what is a new pipeline is going to be in an enviromentally sensitave area
Construction is underway on the new 515-mile Sabal Trail natural gas pipeline that will travel about 86 miles through four due east-central Alabama counties. The line will as well go through southwest Georgia and north Florida to provide natural gas to Florida Power & Light customers in southward Florida.
The bulldozers and pipage are on the basis in Tallapoosa, Chambers, Lee, and Russell counties. They are a welcome sight to local officials who see new tax revenues and picayune concern from Alabama residents.
Environmentalists, nevertheless, are continuing a so-far failed endeavor to stop the pipeline. They say it poses a threat to drinking h2o sources, environmentally sensitive wetlands and sink-pigsty prone areas, and has roused public opposition in Georgia and Florida.
The Sabal Trail pipeline is the first major addition to Alabama'due south thousands of miles of gas and oil pipelines since the leak of 330,000 gallons of gasoline from an interstate transmission line in Shelby County in early on September. That incident brought headlines and new attention to a mostly hole-and-corner arrangement that stays largely out of sight and mind.
Lawsuit Fights Pipeline
A trio of environmental groups is holding out hope that their lawsuit challenging federal regulators' approval of the project will exist successful. The arrange was filed Sept. 22 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on behalf of the Sierra Club, Flint Riverkeeper and Chattahoochee Riverkeeper. It alleges the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), in okaying the construction of the pipeline, did not fairly appraise climate impacts and alternate routes that would be less disruptive to the environment and to minority communities.
That case is being managed by GreenLaw.org, an environmental legal grouping in Atlanta. Lead attorney Steve Caley said, "Since we don't conceptualize the courtroom would set the conference schedule until 2017, nosotros are planning to motion for expedited consideration by arguing the pipeline owners are already starting to cut down trees and plow through wetlands and waterways. That work would destroy environmental areas that could non be restored, causing irreparable harm to the area."
Caley added, "That's what we are going to effort to do, but whether the court will grant us a hearing, I do non know."
The companies partnering on the Sabal Trail Manual, LLC — Spectra Energy, Duke Energy and NextEra Free energy – received a FERC certificate of public convenience and necessity in February to construct and operate the Sabal Trail interstate natural gas pipeline project. FERC issued permits in mid-Baronial that let the Regular army Corps of Engineers to discharge dredged and fill material into bodies of water such every bit wetlands. The permit requires the Sabal Trail partnership to first the environmental impact by purchasing credits from federal- and state-approved wetlands mitigation banks.
Kevin Jeselnik, staff attorney for the Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, said, "We are still fighting, but (the pipeline) has FERC approvals, land approvals, and Army Corps approval."
Jeselnik said his group charges that the Corps's environmental bear upon studies on the proposed route were "adequately superficial and did non look at the touch on on the minority citizens in southwest Georgia. We also are concerned about the location of the line and potential dangers from sinkhole-prone country."
A lawsuit filed in August by Alabama Rivers Brotherhood partner Gulf Restoration Network (GRN) and two other ecology groups failed to get an expedited hearing. Those plaintiffs decided to dismiss their example to concentrate on the current one.
"Communities in Georgia and Florida have clearly stated that they do not want this dangerous, fracked-gas pipeline polluting their h2o or their neighborhoods," said GRN's Johanna deGraffenreid. "We nerveless 25,000 signatures."
Sierra Club spokesperson Merilee Malwitz-Jipson said much of the gas transported through the new pipeline will be extracted from shale fields, specially the Marcellus shale germination in northwest Pennsylvania. The Sabal Trail, she said, "increases Florida'due south reliance on fracked natural gas and the harmful emissions that come from it."
The gas would originate from diverse sources, according to Andrea Grover, director of stakeholder outreach and a spokesperson from the Sabal Trail partnership. Grover said, "Information technology is possible gas is coming from Pennsylvania. It is estimated that the United States currently has well over 100 years supply of natural gas coming from the various basins."
