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.

Norman Bay resigns, leaving FERC without a quorum 2017-01-26

After Trump bumped LaFleur over his head today, former FERC Chairman Norman Bay resigned from the Commission this same day. That leaves FERC with only 2 out of five Commission slots occupied. I would guess that means no quorum, although what does it matter? The FERC Commissioners only ever rejected one pipeline in thirty years.

His resignation letter is a six-page pat on his own back that never once mentions solar power, eminent domain, landowners, water, river, aquifer, or environment. His biggest brag is: Continue reading

Cheryl A. LaFleur again FERC Acting Chairman 2017-01-26

President Trump just brushed aside FERC Chairman Norman Bay, one of the few FERC Commissioners to show any reservations about FERC’s rubberstamping of pipelines, and put Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur back once again as Acting Chairman. This while FERC has only three Commissions, when it’s supposed to have five, probably indicates FERC is going to be pushing ahead all pipeline projects. Of course, that’s not much different from what we’ve seen for years with Sabal Trail.

Johnathan Crawford and Jennifer A. Diouhy, Bloomberg Politics, 19 January 2017, Trump Picks LaFleur as Chairman of U.S. Energy Regulator, Sources Say, Continue reading

Walk for Water, Speak for the Springs 2017-01-28

With speakers from the far south of Florida (Tim Canova from Miami) and north (Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman) and everywhere between, you can come to Dunnellon, Florida, and walk to Rainbow Springs to hear and speak about the destruction the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline is wreaking right now less than half a mile from Dunnellon High School before it gouges under the other Withlacoochee (south) River from Marion County into Citrus County down to Crystal River, in addition to its main path down past Orlando which with Florida Southeast Connection sends bomb trucks and trains to Miami and Jacksonville.

When: 10:30 AM, Saturday, January 28, 2017

Where: 11012 Williams St, Dunnellon, FL 34432-8319

Event: facebook 11012 Williams St, Dunnellon, FL 34432-8319

Please sign Tim Canova’s peition to Continue reading

International coverage of Sabal Trail opposition and Suwannee River water protectors –The Guardian 2017-01-24

For once a news story gives the last word to local water protectors, and it plays up our land and our water.

Richard Luscombe, The Guardian, 24 January 2017, Why a protest camp in Florida is being called the next Standing Rock: At first glance the quiet town of Live Oak seems an unlikely venue for a stand against Big Energy. But in recent weeks it’s become a centre of opposition,

A north Florida river that attracted the state’s first tourists a century before Walt Disney’s famous cartoon mouse is emerging at the centre of a fight against a contentious 515-mile natural gas pipeline that many are calling America’s next Standing Rock.

One section of the so-called Sabal Trail pipeline is being laid beneath the crystal waters of the Suwannee river, whose pure mineral springs were once fabled to cure anything from marital strife to gout.

The story quotes Continue reading

Videos: NFRWSP Plan passed at joint SRWMD-SJRWMD Board Meeting 2017-01-17

Pretty full The playwright could have added a bit more suspense. After listening to almost two dozen public comments, many recommending tabling the North Florida Regional Water Supply Plan (NFRWSP) or a moratorium on new water withdrawal permits, the boards of the Suwannee River Water Management District and the St Johns River Water Management District each voted unanimously to approve.

Here are WWALS videos of each of the speakers, with a few notes, followed by video playlist of the whole thing. Continue reading

Revoke Sabal Trail Permits 2017-01-14

Water protectors encircle a sign saying “REVOKE SABAL TRAIL PERMITS” on 24th Street on Sabal Trail’s right of way leading to its Suwannee County horizontal directional drilling (HDD) site drilling under the Suwannee River and Suwannnee River State Park. So say we all.

24th Street at Sabal Trail RoW, 12:57 PM,

Photograph taken 12:57 PM, January 14, 2017 by Beth Gammie for WWALS from Southwings flight piloted by Roy Zimmer, navigated by Can Denizman. You may reuse this picture provided you cite the source: Beth Gammie for WWALS Watershed Coalition.

 -jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®

You can join this fun and work by becoming a WWALS member today!

SRWMD responds about NFRWSP; come to Alachua Tuesday 2017-01-17

SRWMD did post responses to comments from WWALS and others on the North Florida Regional Water Supply Plan (NFRWSP). A week before the planned NFRWSP adoption, same as for the agenda for the joint SRWMD-SJRWMD meeting next Tuesday in Alachua. After OSFR and WWALS posted critical blog posts, SRWMD Executive Director Noah Valenstein sent us and others an offer to meet this Friday in Live Oak to discuss. While many (including me), thanked him for his collegial offer, nobody took him up on it. See you in Alachua Tuesday (facebook event).

Below are Noah Valenstein’s letter and my response. Continue reading

North Florida Regional Water Supply Plan on agenda for joint SRWMD-SJRWMD meeting 2017-01-17

Update 2017-01-19: Videos: NFRWSP Plan passed at joint SRWMD-SJRWMD Board Meeting 2017-01-17.

Update 2017-01-12: SRWMD did post responses to comments on the NFRWSP: they posted them a week in advance of planned adoption. Come on down to Alachua Tuesday!

Next week in Alachua without further public meetings or response to those who wrote in, SRWMD and SJRWMD plan to approve the North Florida Regional Water Supply Plan (NFRWSP), as the only item on the agenda.

Agenda

When: 11AM Tuesday 17 January 2017

Where: 15100 NW 142nd Terrace, Alachua, FL 32615

Event: facebook

WWALS never got a response to our letter about the NFRWSP, not about less water withdrawal, nor about better modeling and data, nor about more water retention, nor specifically about ditching the Rube Goldberg Falling Creek Aquifer Recharge Project for Dennis Price P.G.’s more cost-effective solution, nor with any mention of participation from farther afield in Florida nor in Georgia, for that matter.

The language of the memorandum accompanying the agenda is rather Orwellian:

The NFRWSP has identified sufficient sources of water to meet the needs of the environment and the projected demands through 2035.

That sounds like the environment is making projected demands. Actually, the maps in the NFRWSP are pretty clear that Jacksonville is making the most demands for water, along with other cities and corporate agriculture, and the plan would take from the environment, mostly from the Suwannee River Basin, to get that water.

Our Santa Fe River sums it up pretty well: Continue reading

Stop Sabal Trail Pipeline and Save the Floridian Aquifer on Maine radio

WWALS member Chris Mericle was on a radio show out of Maine last week, along with Shannon Larsen of AncienTrees and Bobby C. Billie of the Council of Original Miccosukee Seminole Nation Aboriginal People.

Sherri Mitchell and Rivera Sun, Love (and Revolution) Radio, 3 January 2017, Stop Sabal Trail Pipeline and Save the Floridian Aquifer, Continue reading

Solar power versus Sabal Trail –Suwannee Riverkeeper in VDT 2017-01-08

Op-ed, Valdosta Daily Times, today, January 8th 2017:

John S. Quarterman, Suwannee Riverkeeper Sabal Trail and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection assured us there would be no problems drilling a 36-inch natural gas pipeline through the fragile karst limestone under the Suwannee River in Florida, yet already Sabal Trail’s pilot hole under the Withlacoochee River in Georgia caused a frac-out of drilling mud into the river and a sinkhole.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers should halt construction and do a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement.

When I happened to fly over the Withlacoochee River frac-out, I also saw Continue reading