Gov Cuomo Turns NY into Sacrifice Zone with Frack & Pipeline Bans
Yesterday API (American Petroleum Institute) New York Executive Director Karen Moreau held a conference call with reporters to discuss the importance of investing in energy infrastructure in the Empire State. By the way, API New York used to be called the API New York State Petroleum Council. Moreau spoke about Gov. Cuomo’s reckless actions in banning shale drilling, and now in preventing an important pipeline project–the Constitution–from being built. She pointed out that New Yorkers pay an average of 50% more for our electricity than residents in other states–mostly because of lack of pipelines and infrastructure in the state. When everyone thought Cuomo was about to allow fracking in select counties on a trial basis, antis called those counties “sacrifice zones.” We’re going to borrow their own language and use it against them. Gov. Cuomo has turned upstate NY into one, big economic sacrifice zone–sentencing residents to a life of poverty and enslavement. Why? To appease the people who vote him into office every four years (mostly located in New York City). A quid pro quo. Here’s an update on what Moreau said yesterday to reporters…
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In November, MDN told you about Pilgrim Pipeline Holdings, developing an East Coast pipeline to carry refined petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel, heating oil, and jet and aviation fuel northbound from Linden, New Jersey to Albany, New York (178 miles). In addition, a second Pilgrim pipeline will carry crude oil from Albany south to NJ and other locations. Two pipelines, side by side, liquids flowing through them in different directions (see 
The partners in the Constitution Pipeline, including Williams and Cabot Oil & Gas, have come roaring back against Gov. Cuomo and his pusillanimous Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) after the DEC lied last Friday in announcing they would not grant stream crossing permits for the pipeline project. Yesterday Cabot, along with Williams, issued a STRONGLY worded rebuttal that says, in part that the DEC’s “stated rationale for the denial includes flagrant misstatements and inaccurate allegations, and appears to be driven more by New York State politics than by environmental science.” Flagrant misstatements is another way of saying the DEC lied, which is exactly what we said yesterday (see 
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s action to stop progress on the Constitution Pipeline has very real, tangible negative effects on jobs in Upstate New York. This is the true story of two large regional employers in New York’s Southern Tier that would benefit from cheap, abundant, and clean-burning Marcellus Shale gas from northeastern Pennsylvania. Wait. You believed the anti’s lie that all of the gas traveling through the Constitution would be transported to other areas, with much of it exported, and would not in any way benefit local residents? Yeah, that’s a lie. Another 100% lie pedaled by irrational fossil fuel haters. As the Constitution crosses places like Broome, Chenango and Delaware counties in the Southern Tier of New York State (i.e. “Upstate”), the pipeline will be tapped in several locations by Leatherstocking Gas Co.–a small but important local utility company. Leatherstocking will then provide gas to area communities and to two large businesses. One of those businesses is the Amphenol Aerospace plant in Sidney, NY. Amphenol is the largest employer in Delaware County with some 1,100 employees. Amphenol needs cheap Marcellus Shale gas from the Constitution to stay competitive and to keep the plant open. The second business is located in the small Chenango County village of Greene–Raymond Corporation. You know those bright red-colored forklifts you see in warehouses and factories? They’re all built at Raymond, which ships them worldwide. The facility is now owned by Toyota. Raymond also needs natural gas from the Constitution Pipeline. With over 
You can’t see we didn’t predict this outcome: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has made the political decision to not grant the Constitution Pipeline stream crossing permits, temporarily stopping the project from advancing. Cuomo’s lackeys at the totally humiliated and discredited Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) made the announcement on Friday, so-called Earth Day. Virulent anti-drillers erupted in spontaneous (and multiple) orgasms at the news. The DEC claims Williams, the builder of the Constitution, did not provide detailed information about pipe burial that the DEC had requested. This is a blatant, 100% lie. Gov. Cuomo is corrupt and is being led, as our friend Tom Shepstone points out, by the nose by Rockefeller money. Prosecutor Preet Bharara–are you paying attention? MDN now calls on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to bypass New York State, as is its right under the U.S. Constitution. FERC has the power to bypass Cuomo and the DEC and authorize the pipeline without NY’s stream crossing permits. Yes, hoops will need to be jumped through with various courts, but now is the time to permanently remove NY from such decision-making. The state has proven it is incapable of making independent, science-based decisions on the topic of oil and gas drilling and pipelines. Time to overrule the state and move on. Below we have the DEC’s pathetic political cover-up, along with various responses to the news…
Talk about media bias. Yesterday over 200 people crowded into a meeting room at the Binghamton Holiday Inn for a rally supporting the Constitution Pipeline–a $683 million, 124-mile pipeline due to run from Susquehanna County, PA to Schoharie County, NY carrying Marcellus gas. The “newspaper of record” for Binghamton, the Press & Sun-Bulletin (P&SB), is so biased they didn’t run a single word covering the event in today’s edition. The P&SB’s so-called reporter who covers the drilling issue (actually an anti-drilling propagandist), Tom Wilber, apparently couldn’t be bothered to cover a major news story under his nose and part of his beat. The P&SB couldn’t even send an intern. Yes, the P&SB is completely in the anti-drilling tank and not in any way an actual news organization–they’re simply Democrat hacks towing the party line. Here’s what happened at yesterday’s meeting, from real news organizations that did show up…
Is this the smoking gun that proves collusion and corruption between Democrat New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and radical Big Green groups? In March, AG Schneiderman and a handful of other Democrat Attorneys General, along with climate huckster Al Gore, gathered in New York City to discuss a coordinated legal attack against oil and gas companies (see 
The Constitution Pipeline is a badly needed natural gas pipeline that would run ~125 miles from the gas fields of Susquehanna County, PA up into New York–all the way to Schoharie County, NY–where it would intersect with the Iroquois Pipeline and the Tennessee Gas Pipeline. The $683 million project would pump 650 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of PA shale gas to markets throughout the northeast and potentially into New England. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the project in 2014. Pennsylvania cleared the way for the pipeline in 2015. New York is holding it up–the tail wagging the dog–by not issuing stream and swamp crossing permits. We have repeatedly called on Williams, the main sponsor of the project, to take New York to court to strip them of their right to have any say in the matter since Cuomo is intentionally stopping the project for political reasons (see