Construction in Alabama
She said gas would travel from its origin – Texas, Arkansas, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and elsewhere – through the interstate pipeline system to an existing natural gas pipeline hub in Alabama's Choctaw County before being routed through an existing pipeline endemic by Transco to the Sabal Trail starting signal in Tallapoosa County, northeast of Alexander City.
"Originally, the plan was to build from the Choctaw hub to Orlando, but we found nosotros could shorten our new structure by using some of the existing Transco pipeline that runs through Tallapoosa County ," Grover said.
The project will employ 494 miles of 36-inch diameter and 21 miles of 24-inch bore carbon steel pipeline to conduct up to 1.1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day.
A large compressor station is being constructed in Tallapoosa County to pressurize the gas and provide its initial push button toward Florida. Two existing compressor stations are beingness expanded in Choctaw and Autauga counties to help handle the additional natural gas moving from southwestern Alabama toward the start of the Sabal Trail.
Customs Reaction
Few protests about construction occurred in Alabama, according to news reports and interviews with elected officials in some of the affected Alabama counties.
At a public coming together in October 2015 at Central Alabama Community College in Alexander City, merely one landowner was present to object to the pipeline crossing his property, co-ordinate to a transcript of the session. And Tallapoosa County Probate Gauge Bill English said this week that he has heard no public reaction to the pipeline proposal. "We will see some increased taxation revenue every bit a result of the construction. Information technology seems to be a good bargain to get tax benefits and a relatively pocket-sized number of jobs," English said.
Much of the Sabal Trail pipeline in Lee County will travel through Canton Commissioner Robert Hamm'southward district. The line volition cross the nearby Tallapoosa River by drilling horizontally 75 anxiety beneath the riverbed, according to Grover.
Hamm said, "Initially nosotros had concerns nearly the line's safe, but once we figured out the visitor had a practiced rubber record, we saw people wanting it to come up through their property because they were paying very well. Sabal Trail's representative did a good job of educating everybody, which helped continue incorrect rumor mills from getting started."
Spectra Energy'south safety record has been questioned by environmental groups, in particular referencing a pipeline rupture in May 2015 that lost almost four meg cubic feet of natural gas into the Arkansas River. There were no injuries, however, and the gas, from a 63-yr-sometime auxiliary pipeline, prodigal within a few days. Spectra Energy spokesperson Grover said the incident was caused past strong river currents during near flood-phase river conditions that washed away the riverbed under and over the pipe and then it had no support for one of its segments. "The backdrop of this backup pipeline and its condition prior to the incident were not a contributing factor to the upshot," she said in an email.
Spectra Free energy's website says its five-year reportable incident charge per unit is half the natural gas manufacture boilerplate, 0.fifteen incidents per one,000 miles per yr versus the manufacture average of 0.36.
The Sabal Trail pipeline could provide natural gas to nearby industry forth the route. Hamm said, "We could tap into the gas line to benefit our industrial park if we become a big amount of industry in there."
In Russell Canton, where the pipeline will cross some 30-forty feet nether the Chattahoochee River, Probate Estimate Alford Harden said, "We haven't heard the outset peep out of anybody about this project. The pipeline company fabricated ii or three presentations, simply nothing came up from whatsoever landowners or residents."
Sabal Trail partners will pay significant ad valorum taxes annually to the counties it traverses. Grover said the estimated payments each year volition amount to $i.1 million to Tallapoosa County, $620,000 to Chambers County, $885,000 to Lee County, and $667,000 to Russell County.
According to Grover, the economic benefits to Alabama during the construction stage will include 1,112 construction jobs, $37,240,486 from job creation and $49,685,416 additional funds contributed past not-directly related construction activity.
In addition, the permanent economical impact and operations in Alabama are expected to include 94 permanent jobs after construction is completed, $2,953,302 from task creation and $4,907,082 additional funds contributed by non-direct related construction activeness.
The Sabal Trail (the name references the Florida land tree, the sabal palmetto) construction is intended to exist complete in May 2017, Grover said.
Source: https://birminghamwatch.org/new-gas-pipeline-coming-to-alabama-brings-tax-revenue-environmental-questions/
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