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Big Green’s Small Protest Against Enbridge Project Maple in New York

This map shows where Enbridge plans to expand gas pipeline capacity on the Algonquin pipeline. (click for larger version)

The Algonquin Gas Transmission pipeline (owned by Enbridge) transports up to 3.09 Bcf/d through 1,131 miles of pipeline. Algonquin connects to Texas Eastern Transmission (TETCO), Millennium Pipeline, and Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline and supplies New England with critically needed natural gas supplies for power generation and consumer use. As we told you in September, Enbridge is currently conducting an open season to gauge interest in expanding Algonquin’s capacity to flow more gas into New England — mainly from the Marcellus/Utica — called Project Maple (see Enbridge Open Season to Expand Algonquin Pipe in New England). Yesterday a small group of global warming nutters rallied outside the now-shuttered Indian Point nuclear plant in Buchanan to protest Project Maple.
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Traitor Con Ed Finishes $275M Power Line to Replace Peaker Plants

We are extremely unimpressed with New York City’s main utility company, Consolidated Edison. Con Ed supplies customers in all of New York City and Westchester County with electricity, and major portions (but not all) of NYC and Westchester with natural gas. The company has thrown in its lot (colluded with) New York’s far-left Democrats on a plan to kill off natural gas for its customers, believing it can eliminate some of its competitors. Con Ed is more than happy to build new projects, like a six-mile electric transmission line through Queens, and then pass the $275 million price to its customers to pay back. The new transmission line is meant to deliver enough extra electricity that Con Ed can shut down the gas-fired peaker plants it uses to help supply electricity on heavy usage days.
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Kinder Morgan Begins Work on 2 of 3 East 300 Pipeline Compressors

Kinder Morgan issued its fourth quarter 2022 update yesterday. Among the news updates, we learned that work on two of three compressor station projects along the Tennessee Gas Pipeline in Pennsylvania and New Jersey (near New York City) is now underway. There was also some big news about top management shuffles. CEO Steve Kean is retiring, setting off a game of musical chairs (or musical ladders) with existing employees moving up the ladder at the company.
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Food & Water Watch Sues FERC to Block KM Pipe Expansion to NYC

Tennessee Gas Pipeline’s (TGP) plan to flow more Marcellus gas to Westchester County, NY, and New York City, to be used for Consolidated Edison customers, is called the East 300 Upgrade Project. The East 300 project took a giant leap forward in April when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued permits that allow TGP to upgrade two existing compressor stations (in PA), and build a brand new compressor station in West Milford (Passaic County, NJ), just across the border and not far from Westchester County (see FERC Issues Compressor Permits for TGP’s East 300 Upgrade in NY, NJ). No good deed goes unpunished. The odious (and misnamed) Food & Water Watch, a far-left, very radical group, is challenging FERC’s approval of East 300 with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
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FERC Issues Compressor Permits for TGP’s East 300 Upgrade in NY, NJ

Tennessee Gas Pipeline’s (TGP) plan to flow more Marcellus gas to Westchester County, NY and New York City for Consolidated Edison customers, called the East 300 Upgrade Project, took a giant leap forward last Thursday when the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued permits that allow TGP to upgrade two existing compressor stations (in PA), and build a brand new compressor station in West Milford (Passaic County, NJ), just across the border and not far from Westchester County. This is a major victory and a sign this project will now get completed.
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NYC Pays Sky-High Gas & Electric Rates Due to No Marcellus Pipes

Consolidated Edison (Con Ed), the local gas and electric utility serving Manhattan Island and Westchester County in the New York City region, has proposed increasing electricity rates by 17.6% and natural gas rates by a stratospheric 28.1% beginning Jan. 1, 2023. Why so high for both? Lack of natural gas in the region. Why is there a lack of natural gas? Lack of pipelines from the Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale.
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TGP Pays West Milford, NJ $200K to Allow Compressor Station

In an effort to flow more Marcellus natural gas to a starving New York City, Kinder Morgan cut a deal with utility company Consolidated Edison in 2019 to provide more gas by beefing up capacity along its Tennessee Gas Pipeline (TGP) that feeds NYC, allowing Con Ed to avoid cutting customers off from natgas hookups (see Con Ed Deal May End Westchester, NY Gas Moratorium…in 2023). Part of KM’s plan to beef up TGP includes building a super-quiet, zero-emissions electric compressor station in West Milford Township in Passaic County, NJ. On Wednesday township officials approved the deal, after TGP agreed to pay $200,000.
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Tennessee Gas Pipeline Plans Compressor Stn for N. New Jersey

