even exists. “Extraction industries” not only provide energy (oil, gas coal), but “extraction industries” mine the metals that make up the innards of her expensive cell phone. “Extraction industries” provide the raw materials to produce plastics, which is in just about everything everyone touches these days–including the clothes on her back and the sneakers on her feet. To call for divestment, and to oppose “extraction industries” is a call to crawl back into a cave and die a very young death. It is, in a word, insane…
A liberal Democrat County from the Washtenaw County, Mich. Board of Commissioners, someone who obviously ignores the rule of law, has pledged to break the law in her misguided attempt to stop Energy Transfer’s Rover Pipeline project from coming through her county. Lib Dems often like to pick and choose which laws they will obey and which they’ll ignore, so we’re not surprised by the mouthy reaction from Commissioner Michelle Deatrick, D-Superior Township. She’s like many other radical anti-fossil fuelers. Michelle is an Al Gore fan and has apparently overdosed on trailers for Gore’s forthcoming Inconvenient Truth Part Deux fictional flick, called “Truth to Power,” because that’s the exact phase she used at a recent board meeting. Here’s what mouthy Michelle had to say…
Last week MDN brought you the news that Energy Transfer’s $3.7 billion, 711-mile Rover Pipeline needs up to 15,000 workers to build it. They currently have ~4,500 workers. And they want to complete the first stage of the pipeline by July (see 
Pssst. Hey buddy. Got a spare power plant you want to sell? Consumers Energy is Michigan’s largest utility, providing natural gas and electricity to 6.7 million of the state’s 10 million residents in all 68 Lower Peninsula counties. Consumers is canceling an existing contract with Entergy’s Palisades nuclear plant in 2018 and needs to replace the electricity they were buying from the plant. So Consumers is going shopping–for a natural gas-fired power plant that can provide up to 800 megawatts of electricity. Who wants to lay odds that whichever plant they end up buying will be supplied, at least partially, but Utica/Marcellus gas…
Sadly, it’s come down to this. Even when entering a property to cut a few trees, pipeline companies like Energy Transfer’s Rover Pipeline must now have a police escort. Rover is paying $60/hour to have Sheriff’s deputies escort tree trimming crews in Livingston County, MI, following an incident where one landowner told tree clearing workers working near (not on) his property that he was going to kill them–according to court records. Seems like a sensible precaution to have the cops handy, to keep the peace and to keep the nutters in check…
Earlier this month Rover Pipeline, a $3.7 billion, 711-mile Marcellus/Utica natural gas pipeline that will run from PA, WV and eastern OH through OH into Michigan and eventually into Canada, received its final authorization from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Friday (see 