Category Archives: Aquifer

The Floridan Aquifer is our main drinking water source under our entire WWALS watershed, east to south Carolina, west through Alabama to Mississippi, and under all of Florida.

WWALS at VSU Learning in Retirement 2017-08-31

Come ask Gretchen questions this Thursday morning, 10-11AM, at VSU’s Continuing Education building in midtown Valdosta.

When: 10AM to 11AM, Thursday, August 31, 2017

Where: VSU Continuing Education
903 N Patterson St, Valdosta, Georgia 31698

Event: facebook

Gretchen Quarterman, Executive Director, WWALS Watershed Coalition
Gretchen Quarterman speaking at a WWALS public meeting at VSU last spring

WWALS will be offering an interactive lecture at Valdosta State Learning in Retirement Fall Session. We will talk about the watershed of the Suwannee Basin, the Floridan Aquifer, current challenges, and how together we can make sure our water is swimmable, fishable, and drinkable.

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HPS II Phosphate Mine proposal maps

Update 2017-08-31: More maps are in Issues menu in the Phosphate Mining page.

These are from the mine permit proposal, and are thus public record.

Location map

Location map
PDF

Detail map

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This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail –Suwannee Riverkeeper in VDT 2017-08-24

Update 2017-08-29: Fourth news roundup: From pipelines to renewable energy and efficiency –Sierra Club 2017-08-29

“This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail,” Quarterman said, on the front page of the newspaper of record in the largest city in the Suwannee Basin, the Valdosta Daily Times.

Heading downstream
We got sails no one can see.
Suwannee Riverkeeper Vessel on the Suwannee River protesting Sabal Trail 2017-01-14

As Frank Jackalone says (see below), FERC has been getting away with murder. And now maybe they can’t.

Thomas Lynn, Valdosta Daily Times, 23 August 2017, Court decision to impact Sabal Trail pipeline, Continue reading

Pipeliners spooked by Sierra Club Major Landmark Victory; could shut down Sabal Trail –industry press

Update 2017-08-29: Fourth news roundup: From pipelines to renewable energy and efficiency –Sierra Club 2017-08-29

Update 2017-08-24: Third news roundup: This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail —Suwannee Riverkeeper in VDT 2017-08-24

OilPrice.com calls it “a critical decision yesterday, that could jeopardize the future for pipeline projects across the country”; pipeline companies could be “spooked” and “…the court ruling raises the unsettling possibility that the project may be forced to shut down — after billions were spent putting it in into service.” Other stories say this ‘huge’ win could also affect the Atlantic Sunrise, Penneast, Atlantic Coast, and Rover Pipelines, among others.

Children against Sabal Trail in Juno Beach, 2016-10-14
(L to R) Lea Fox, 4, Finn Ryder Purdy, 4, and Mason Dana, 7, of Lake Worth, sit with gas pipeline protesters outside of Florida Power and Light headquarters on Universe Boulevard in Juno Beach on October 14, 2016. The Sabal Trail Pipeline began supplying FPL’s plants in June. Groups opposed the pipeline that will start in Alabama and bring fracked gas through several counties in Florida’s springs and wetlands. (Richard Graulich / The Palm Beach Post)

Sad for FPL, Duke, Spectra, and all the other pipeline-building purveyors of fracked methane, maybe, but glad for all the landowners whose land was taken, local citizens who don’t want a 500+-mile IED next to their homes, schools, and waterways, and all people who want clean sun and wind energy, not more polluting fossil fuels.

It’s good the industry press agrees with what I told the VDT: “This is wind in our sails and could be the end of Sabal Trail.”

Here’s a news roundup, in addition to Continue reading

2018 5-year update of SGRC Regional Plan Kick-off 2017-08-24

Received 21 August 2017:

Good Morning Everyone,

This email is to inform you that the Southern Georgia Regional Commission is formally kicking off its 2018 5-year update of the SGRC Regional Plan. The initial kick-off public meeting will be held during the regular SGRC Board meeting on:

Thursday, August 24, 2017
11 a.m. or soon thereafter
City of Pearson Sports Complex and Civic Center,
786 Austin Ave East, Pearson

Page 13: Conservation and Development Map
Page 13: Conservation and Development Map

The purpose of this kick-off hearing is to Continue reading

Sierra Club wins case against Sabal Trail 2017-08-22

Congratulations Sierra Club, Flint Riverkeeper, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, and witnesses, who just won their case against FERC about Sabal Trail! Florida landowner Robin Koon is called out by name in the court’s decision to vacate FERC’s order that approved Sabal Trail. Thanks to him and everyone else who for years have demanded to hold regulatory agencies accountable.