In March 2019 natural gas utility Consolidated Edison, which supplies Manhattan, the Bronx and most of Westchester County, slapped a moratorium on new natural gas customers from hooking up to the grid in Westchester due to lack of gas supplies (see Moratorium on New Gas Hookups in Westchester County Begins Today). In April 2019 Con Ed announced a deal with Kinder Morgan’s Tennessee Gas Pipeline (TGP) to flow more gas to Westchester (and NYC), but not until 2023 (see Con Ed Deal May End Westchester, NY Gas Moratorium…in 2023). We have more details about TGP’s plan, including a plan to construct a new compressor station in northern New Jersey. Good luck with that!
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Cuomo Now Threatening to End Con Edison’s NatGas Franchise

When bullies get away with their bullying, as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has done with natural gas utility National Grid (see Andrew “Don Corleone” Cuomo Extorts National Grid, Wins Pipe Battle), they turn around look for more “marks” to bully. That’s how bullies behave. That’s how Cuomo is behaving since his big “win” in bullying National Grid to give up on its plan to get new gas supplies via pipeline. As we told you last week, sometimes the bad guys win. This is one of those times.
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Con Ed Desperately Looking for Sites to Add CNG in Westchester County

Consolidated Edison (Con Ed), the electric and natural gas utility that services parts of New York City and to the north of NY, Westchester County, is getting desperate in their bid to locate sites where they can unload CNG (compressed natural gas) trucks into their pipeline network in Westchester County. You may recall Con Ed was the first utility to slap a moratorium on any new natgas customers from hooking up to their supply system in Westchester, back in March (see Moratorium on New Gas Hookups in Westchester County Begins Today). That moratorium remains in place–for the next four years. However, Con Ed is running low on gas for new customers approved *before* they put the moratorium in place.
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Westchester County Forms Gas Moratorium Task Force…To Do What?

Westchester Gas Moratorium Task Force

We’ve covered, extensively, the situation in Westchester County, NY (northern suburb of New York City), where Consolidated Edison has placed a moratorium on new natural gas customer hookups for the next 4+ years (see Moratorium on New Gas Hookups in Westchester County Begins Today). The moratorium has Westchester economic leaders and politicians in a panic (see Westchester County Soiling Itself re NatGas Moratorium). Said leaders and politicians have just formed a “Gas Moratorium Task Force” to search for solutions.
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Con Ed Deal May End Westchester, NY Gas Moratorium…in 2023

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.
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Cuomo’s $250M Bribe Didn’t Work, Westchester Under Gas Moratorium

On Friday MDN told you that Consolidated Edison’s deadline to apply to be added as a natural gas customer in Westchester County had arrived (see Moratorium on New Gas Hookups in Westchester County Begins Today). We also told you about a last minute “program” (i.e. bribe) of $250 million of state taxpayer money that could be used in Westchester to hopefully convince Con Ed to not go forward with their new customer moratorium. The bribe didn’t work.
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Moratorium on New Gas Hookups in Westchester County Begins Today

Today is the last day for customers who want to apply to be added to Consolidated Edison’s natural gas delivery system in Westchester County, NY to apply. There’s no guarantee if they do apply they’ll be accepted, but after today new applications to get gas service will automatically go on a waiting list. That is, the moratorium on new customers in Westchester essentially begins NOW, today–thanks to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s policies in prohibiting new natural gas pipelines.
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Westchester County Soiling Itself re NatGas Moratorium

Now that the reality has begun to sink in that there will be no magic bullet, no magic wand waved to prevent Consolidated Edison from refusing to add new customers (like hotels, apartment buildings, etc.) to its natural gas distribution system in Westchester County, NY, politicians and business leaders in the county are beginning to soil themselves. Certainly metaphorically–maybe literally.
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Westchester County Panic Continues – New Gas Requests Double

Utility company Consolidated Edison recently announced it will slap a moratorium on hooking up new customers for natural gas in Westchester County (NYC suburb) beginning March 15 (see Moratorium on New NatGas Customers Coming in NYC Area). Guess what’s happened? New applications to hook up to the gas line have doubled and there’s a virtual stampede to Con Ed’s door to file even more requests–before the March 15 deadline.
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