Looks Like WNY Coal-Fired Plant Will Never Convert to Gas/Reopen
In 2013, a coal-fired electric generating plant near Buffalo, NY (in Dunkirk) was slated to be converted to burn natural gas–a win/win for everyone (see Dunkirk, NY Electric Plant Saved – Converting from Coal to NatGas). Radical environmentalists like the Sierra Club opposed it, but that’s to be expected. Everything seemed to be fine until a competitor hauled NRG, the plant’s owner, into court to dispute the change from coal to natgas. They objected to ratepayers kicking in $150 million for the project. NRG said fighting the case in court will take years, so they just closed down the plant instead (see Dunkirk, NY Coal-Fired Electric Plant Closing in January 2016). It was an economic nuclear bomb for that community. The Town of Dunkirk gets 40% of its tax revenue from that single plant! New York State “generously” shucked out $5.5 million so Dunkirk wouldn’t collapse economically. But doing that year after year will get old quick. Other communities can rightly demand state help too. But then the competitor who had objected to converting the old coal plant to natgas (with ratepayer assistance) dropped their objection, and NRG restarted the project in December 2016 (see Coal-to-Gas Plant Conversion in Western NY Back from the Dead). Once again, environmental lunatics would rather bankrupt Dunkirk than let the plant restart as a gas-fired plant. They lobbied the state Public Service Commission to block the deal. That didn’t happen, but what has happened is that because of the delays caused by NY and NRG’s competitor, NRG has to “restart” the project and along with that comes connection costs–the cost to reconnect the plant to the electricity grid. Estimated reconnect costs go as high as $115 million! The cost of “transmission upgrades” according to the NY grid operator. The cost to reconnect would be almost as much as the project cost itself, meaning there’s no way in Hades NRG will build it. So although antis couldn’t get NY to regulate the project out of existence, electric grid bureaucratic claptrap will keep it out of existence. Same result…
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The Pennsylvania House State Government Committee held a hearing yesterday on the “regulatory overreach” by the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) and Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SRBC). The big guns came out and blew multiple holes in the DRBC and SRBC. One of the big guns was PA State Rep. Jonathan Fritz, who said the DRBC has become “dangerous, unaccountable, and rogue.” Never truer words were spoken! MDN friend Tom Shepstone was there (his testimony below), as was Betty Sutliff from Upper Delaware River Basin Citizens. Marcellus Shale Coalition president Dave Spigelmyer delivered a powerful condemnation of the DRBC, calling their proposed frack ban “absurd.” Not be left out, DRBC executive director Steve Tambini (a major disappointment in that role) tried to defend the indefensible. To his credit, at least he showed up. Here’s a rundown on what happened yesterday, the castigation of the DRBC and SRBC…
The “best of the rest”–stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading: PA House postpones hearing on permit reform bill Wolf wanted, because now he doesn’t want it; Wolf aims to increase utility bills via severance tax; early impacts from Rover pipe on Michigan & Dawn Hub; soaring NGL supplies may soon overwhelm Gulf Coast fractionation capacity; environmentalists rename methane “renewable biogas” so they can support it; global LNG trade continues to grow; Germany’s wacky logic in supporting Big Solar; and more!
MDN is very excited to announce the publication of the 
It’s one thing for a landowner (or Big Green supporter, sometimes one and the same) to oppose a pipeline project by protesting, asking politicians to get involved, writing to regulatory agencies, etc. We have a great American tradition of free speech. Go for it. But it’s quite another thing to “harass, intimidate and interfere” with work crews in an area by screaming at them and shooting your “large caliber gun” near where they’re working. Columbia Gas Transmission is currently building the Mountaineer XPress Pipeline, a $2 billion, 170-mile pipeline that will flow 2.7 billion cubic feet (Bcf) per day of natural gas from existing and future points of receipt along or near the Columbia pipeline system–most of it located in West Virginia (see 
In 2013, Buckeye Brine, a relatively young Ohio-based company, added a second shale wastewater injection well in Coshocton County (see 
Events related (or of interest) to the Marcellus and Utica Shale, primarily pro-drilling events. To have your event included (or if you are aware of a worthy event you believe should be on this page), please send the details and/or a link to have it included to the calendar@marcellusdrilling.com email address.
In April 2016 MDN told you about the Guernsey Power Station–a new Utica/Marcellus natural gas-fired electric generating plant proposed for Guernsey County, OH (see 
This story stretches back four years. In November 2014, MDN told you about anti-drillers in Lebanon County, PA who had succumbed to shiny object syndrome and transferred their irrational hatred of fossil fuels from the Williams Atlantic Sunrise pipeline project to the already-in-the-ground but getting repurposed Sunoco Logistics Mariner East 1 pipeline (see