Robin Koon speaking in Tallahassee
Still from WWALS video of Robin Koon speaking in Tallahassee, 23 January 2017

The actual decision is:

The petition for review in No. 16-1329 is granted. The orders under review are vacated and remanded to FERC for the preparation of an environmental impact statement that is consistent with this opinion. The petition for review in No. 16-1387 is denied.

So ordered.

I am not an attorney, but if I’m reading that right, the court just vacated FERC’s February 2016 Order that approved the Sabal Trail pipeline. Continue reading

The handwriting on the wall for Plant Vogtle: electric cars and South Carolina cancels its nuclear project –WWALS to GA-PSC

Sent in PDF via email today.


August 2, 2017

To: Georgia Public Service Commission
244 Washington Street, SW
Atlanta, GA 30334-9052

gapsc@psc.state.ga.us

Re: Electric cars and solar power are here now; South Carolina cancels its nuclear project

Dear Public Service Commissioners and Staff,

Since my letter of July 23, 2017, asking you to stop cost overruns for Plant Vogtle and to require Georgia Power again to buy more solar power,1 there have been major developments that further indicate the desirability of these actions.

Tesla is now shipping its Model 3, which many consider the Model T of the electric car industry, affordable not just to executives, but to the masses. New York City changed in thirteen years from all but one horse-drawn carriages to all but one automobiles in its Easter Parade: 1900 to 1913,2 and not much longer for the rest of the country, after the Ford Model T shipped in 1908.

We’re well past 1900 in the electric vehicle revolution, and that is a rapidly growing market for solar panels on business and house roofs.

In The Hill yesterday:3

South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. (SCE&G) and state-run Santee Cooper both said Monday they would suspend their plan to build two nuclear reactors at the V.C. Summer power plant northwest of Columbia.

The companies cited Continue reading

Sabal Trail leak at Dunnellon City Council 2017-07-24

The Dunnellon City Council and staff also seemed to want to know what was going on with the powerful natural gas smell at the Dunnellon Compressor Station site.

Two Withlacoochee Rivers --John S. Quarterman

As promised, I sent questions to FERC, USACE, FDEP, etc.. Here is video of what Suwannee Riverkeeper asked the Dunnellon City Council: Continue reading

Stop failed Big Bet on nuclear Plant Vogtle and go solar: WWALS to GA-PSC

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Hahira, Georgia, July 27, 2017 — On Monday, WWALS Watershed Coalition asked the Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) to take Southern Company (SO) CEO Tom Fanning up on his suggestion that the PSC could affect the SO board’s August self-imposed deadline about the two new nuclear units at Plant Vogtle: to go ahead despite the bankruptcy of Toshiba, or not. WWALS also asked the PSC, like it did four years ago, to require Georgia Power to buy more solar power.

Legacy --crowd reaction

Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman wrote to Georgia PSC: “The Mississippi Public Service Commission in June refused Continue reading

19 Questions from WWALS about Leak at Sabal Trail Dunnellon Compressor Station Site

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Dunnellon, Florida, July 27, 2017 — Following up member reports of a very strong smell of natural gas on Florida 200 next to the site of Sabal Trail’s planned Dunnellon Compressor Station, which apparently was leaking, Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman and several WWALS members took pictures of the site and related locations from the ground and from the air. Today Suwannee Riverkeeper sent nineteen questions to the agencies that permitted the Sabal Trail natural gas pipeline, all of whom assured us that pipeline would be safe, even though it appears it developed a leak less than a week after saying it had gone into service. These questions range from what did Sabal Trail report to the agencies to who asked for the smell to be put into the gas to what were the local counties and cities or the public told?

Tree berm

While this apparent leak was in Florida, Continue reading