Fractivists Still Fighting Gas Dock Renovation

FERC denies environmentalists’ request for LNG project rehearing

Gas Dock Sunrise 3/16/15

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has denied a request for rehearing regarding the controversial liquefied natural gas export facility currently under construction at Dominion Cove Point in Lusby.

The petition for rehearing was filed by several environmentalist groups, including Earthjustice and the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, which have opposed the $3.8 billion expansion of the existing LNG import terminal. Until FERC answered the petition, the groups were not able to continue with legal action. The Natural Gas Act requires a petition and an answer to that petition before legal action can be pursued, said Jocelyn D’Ambrosio, an attorney for Earthjustice.

Which brings us to:

Environmentalists file suit in bid to block natural gas export facility on the Chesapeake Bay.

Environmental groups filed suit Thursday in a bid to block development of the East Coast's first natural gas export facility - in the Chesapeake Bay off Calvert County.
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"After months of delay, we will finally get our day in court to challenge the fundamentally flawed approval of Dominion’s climate- and community-wrecking project,” Mike Tidwell, director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, said in a statement.
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Opponents have argued that the construction of a gas liquefaction plant in Lusby could lead to a catastrophic explosion and fire that could endanger nearby residents.

They also contend that exporting gas would trigger expanded drilling for it in the Marcellus shale region, increasing air, water and climate-disrupting pollution. And they assert that the bay could be fouled by dirty wastewater from an influx of LNG tankers.

We had no significant problem with wastewater from tankers when the dock was unloading 5 ships a week; there's no reason to expect it to be significantly worse when the direction of natural gas flow is in the other direction. Waste water from ships is carefully controlled, and due to invasive species considerations, water in the bilges is exchanged out in the ocean before entering the bay.

The whole effort is really aimed at "climate change."  They really want to shut down drilling, fracking, and fossil fuel use in general in hopes of getting back to the glory days of the medieval times when mankind relied on slaves, wind and water to do the heavy lifting.

Fractivists threaten the poor

Anti-fracking crusaders claim they fight for minorities and the poor. They clearly do the opposite.

On the legislature's last day of the 2015 session, Coloradans Against Fracking set up a mock classroom on the Capitol steps and placed dunce caps on figures portraying Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper and the legislature. Each was given an "F" in "preventing harm to health and property caused by the Colorado oil and gas industry." Hickenlooper has protected fracking because people in this state need jobs.

The Colorado Progressive Coalition chimed in with executive director Mike Roque instantly playing the race card.

"The State Legislature and Governor Hickenlooper have allowed gas & oil companies to continue to pollute and endanger the residents of low-income communities of color through continued fracking in northern Colorado and northeast Denver," said Roque.

If these protesters cared about "low income communities of color," they would defend a fracking revolution that has done more than any government program to help them. There is nothing like a $500-a-day job — entry-level fracking work — to dramatically improve the status of a low-income household.

All over Colorado and other energy states, fracking has put low-skilled workers into wage brackets traditionally reserved for college graduates. In North Dakota, where the fracking frenzy began, per-capita incomes jumped by 31 percent to $57,367 between 2008 and 2012.
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As for health and safety, the anti-energy crowd can win no prize. As the activist thespians sat in their dunce caps, another oil train full of Bakken crude went off the rails. It was the latest in a spate of oil train mishaps that have killed, threatened, harmed or evacuated mostly low-income people who live near the tracks.

"Accidents Surge as Oil Industry Takes the Train," said the headline over a 2014 New York Times article, which appeared months before this year's series of problems.

So why do "Fractivists" hate the poor? They don't really hate them; they just don't care. If poor people's safety can be cited to justify shutting down fossil fuel development, they're all for the poor people. If controlling fossil fuel transportation, to make it more expensive, and less reliable endangers poor people, well, that's just too damn bad.

Incidentally, all indications are that Dominion is expecting to be able to make the changes needed to export natural gas at the Gas Dock; massive amounts of infrastructure are being constructed as we speak, employing thousands of workers.