chesapeake climate action network

Mountaintop removal: Groups argue its definition

In an April 27 telepresser, a number of environmental groups discussed Dominion’s alleged plans to decapitate 38 miles of ridgelines in Virginia and West Virginia to make way for the proposed Atlantic Coast Pipeline. About 5.6 of those miles are atop Roberts Mountain in Nelson County.

Moderated by the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, spokespeople from anti-pipeline groups Friends of Nelson, Appalachian Mountain Advocates and the Allegheny-Blue Ridge Alliance discussed some key points of mountaintop removal, including that the majority of the mountains in question would be flattened by 10 to 20 feet, with some places along the route requiring the removal of about 60 feet of ridgetop.

Mountaintop removal also results in an excess of material, known as overburden. In this case, Dominion would likely need to dispose of about 2.47 million cubic yards of it, according to the environmental groups.

“The information that was put out by these groups last week is just totally inaccurate,” says Dominion spokesperson Aaron Ruby. “We’re not conducting mountaintop removal. That is a total mischaracterization of how we’re building this pipeline.”

According to Ruby, Dominion will “clear and grade a relatively limited area on certain ridgelines,” so workers will have enough space to dig a 10-foot-wide trench, install the pipe and fill the trench back in.

“It is astounding that [the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission] has not required Dominion to produce a plan for dealing with the millions of cubic yards of excess [overburden],” says Ben Luckett, a staff attorney at Appalachian Mountain Advocates. FERC will eventually approve or deny the project.

But Ruby says that claim from Luckett isn’t true, either. “We are required by federal regulations to fully restore those ridgelines to their original contours using the native material that is either graded or excavated. …For these groups to say we’re going to level the tops of mountains and remove 250,000 dump truck loads of material is completely inaccurate.”

Approximately two miles of ridgeline are proposed to be removed (and replaced) in western Highland County in the George Washington National Forest. According to Rick Webb, the program coordinator for the Dominion Pipeline Monitoring Coalition, drainage from a mountain there named Big Ridge will affect two of the state’s remaining native brook trout streams, Townsend Draft and Erwin Draft.

“The Atlantic Coast Pipeline could easily prove itself deadly,” says Joyce Burton, a board member of Friends of Nelson. “Many of the slopes along the right of way are significantly steeper than a black diamond ski slope. Both FERC and Dominion concede that constructing pipelines on these steep slopes can increase the potential for landslides, yet they still have not demonstrated how they propose to protect us from this risk. With all of this, it is clear that the pipeline is a recipe for disaster.”

Ruby says his company has extensively studied all of the steep slopes they will encounter while installing the ACP and have developed a best-in-class program for construction on those areas that goes beyond federal regulations and has been thoroughly evaluated by FERC, which confirmed its effectiveness.

“My company has built over 2,000 miles of underground pipeline through West Virginia and Western Pennsylvania,” he says. “How many pipelines has the Chesapeake Climate Action Network built?”

Updated May 3 at 4pm to correct a misquote.

Bipartisan issue: Survey says majority of Virginians oppose pipelines

Though Dominion Virginia Power announced last week the hiring of a contractor to build the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, efforts to halt its construction, and that of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, have not ceased.

A new survey released September 21 by two anti-pipeline groups, the Chesapeake Climate Action Network and Virginia Organizing, shows that 55 percent of Virginians do not back Governor Terry McAuliffe’s support of the two pipelines, despite his belief they will create jobs, lower bills and help the environment.

The Cromer Group, a public opinion research group, interviewed 732 of the state’s registered voters for the survey.

The environmental groups note that 60 percent of female Republicans and 52 percent of female Democrats say McAuliffe has missed the mark.

Caroline Bray, a 20-year-old third-year student at UVA and the president of the university’s Climate Action Society, falls on the far left of that spectrum, she says. But she’s not sure it matters in this case.

Caroline pipeline-BL — Caroline Bray, a 20-year-old third-year student at UVA and the president of the university’s Climate Action Society, says the fight against the pipeline isn’t a partisan issue. Courtesy Caroline Bray

“One thing I’ve learned from traveling through the counties that the pipelines are supposed to cut across is that pipelines are not a partisan issue,” she says, adding that those bearing the brunt of the proposed pipelines live in rural, historically conservative areas. “They fight against them as hard as, if not more than, many liberals.”

A typical conservative pipeline opposer, she says, takes the stance that the proposed pipelines would infringe on their property rights, while liberals worry more about environmental concerns.

And one of those most recent concerns is the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s newly released Mountain Valley Pipeline environmental impact statement, which determines that any negative ecological effects associated with it are “limited.”

“Having crossed through the countryside that the Mountain Valley Pipeline is supposed to traverse,” Bray says, “I find it shocking.”

This spring, she hit the road with the Virginia Student Environmental Coalition to travel the MVP’s proposed path from Wetzel County, West Virginia, to Blacksburg, stopping along the way to speak with people who would be impacted by its presence.

“This land is unprecedented for a 42-inch pipeline,” she says. Much of the area’s mountainous topography has a karst landscape that is conducive to sinkholes and erosion, and West Virginia’s Monroe County has more than 100 natural water springs, she says. “If the rocks below these springs are shifted by the pipeline, the source of drinking water for an entire community and wildlife down the watershed could be permanently threatened.”

She also mentions a Monroe family she met that has lived on their property for more than eight generations, since before the Declaration of Independence was signed.

“Their land is sacred to them, and altering it with this pipeline is unjust in every way,” Bray says.

Also making headlines in the realm of Virginia pipelines has been McAuliffe’s insistence that governance over those entities is strictly a federal issue and the state has no authority.

“He seems both confused and forgetful,” says the Dominion Pipeline Monitoring Coalition’s Rick Webb, who notes that McAuliffe has said the state will grant the natural gas pipelines their water permits, which are required, under the Clean Water Act if the companies backing them meet the statutory requirements.

On McAuliffe’s September 22 visit to Charlottesville, he was greeted outside Democratic campaign headquarters on the Downtown Mall by a group of sign-waving pipeline protesters who demanded he take action.

He told a Newsplex reporter that he has no say in the matter, but he supports the group’s right to protest.

“This is democracy, this is what America is all about,” he said. “You’ve got 10, 15 folks protesting, but remember, I’m the governor of 8.5 million people.”

In other news, the results of a study commissioned by the Southern Environmental Law Center and Appalachian Mountain Advocates released September 12 say the anticipated natural gas supply will meet the maximum demand from next year until 2030 without building a new pipeline.

“It’s an issue of competitive advantage rather than public need,” Webb says. “It’s mostly about Dominion seeking to displace Williams Transco as the major natural gas supply for the Southeast, while passing the cost of doing so along to its captive ratepayers.”

Dominion spokesperson Aaron Ruby says the report is full of flawed assumptions and misleading data.

“It’s an anti-pipeline report paid for by anti-pipeline groups, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone what it says,” he says. “The fact is, demand for natural gas in Virginia and North Carolina is growing significantly.”

Demand will grow by 165 percent over the next 20 years, he says, because coal is being replaced with cleaner-burning natural gas. And not only are new industries increasingly relying on natural gas, but the population itself is growing.

“There is no way existing pipelines or gas storage can meet that huge growth in demand,” Ruby says. “Existing pipelines in the region are constrained and operating at full capacity. Even planned expansions of those pipelines are fully subscribed.”

In Hampton Roads, he says pipelines are so constrained that the natural gas service is “curtailed” for large industrial customers during high-demand periods in the winter. In North Carolina, he adds, one pipeline serves the entire state, and because it’s located in the western half, entire communities in eastern North Carolina have limited to no access to the supply.

“The region’s existing pipelines cannot address these challenges,” says Ruby. “New infrastructure is required. That’s why we’re proposing to build the Atlantic Coast Pipeline.”